those of you who talk with us frequently (or read my facebook status updates) probably know that kyle and i have been in the market for a new car.

kyle's poor car has been struggling lately, and we've come to the conclusion that we'd rather sell it while we can maybe get some money for it than drive it into the ground. which means, we've been car shopping!

and while we have time, so to speak, in finding a new car, we also have felt a little bit of pressure. i mean, the tires on kyle's car will need to be replaced soon, and we think the muffler might be needing some fixin' as well. if we were going to get a new car, we wanted to do it before having to dump more money into kyle's car.

it's been 3 years since i've been car shopping, and 3 years prior to that since the last time i car shopped for me. i've come to the conclusion that car shopping has gotten really tricky!

first, we've been trying to find a car that will fit our budget yet be reliable. no small feat, that's for certain, especially since we are prone to honda civic's. any reasonably priced honda civic with low miles gets snatched up before you can even call to check if it's still there! we've been trying to find a car that we can take a loan on but that won't cause to us to pay to fix it while paying to own it.

second, we would love to avoid going to a dealership, but we've recently discovered the challenges that come with buying older used cars. most banks won't finance an auto loan if the car is older than 2002 or if the loan amount is less than $7,500. you can get financing through a dealership, but dealerships tend to inflate the price of used vehicles to the point where they are out of our price range. hence lies the conundrum: how do we afford a vehicle that most banks won't finance when we can't afford to pay for the car outright?


but booyah! it appears we have dominated the used car dilemma and come out victorious!
(i say appears, because we will find the official word on monday morning)

last night while i was doing more used car research, i decided to search private party instead of dealerships. now, i've had considerable luck with my private party purchases - the 3 cars i've bought private party have been great for me, and in hindsight i've realized how trusting i was of the person selling the car.

last night i found online and called on a 1999 honda civic ex, white, automatic transmission, with only 75,000 miles on it that was right in our price range. this is basically the same car that my parents own and it has been a wonderful car for them for the last 10 years. we scheduled a time this morning to come test drive it, at 10:00 a.m. i know it's an older car, but the mileage is great, and most cars in that price range come with 95,000 - 110,000 miles, so this seemed like a great deal. plus, david (the man selling it) posted a link to his own full detailed carfax history report. it's been in 3 minor accidents, but they were all rear end accidents and he said the repairs were mostly cosmetic in nature.

we got there this morning and checked out the car. besides the low mileage, it's in *amazing* condition for a 10 year old car! it only has a few scratches on it, the interior is immaculate, and the engine runs so quiet that you hardly know it's on. he had a binder with all his maintenance and repair history receipts from a nearby honda dealership, which he showed us. considering his honesty in the vehicle's past repairs, the pre-paid for carfax report, and just the way that the couple interacted with us in general, it seemed like a wonderful deal.

and then we found out that he had someone else coming to look at it at 3:00. yikes!

as much as we loved the car, we still didn't have financing for it, and there was no way that we could come up with that amount of money overnight. so we got home at 10:45, and i started doing some searching. i was pointed towards a credit union, which would be the most likely bank to provide financing on older used cars, provided that you have good credit history. so i ended up driving around to two credit unions before i found one that would finance this car.

the lovely woman at vantage credit union told me that she'd send the application in and we'd find out on monday morning. i asked her to cross her fingers for us that the car didn't sell over the weekend, since he had someone looking at it at 3; at which point she said that she could run the application for me now and at least see if any glaring problems arose. she actually stayed to help me a half hour after the bank closed to do this! how wonderful!

and the best part? we are pre-approved!! and with the best apr that we could get on this kind of car, without a cosigner! and the monthly payments are beautifully within our price range (and actually less than i was expecting)! amazing - it's like we're becoming adults! *grin*

so giddy with excitement, i tore over to kyle's starbucks where he was working to deliver the good news. he was also really excited, so we called david back and asked if he would take a cash deposit to hold the car for us until we a. were able to bring the car in to our mechanics to check it out and b. got the final word on the financing on monday. he was very willing to hold the car for us, so i stopped by the bank and then ran back over to his house to give him the deposit! and now i'm looking at a motor vehicle bill of sale for our upcoming intended purchase.

if it all works out like we hope, we could finalize the deal on monday evening! how wonderful, and unexpected!

so that's the latest. if you are a pray-er, we'd love prayers that the financing works out, that our mechanics approve of the car, and of course that my car continues to be accommodating. *grin* and once it's all official, i'll be posting pictures of our new beauty.

yay!

literally.  i think whoever first said that was thinking about st louis when he said it, cuz it doesn't just rain here.

it's pretty rare, actually to have a day of gentle rain (in my 2 years experience of living here).  it's either sunny, or it's downpouring, complete with thunder and lightning.  st louis is actually kind of funny in that way - it's such an extreme city.  i mean, really, where else can you experience an earthquake, tornado, the worst winter in 15 years, and a hurricane (yes, hurricane gustav was still rated as a hurricane when it struck our fair city), all within one year? 

but that's besides the point.  this isn't really a blog about the weather.  it's a blog about our cat. 

our little scaredy-cat luther.  he's so funny, because he's really just a big wuss.  calvin is usually the first one to run up and check something out, and luther will hang back until he sees that calvin doesn't die.  but the first alarm after he moves up, he scampers out of the room like his tail is on fire.

and when it comes to thunderstorms, he literally crawls under the bed and refuses to get out. 

if he can't get to our bed, he will wait by our bedroom door and meow in the most pathetic sad voice a kitty has ever had.  and as he runs around trying to get to the bed, his body is low to the ground which clearly demonstrates his terror, and his tail hangs down close to his body. plus his eyes are always wide open and his pupils are super dilated. and i think it's funny.

like this:

see how calvin's tail is up in the air?  luther's tail is usually up high and proud as well in a question mark shape.  but not this morning, my dear friends.  not this morning.

look at how he's all crouched up!  poor funny kitty...

and finally.  safe haven at last.

my delight at how he acts when he is afraid concerns me.  am i going to be a horrible mother who laughs in the face of her child's fear?  or is it different when it's a cat?  

i don't know.  i just don't know.

but here's a video of luther freaking out. sorry that it's so dark, but you can usually at least make out outlines of luther.  if you turn the sound up, you can hear the thunder in the background and me laughing at him. 

*sigh*

 

there's just something about country music.