My pants still fit me from college. Well, they are sweatpants after all. They were given to me by a friend of mine who is known as a ‘Datsunaholic’. He keeps a few old cars. A few of those models have been written up by Paul Niedermeyer who now keeps a lot of houses along with his new web site. He invariably finds ‘keeper folk’ from all walks of life. But most of the people he finds are not car enthusiasts at all. Why do they ‘keep’ these cars then?  Are they perhaps hoarders? Do they suffer the afflictions of the wantless? Or is this just another write-up inspired by Kevin Bacon? (Read More…)

Mark writes

Hi,

We will be buying a new car soon and that will leave us with an extra one. My experience selling a car myself makes me think we don’t really have the motivation to do it ourselves this time around.

The car is located in CT and is a White 2007 Hyundai Sonata SE with ~73k miles on it.  The only option is the Sunroof.  For whatever reason the side mirrors seem to attract having the outer housing broken, they sre still functional but the housing rattles..  I’ve replaced one, unpainted grey , and will be replacing the other shortly.  There are no other issues with the car as I can tell.  The emissions test is due next month, so I’ll have to have that done.

Any tips?

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Have you ever been made an offer you couldn’t refuse? You never know when it might happen, so a little practice can’t hurt. Here’s the scenario: thanks to one of my old friends from New Jersey who has an amazing collection of Louisville Sluggers, 200 thousand dollars has been allocated to TTAC’s writers. $20,000 each. You’re welcome.

There is one catch.

The writers at TTAC have to buy a new car. That’s right. One new car (no BOGO free deals for a leftover Aveo). It can be anything they like. Hyundai, Toyota, Chevy… Jaguar? Fat chance! These fellows can go a little over the $20k mark on the MSRP. But the real world price before tax, title, bullshit fees etc. has to be no more than $20k.

So what car will they get? Will they follow the bleating herd of Billy Joel fans and buy something more milquetoast than a Milan? Perhaps a beige Camcord with an off-creme interior? Or maybe a Jetta that’s been as thoroughly decontented as Christina Aguilera’s last album? Or will it be something a bit more in your face? Like a… well… let me get to that later. I have to go move some mink coats. Just remember, when you’re taking favors from guys in a certain line of work, every decision has consequences…
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Have you ever seen a car truly ratted out? I’m not talking about the Oscar Madisons amongst us who leave their food wrappers in their cars til’ kingdom come. I’m talking about a real rat car. Interior seats with more thread than fabric. Transmission shifts that make the car jerk quicker than John Ashcroft at a Mardi Gras. Panels with more dents than…. you get the idea.  The owner of this Grand Prix decided to get an advanced pharmacology degree during the waning moments of ownership. He was kind enough to bring what was left of the car after his latest meeting with the local magistrate, and with $410 left on the note I could…

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Back in 2001 VW was the comeback kid . Sales had grown over seven-fold in only eight years from less than 50k in 1993 to over 350k and change. It seemed like the company was offering everything an aspiring Yuppie wanted to buy. At least here in the States. Cute Jettas and Beetles for the successful young female (and a few males). Turbochargers, stickshifts, and GTI’s for those who coveted a sport model. Diesels for the frugal and the long-term owner. Even wagons and convertibles for those who were flipping between becoming a ‘family man’ or a mid-life crisis. VW was hip and profitable… but then the market woke up.

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My memories of ‘charity cars’ are not fond ones. Back in the late 1990’s the dirtiest public auction in metro-Atlanta would line up about 50 of these vehicles for the beginning of their sale. The acrid smell of blown head gaskets and leaking oils of every type would soon emanate the auction as most of these vehicles were pushed past the block. Back then you could buy a non-running car for about $20, and a running one for no more than $250. The high bidders were usually dealers, who would then bring back the same vehicles the following week and try to sell them for huge markup’s.
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Jack Baruth thinks that any vehicle can be entertaining to drive. Well he’s never owned one of these. This 5-speed base model is a masterpiece of simplicity… and boredom. I used every trick I know to find happiness with it. Rev it in fifth. Rev it in third. Hypermile it. Even throw in a sound system to replace the chintziest radio this side of a Tercel EZ. Nothing worked. But then again this Prizm has almost nothing that can break in it either. This generation Prizm is arguably the most reliable GM model of the 1990’s (thanks Toyota!). And with only 126k miles and $1500 in the hole I can…

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When should you not buy a used car? Try right now. From mid-February thru early-June, the auto industry goes through an event called tax season. Folks receive their refund checks from the IRS, which in turn creates a nice little bubble of activity in the used car industry. Which is a good thing. Except that bubbles always have nasty repercussions down the road. (Read More…)

Sledgehammers aren’t a common mechanic’s tool. Yet there it was. In my neighbor’s hands as he sought to knock some sense into his old Saab. The trunk had leaked from day one and the wiring harness made the rear lights as helter-skelter as a Charlie Manson jailhouse flashback. The cops pulled him over for the third time in a week and as a special, “Thank you!”, to his car, he decided to give it an early Christmas present. Jersey style.
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We had to move 10 cars in 1 day. 75 miles each way. Five at the lot. Five at the auction. Atlanta was going through it’s 16th cold spell of this season and I had my wife, two seniors, and a Honda Insight enthusiast who came in all the way from Florida for a spare battery pack. Yes, I could have hired a hauler for this. But that would have cost me over $700 in the end. Doing it this way would cost less than $100 and with this being a Wednesday, it was worth the four hours. Or would it be eight?

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You have arrived. Through the sweat and brow of your efforts, you have achieved the rewards of upper middle class living. A nice job. A nice spouse. Two very quaint child like creatures, and of course… the car. A beautiful burgundy luxury car with opulent leather, elite walnut trim, a premium ‘Surround sound’ system with a quite advanced CD player, and a trademark waterfall grille on the front. In the late 1990’s your car stacks out at about $34,000 new. Fast forward 12 years, two recessions and 180k miles later, and you may be able to get a discount. How does $900 sound to you? With that in mind do you…

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Back in 2003, nearly a third of the vehicles I bought were either Volvos or Subarus. An auctioneer friend of mine described these cars as ‘wanna-be’s’. Since most of the buyers of these vehicles at his uncle’s car lot seemed to all fit the bill of an aspiring Yuppie. A lot of education. A lot of debt. Very little knowledge about cars beyond the Consumer Reports and monthly car mags. These buyers were a near nuisance in the Atlanta outskirts due to their pickiness and excessive question asking. For me though it was a different story.

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We used to call Logandale Auto Auction the red light district. In the auction business, when a red light flashes above the auction block, that means the vehicle is selling AS/IS. Once you become the high bidder, you own it. Along with any and all parts that may fall off the vehicle once it exits the auction barn. I have sold vehicles that literally gave up their last gasp right in front of the auction block, and Logandale was the absolute king of these “crap auctions”.

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