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Re: Manufacturer's Profits at Buyer's Expense

To: "Gordie's Garage" <mg_garage@ameritech.net>
Subject: Re: Manufacturer's Profits at Buyer's Expense
From: "Paul T. Root" <proot@horton.iaces.com>
Date: Fri, 6 Dec 2002 19:07:44 -0600
Ok, sorry, I'm off topic, WAY off topic. 

Ok, let's see if I can remember it. I leased it in the fall of 
'93, Labor Day to be exact. We traded it in in June of '98. It
had somewhere around 50k miles. I guess it would have needed tires
sometime in the next year. The seats were perfect, the only problem
in the interior was the arm rest pedestal was cracked. 

The ABS was perfect, the engine was perfect, the transmission was perfect.
The paint had a few scratches, like any car ever parked in a parking lot
with other cars.

After the lease was up, we took the buy option.

My point was the trade in value of the truck was bad because it didn't have
all the junk on it that made it less truck, more luxury, more passenger
car like. 

The problems were few on the thing. The ABS went out, fixed under warentee.
A/C similarly. The oil filter was horrible to access, and after a 3 hour
oil change (you don't want to know) I gave up changing the oil on it.

Oh yeah,  the starter wire (battery to solenoid) burned up, just like in 
Taurus's(?) of the day that were recalled, no recall on the Explorer. Hmm.

For the most part it was a good truck. I used it as a truck quite a bit, 
but it was also my daily driver, just me in that big ol' thing. 

What I'm trying to say is people aren't buying SUVs and trucks to haul stuff
and tow stuff for the most part. They buy them for the macho image or the
perceaved extra safty they provide. Bigger wins when I run you over when I'm
talking on the cell phone and not paying attention.

I got good use out of it, but it wasn't used up. 

I know I've got my $$$ out of my 626, and I don't expect I'll get a lot
in trade in at 11+ years and 156k miles. The engine seems good, the interior
is good. Starting to get a little rust. Electricals are suspect, as I've
strayed off topic before. 


On Fri, Dec 06, 2002 at 06:59:51PM -0500, Gordie's Garage wrote:
> Off topic, but I've got to chime in...Paul, do you think it is possible to
> have used the truck up?  Or most of it anyway?
> Seems that few account for the value they get from the vehicle (car or
> truck) and always figure they "took a bath" on resale.
> I wonder if anyone has put a $$$ figure on all the value you get from use of
> a vehicle?  I'll bet it would be greater than the overall cost, 0% financing
> or not.
> 
> my .02
> Safety Fast!
> Gordie Bird
> 62 MGA
> 80 MGB
> 
> 
> >
> > I bought a pretty much base Mazda Navajo back in '93, steel wheels, manual
> > transmission, no cruise, wind up windows, cloth etc. I used it for camping
> > etc. It was a pretty good truck. It did what it was supposed to
> > do. It didn't
> > pretend to be a car, and while I used it a daily transportation,
> > I also used
> > it a lot as a truck.
> >
> > I took a bath on resale value. And it had low miles and was in very good
> > shape.

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