Josche
04-14-2005, 08:08 PM
Hi all, first post.
I found this forum a couple of weeks ago and started to get really excited about the prospect of buying a new '04 because of the good deals available. People on the forum seem to be in love with their cars, so I decided to take the plunge.
After some research of local dealer inventories, I headed to Schaumburg Mazda, which is a couple miles from my home. I couldn't stand the high-pressure sales guys who wanted to bargain down from MSRP. They had a good selection of new '04s, but I'd read enough on this forum to beware of them, so I called the Autobarn in Evanston, where I spoke with Chris Duhon, the internet sales manager.
The next day I drove the 25 miles or so over there and was introduced to a black GT with 300 miles and almost every option known to mazda (appearance, rotary accents, spoiler, 6 CD, nav, and a few others). Sticker price was over $36K.
I had a great experience dealing with Chris (he said I could post his contact info here, so let me know if you're interested), and I bought the car with a deal I felt good about:
$27750 (after 4K rebate, before taxes), plus they gave me $13K for my trade-in, which was $1K more than CarMax offered me.
Unfortunately I don't qualify for the recent grad rebate and my gerber rebate never came in the email :(
Anyway, it was a good sales experience and I'm in love with my car. I bought it Saturday and took a used blue GT home for the rest of the weekend so the battery could be replaced in my car and detailing could be done. I got addicted to the high revs in the used car! I picked up mine on Monday. It will be tough to adhere to 1000 miles of break-in.
Anyway, I wanted to thank everybody who has been offering so much purchasing advice on this forum. I felt like I went into the dealership armed with enough knowledge to get a good deal. I might have been able to do better, but I look at it as spending $26.5K for a $36K car, so it's worth every penny.
Josh
I found this forum a couple of weeks ago and started to get really excited about the prospect of buying a new '04 because of the good deals available. People on the forum seem to be in love with their cars, so I decided to take the plunge.
After some research of local dealer inventories, I headed to Schaumburg Mazda, which is a couple miles from my home. I couldn't stand the high-pressure sales guys who wanted to bargain down from MSRP. They had a good selection of new '04s, but I'd read enough on this forum to beware of them, so I called the Autobarn in Evanston, where I spoke with Chris Duhon, the internet sales manager.
The next day I drove the 25 miles or so over there and was introduced to a black GT with 300 miles and almost every option known to mazda (appearance, rotary accents, spoiler, 6 CD, nav, and a few others). Sticker price was over $36K.
I had a great experience dealing with Chris (he said I could post his contact info here, so let me know if you're interested), and I bought the car with a deal I felt good about:
$27750 (after 4K rebate, before taxes), plus they gave me $13K for my trade-in, which was $1K more than CarMax offered me.
Unfortunately I don't qualify for the recent grad rebate and my gerber rebate never came in the email :(
Anyway, it was a good sales experience and I'm in love with my car. I bought it Saturday and took a used blue GT home for the rest of the weekend so the battery could be replaced in my car and detailing could be done. I got addicted to the high revs in the used car! I picked up mine on Monday. It will be tough to adhere to 1000 miles of break-in.
Anyway, I wanted to thank everybody who has been offering so much purchasing advice on this forum. I felt like I went into the dealership armed with enough knowledge to get a good deal. I might have been able to do better, but I look at it as spending $26.5K for a $36K car, so it's worth every penny.
Josh