In our Dealing with Car Dealers post, I mentioned my wife and I would be venturing out into the vast expanse of car dealer lots looking for a larger, yet economical replacement to our smaller Hyundai Sonata. We succeeded! We had driven through a few lots pricing cars on the Saturday before Memorial day. We also spent some of the three day weekend researching prices online, so we knew the likely breaking point for our target vehicles. We took our strategy to task on the Tuesday after Memorial day when we visited a car dealership.

The dealership was about a 20 minute drive from our house, so on the way I coached my wife on what to expect. Do not expect to leave with a new vehicle tonight, I told her. We cannot get roped into an emotional purchase. We had our eyes on a 2006 Dodge Caravan. The price was right and the size of the vehicle would allow us to cart around the little one without too much hassle. We arrived and talked to a salesperson. In no time we were driving around a large country block, testing brakes (gently, of course) and other things like acceleration.

The van met and exceeded our expectations. We hoped to buy it without sacrificing any money each month, which meant the payments had to be in the same ballpark as the previous car. We still owed $5,500 on the old car. The dealership of course didn’t want to give us $5,500 for our old car, which meant we would have to pick up the difference. I was disappointed, but told the salesperson if that was all they could do then that was fine. We left on good terms, and with a slightly better counter offer. I told them to call me if they could do $500 better.

I received a call the next afternoon.

It wasn’t too much of a shock. I figured $500 wouldn’t keep them from selling the car to me. The biggest thing was being cool enough to walk away. Two years ago I wouldn’t have done that. I would have conceded the $500, which amounts to two months worth of payments. The deal keeps us at the same payments a month, so we’re both thrilled.

In the end, the deal came down to what we could afford in our budget and negotiating to get to that point. Of course, in the loan paperwork office they offered us a three year warranty that amounted to an extra $40 a month on the loan payment. That’s for five years. Wow. An almost $2,500 service plan on a three year old vehicle. I don’t think so. Be sure you watch what you sign up for. All in all it was a great experience, and we now have the little one to go with the van. More on that in my next post.

I was going to do a Memorial day themed post today, but decided last years about grilling at home will have to suffice. This post will deal with something very important to my family at the moment, transportation.

As most of you know, my wife is about to deliver our first child. This brought on a multitude of problems the final one being transportation. Last weekend the friendly insurance company down the street held a free child seat safety event. They helped me properly install the newly purchased child seat into my wife’s car. (Her car has four doors, unlike my two door — so hers has been deemed the baby mobile.) Afterward, I realized my 6′ 1″ frame would be hard pressed to ride around in that car — the baby seat was digging into the back of the seat and my knees brush find the dashboardirritating.

After much discussion, we agreed that her car could be traded in for an economical van. The hope was to keep her payments the same, and not stress out our finances. We hopped in the car Saturday and made rounds at car dealerships. We were pleasantly surprised to find more than a few good deals on vans with low mileage. We jotted down locations, mileage, make, model, and year, so we could research a bit at home.

The research began on KBB.com, which stands for Kelley Blue Book. It’s the end-all-be-all tome for car enthusiasts. The site relates all the information a person needs to know, including trade-in value, retail value, and private owner sale value. The difference can be a few thousand dollars on many cars. Of course, dealerships have overhead, and their markup is understandable. You know what we found? Most of the cars we took note of were priced a few hundred dollars over the KBB dealership price for an excellent condition vehicle.

Through negotiating we want to meet our financial goal, lowering their sale price closer to the private owner sale price. We can at least assume on the private owner price that the dealership would be doing fine. They would make a profit and I would walk away with a deal.

I’m bringing my secret weapon — my father. He’s the negotiator before William Shatner in his Priceline commercials. He’s hard-nosed and unrelenting in his pursuit of a deal. Me, well, I know my limits. I sometimes get sentimental about a vehicle and let that cloud my judgment. It’s best to go armed with an expert. At least I won’t go soft and take on more financial responsibility than I can handle. I’ll post in a few days regarding our negotiations and see if we can save some money off the market price.

A saver’s nightmare should be the unforeseen expenses, like faulty fuel pumps, emergency plumber visits, blown tires, and toothaches. These uncontrollable events are simply a part of life. Of course, we can do our best to prevent mechanical failure, eat less sweets, and park only in designated areas, but life is not a square box into which we fit perfectly. There’s a cousin to this type of spending, impulsivity, the greenback thief, the choked-up-emotional-needy habit that strips us of our financial security when we least expect it.

Impulsive spending hits us when we least expect it. It could be a result of any number of things, like a recent tax return that was larger than expected, a bonus at work, a large rebate, a small rebate, inheritance, settlement, or lucky scratch-off (shame on you!).

The impulsive buy rears its head while we’re out shopping  at the grocery store, clothing outlet, or roaming the mall for a birthday gift. It can attack without warning. Sometimes it’s a hunger in the belly that forces us into Cinnabon followed by a gallop to Starbucks. Other times its the vision of ourselves in a sleek leather jacket, a cotton blouse, or a ballcap from our favorite team. Without regard to budget, savings, future, or regret, we reach for our wallet and pull out clams, dough, or plastic.

A proper response to impulsive shopping should be practiced time and again.  I’ve heard of extremes, like freezing a credit card in a block of ice (it doesn’t damage the card, but keeps our paws off the thing). Our method is simple. Ask yourself a question: Do I need this right now?

At one point in my life, I could have been crowned impulsive shopping king. Those days ended when credit card bills became tomes and savings accounts dwindled. I started asking myself the question above, and I made decisions based on need, not on want. It’s such a simple thing, really.

Of course, many of us might make changes in spending habits for other reasons, like family, education, or simple lack of funds. Good luck curbing impulsive purchases. It’s a habit to break, if you want to save money.