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The Kid, the Car and the Bad Deal (tm)
Solandra
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
The setup: My stepson is freshly 18, freshly graduated from highschool, and comes from a background where welfare as a lifestyle and the occasional period in juvie or jail or prison is the rule, not the exception. His father (my husband, of course), for a variety of very good and tragically bad reasons was not a part of his life for 11 years. The Kid moved voluntarily from his hometown in California, across the country to Alabama to make a fresh start with his dad and the rest of his life. They're working through all of the problems inherent in a father/son reunion out of that kind of scenario, and the Kid is having a tough time reconciling the stories he's been told by his mother versus the very different reality of his father today.
Since he's been here, he's got a good job working construction, opened a savings account and a checking account, socked away almost a grand, and is looking at college. We don't have a lot of money, but we make what we do have count, as much as possible. Right now, the three of us are sharing one car; we get him to work, he rides home with a buddy who lives around the corner from us. We recognize that he's an adult, and the house rules are built around that; don't be a silly goose, don't come in stupidly drunk and disrupt the household, pay rent and do your share of the housework (which is mostly the dishes a few times a week, cutting the grass occasionally), be where you say you're going to be or call and let folks know so they don't worry.
The problem: So the Kid knows This Guy At Work, who has a car that he's rebuilt and wants to sell to The Kid for $2,300. TGAW has allegedly put $8K in parts into the car, has bought the title back from the Cash for Title place, and has recently purchased a new truck, which he is driving. Everybody at work has told The Kid that this is a Bad Deal. His father and I have told him that this is a fishy sort of thing, explained that with just a few more months of savings that we'll cosign for something from a reputable dealer, something that has a warranty. TGAW is telling him he can drive it for a week and get it checked out, that he'd be happy to put The Kid's name on the title, blah blah blah. The Car = Independence/ Manliness/ Adulthood - we've all been there.
The more he's told it's a bad idea, the more he talks about getting the car. There's only one person who's telling him it's a good idea is This Guy At Work, and the reaction of the people still stuck in that tiny northern California town is akin to wonder and awe.
H/A, is there any line of persuasion that might talk The Kid out of The Car, or should we even continue to try?
Since he's been here, he's got a good job working construction, opened a savings account and a checking account, socked away almost a grand, and is looking at college. We don't have a lot of money, but we make what we do have count, as much as possible. Right now, the three of us are sharing one car; we get him to work, he rides home with a buddy who lives around the corner from us. We recognize that he's an adult, and the house rules are built around that; don't be a silly goose, don't come in stupidly drunk and disrupt the household, pay rent and do your share of the housework (which is mostly the dishes a few times a week, cutting the grass occasionally), be where you say you're going to be or call and let folks know so they don't worry.
The problem: So the Kid knows This Guy At Work, who has a car that he's rebuilt and wants to sell to The Kid for $2,300. TGAW has allegedly put $8K in parts into the car, has bought the title back from the Cash for Title place, and has recently purchased a new truck, which he is driving. Everybody at work has told The Kid that this is a Bad Deal. His father and I have told him that this is a fishy sort of thing, explained that with just a few more months of savings that we'll cosign for something from a reputable dealer, something that has a warranty. TGAW is telling him he can drive it for a week and get it checked out, that he'd be happy to put The Kid's name on the title, blah blah blah. The Car = Independence/ Manliness/ Adulthood - we've all been there.
The more he's told it's a bad idea, the more he talks about getting the car. There's only one person who's telling him it's a good idea is This Guy At Work, and the reaction of the people still stuck in that tiny northern California town is akin to wonder and awe.
H/A, is there any line of persuasion that might talk The Kid out of The Car, or should we even continue to try?
Solandra on
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Get it checked out by a mechanic and if there's anything wrong with it, don't buy the car.
What sort of car are we talking about here? Get him to spend $20 or so and get a month of autocheck or carfax - if he passes on this car but continues to shop around, it will be useful. With the VIN, he can run a check to see if the car is salvaged (which, if it is a rebuild, is likely the case) or tagged with flood damage or whatever. If the seller is so confident in the car, it may make sense to put a lemon clause in the bill of sale as well.
Your family is correct to be cautious with this, but who knows, it could be legit.
Heh. In this case I really think that the only potential legal iffiness are whether The Guy At Work may have put parts in that are of questionable origin, and whether a K-9 unit would find evidence that TGAW smokes something other than menthols.
If it's some built up fast car, it's very easy to see parents telling you it's a bad deal as them trying to keep you from getting this cool fast car. Someone else that he feels has no reason at all to keep him from getting the cool new toy giving the opinion that it's a bad deal may help him out. I know when I was that age, when my parents said they didn't like some car I was looking at it made me want it more. We had a local mechanic my whole family used for years and if they told me it was a piece of crap, I believed them.
Aside from that, you may just have to let him learn the hard way. I'm sure that's very hard for parents to do. In the end, letting me screw up a bit financially did far more good for helping me learn to make good decisions than just the telling me how to make a good decision and parent enforced good decisions alone did (although without those lessons, I also think I would not have learned from the bad decisions).
It doesn't matter what the car is, nobody takes a $5+k hit for parts. Even if every last part is aftermarket, I don't believe $8k retail would drop down to $2.3. Further factoring in that we don't know what kind of car or what year, I wouldn't touch this thing with several ten-foot poles tied together.
The easiest way to alleviate the problem of him looking for this car is to take him car shopping now. Get him interested in some other deal that isn't the car from TGAW.
Does he get along with his boss/crew sup? Try to get one of the guys he respects to tell him not to buy it.
Unfortunately there's not a lot of cheap functioning cars out there these days, but dumping money into a shitbox is not the way to go.
We don't know make/model, that's information that The Kid isn't retaining (he's only seen it after work with a buddy along), but the color is currently primer grey. I think the $8K is a gross exaggeration, or may represent the lifetime of parts put into the car.
Also, TGAW's name should be on the Title when he hands it over to your kid... so if not, that would also be a red flag.
And keep in mind that a paint job on a car is going to run anywhere from $400 to $2000+ dollars, depending on how much sanding and resurfacing needs to be done and how good a job you want done. And you really want to get it painted to prevent rusting.
Once you find the make/model, do a quick google for VIN # locations. Check a handful, and see if they match. If not, you might have an issue. Mention it to the mechanic, THEN get on the (non emergency) line with the 5-0 in your area. Have them run the VIN and tell you if there's anything outstanding on the car. DMV might do this as well.
You can get a really awesome car for $2.5K or so, there's no need to buy a POS.
Also, Carfax no longer does the "month for $40" thing. You pay by the car now, sadly. Just a heads up.
I think this is kind of a right of passage for guys, buying a crappy car you swear you can fix up and keep running and then dealing with the fallout. I know I did it.
I got a car used a few months ago for 2/3 of the expected price. The car is great, my dad and I just shopped around and made some good contacts. I'm 26 just FYI.
We're generally big fans of letting him make most of the really outrageous mistakes of youth, particularly while he's living at home and starting to stretch his wings. Like all seasoned adults, there is the urge to sometimes poke him in the forehead and say "if everyone around you says it's a bad idea... maybe it's a bad idea!"
On the other hand, I've heard more than one parent say "just because all your friends are doing it doesn't mean you should..." so maybe there's a flaw in that parenting meme, too.
Have you ever restored a car? Unless youre restoring rare, classic cars, you will never, ever, ever, ever get your money back, or anything close to it.
It is not uncommon to take a hit like that, or larger, if youre going to sell a car youve been attempting to restore especially if its a relatively common car that most people have no interest in paying a premium for (like a civic).
Check the vehicles section of craigslist for about 10 minutes and look at some of the ads for older cars with a "high" price. Youll see a bunch of kids whove dumped 15k dollars into a car thats only worth 3 grand on the open market.
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- You buy the car at face value (no recourse if something goes wrong).
- If it is something serious, then he may basically lose all his money.
- The guy at his work, may well be a nice chap, but at the end of the day, he just wants to sell the thing.
Maybe help him look for alternatives?
Aside from that, you said it yourself that the car sybolises many things to him - and it's kind of a coming of age. With that comes these kinds of risks - it's part of being an adult... So long as he's aware of what they are - I'd encourage him to make the decision himself.
Frankly, he's probably a lot more likely to listen to you if you do it that way than he is if you force him into it. And if he does go with his friend's car, he's probably going to learn a life lesson at a relatively cheap cost.
Stock tires? You can get decent bridgestone 225/50/16's for like 50 bucks each. Tires are the same size all around, its AWD so theres no difference between the front tires and the rears (im assuming youre not talking about the newest skyline, because if youre dropping 100k on a car, tires are not going to be on your list of "too expensive").
Yes tires can be expensive, but if you know how to shop around (or buy online), they will not be a limiting factor for any stock (non-super) car.
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It was a GTS25T with performance wheels, and these were basic tires
if this guy has dumped "$8000" I'd guess he has fucked with the wheels
We need to know what sort of car it is, maybe someone can dig up some dirt on it to scare him off
Do all of those things. I'd also suggest he go around to a few dealerships and see if any of them would be willing to get a used car loan for him for one of their pre-owned certified cars.
It really all depends on what kind of tires you're buying. Low profile, brand name performance tires are crazy expensive, the Michelins that came with my Audi gave me some real sticker shock, so much so that I switched over to Bridgestone when I replaced them. But you can find plenty of tires from manufacturers that are way cheaper, even in the low profile performance tire range, like Falken for example. So I wouldn't worry too much about tire cost for a beater.
He considered it for an hour or so, then came back and said that considering all the feedback from everyone he's talked to about it, he's going to say no to the purchase, but the idea of driving it for a week anyway still appeals.
Thanks, all!
I know this is basically resolved but I wanted to quote this post because all you guys going "Oh the car is obviously stolen/going to blow up/a flaming metal death trap/improperly repaired" don't know about cars.
This is a common occurrence with project cars, and it is entirely possible that he thing is totally frickin' sweet and awesome. A lot of the time people fixing up something like this put all the work into the engine/tranny/etc. the stuff they really need to get it running and fun to drive first (people who build project cars out are generally concerned with performance and drivability first, aesthetics second) and then for whatever reason (unexpected kid/unexpected expenses/they get bored/just too much money spent with no return) need to sell it off for some reason before it's painted.
In addition, if the kid is at all mechanically inclined or interested in learning to fix up/maintain cars it could be a valuable investment; not to say he will EVER recoup the cost of whatever work he puts into it, but he will learn a lot about repairing his own cars, how things sound when they break, and how not to get scammed by mechanics when he is an ADULT and owns a REAL CAR. Not to mention the sense of satisfaction you get from doing your own work.
I had plenty of similar lessons not because I had a hot rod project car, but just because I was always too poor to afford something nice and ended up getting $1000 clunkers. Some of which were great by the way, you can pick up some pretty awesome late 80s BMWs, Hondas, and Toyotas for under two grand.
I am just saying, don't discount the thing just because, plenty of people will say buying a car like that is a BAD IDEA just because they don't understand the mindset of somebody who wants to tear something apart and understand how it works, or who just enjoys fixing things.