subject: Choosing The Right Car For You [print this page] I tend to harp on certain things, and one thing that I cannot seem to forget (because I am still paying for itliterally) is a purchase that I made a few years ago involving a brand new Jeep. I had just graduated from the police academy when the lease on my Jeep was up. I only had a few weeks to decide what I was going to do. Was I going to keep the Jeep (which had been purchased brand new) or was I going to trade it in and get something different? Previously, my father had bought the leased Jeep for me as a graduation gift from college, and he had warned me that once the lease was up, I was going to have to make the decision to either take over the payments or trade it back in and purchase a car on my own. It was time to grow up I guess. However, looking back to how I thought back then, this wasn't necessarily how I viewed it.
Instead, I felt rushed, and living hundreds of miles away from my family didn't help either. I brought one lackluster friend (whom I no longer speak to) with me to a few dealerships in the area, and after what I thought was a long deliberation, I hastily decided to settle on ANOTHER Jeep that I had fallen in love with. All I cared about at that point was that the salesman told me that I would be able to afford the Jeep with no money down and that the new Jeep would be better than the old one because it was newer and had a great sound system as well as the full towing package, etc. While it didn't have the sunroof that my last Jeep had, everything else seemed fine. I jumped on the opportunity. I believed that this salesman, who was a father and had a family, was actually looking out for my best interests.
So, foolishly (and much to the chagrin of my mother and brother who had tried to counsel me via phone), I purchased the Jeep. No sooner had I driven off of the parking lot of the dealership, I noticed that the air conditioning wasn't working properly. Little did I know that that summer would be the beginning of what would later translate into a lot of trips up to that Jeep dealership for maintenance issues and repairs. With the last Jeep that I had owned, I never had a problem- not even so much as a flat tire. However, with the next Jeep that I owned, you name it- and I had a problem with it. Thankfully, most of the issues were covered under the warranty. But when the price of gasoline skyrocketed that summer that I bought it and later on when I saw that the warranty was almost up and that I could no longer afford to drive the Jeep around, I sought the help of my father (once again) to get rid of the Jeep. Many headaches later, I hope that I have now learned my lesson with vehicles!
