Deep dark depression, excessive misery.

Well, looks like after an eight-month long (mostly) love affair with our MINI, we're taking a break for a while.

Some of you may know about our saga of ordering our new Cabrio, and the intolerable wait, and the agonizing over options, colors, etc. Well, now that the car has finally been built (week 32) and shipped to California, and trucked to Colorado, and is sitting there all shiny and new waiting for us, we are forced to take a pass on the MINI of our dreams.

Poor communication? Greedy dealer? Economic slump? Who knows - but the bottom line is that we got offered exactly $7,000 less on trade than what we paid for the car in January. That was way too much of a depriciation hit for us to absorb and feel good about it. . .all my recent research showed that MINIs held their resale a little better than this, but I guess I underestimated the numbers a little.

So - after all the sleepless nights, endless hours tracking production and shipping, ordering accessories, etc, it seems that we will be without a MINI in a few short days.

Hopefully we'll be able to overcome the negative feelings we have right now and rejoin the MINI family sometime in the future, but for now, it looks like we'll be MINI-free before too long.

To everyone on NAM who helped make our all-to-brief MINI experience so enjoyable, thank you. I'll try to pop in from time to time to keep up on all things MINI, but I'll be much more of a lurker than an active participant.

Hope to see you all again in the near future, and in the meantime, keep motoring.

BP

 

Try selling it on your own; you can probably get at least $3-5k more than the dealer is offering on trade-in! At least try that for a few days before you give up! Not to rub salt in the wound, but any of us could have told you that you weren't going to get a good trade-in offer from the dealer. Dealer trade-ins, as a rule, are huge profit for them, and only advisable for you as an act of desperation - especially with a car that holds its value as well as the MINI. The buzz around here lately is that, with gas prices sky high for so long, it's getting very tough to find a quality used MINI (as opposed to, say, a quality used Durango) - that should be good news for you!

Good luck,
Chris

 

I don't get it. If the trade-in deal went bad, couldn't you sell your current MINI on your own and get a fair market price for it?

 

Man, sorry to hear that. Were you unable to get a number on your trade before the order? Have you talked to the guys at Ralph Shomp? Rob Miller there is a really cool guy. I have seen cars that use more gas than others plunge in resale value lately. I hope that you can figure something out. Good luck.

 

Given the poor mileage of the S, I'm not sure what the connection might be.

So what happened, did you expect to get a better trade-in offer, or just couldn't find a buyer on your own and were using the trade-in as a fallback? Will they not hold it for you? or are you just walking away from it because you're pissed at the dealer?

 

It can get over 30 mpg on the highway, which people have been brainwashed to regard as miraculous. Seriously, I've seen numerous people commenting in the past few weeks about how the used market has really dried up from the buyer's perspective.

 

As a rule of thumb, a dealer can only offer you $2000 less than what he thinks he(or she, depending on the dealer) can easily sell it for. They are going to spend $2000 cleaning up the car, checking it out, applying a warranty (some of them will), transferring ownership titles and general cost of running a business. So to even break even, they can't offer you too close to what you can get if you sold it yourself.

In Canada, the difference can offset the sales tax in buying a new car so it's not such a big issue. Probably our neighbors south of us don't get the same kind of tax break.

Hope you get it sorted out and we get to see pictures of your new car when you get around to pickup up the new MINI.

 

If it had been a $2K difference between retail and trade, we'd be doing okay. Edmunds and Kelley have the retail value of the car at $23,652 and $24,070 respectively. If we could have gotten $21-22 like we'd been led to believe, it would have been a done deal - the car needs a windshield (like most Colorado cars) but other than that, it was perfect. Garage kept and all that stuff. . .

The tax benefits on a trade help, but they didn't come close to closing the gap - I guess the lesson learned here is to get things firmed up in writing as early as possible to avoid last minute surprises. . .

 

Do you have a CarMax out your way? My personal experience (and that of others I've talked to) is that you get a fairly good deal on trade-ins, no hassle, and it's not tied to whether or not you're buying a car from them.

Check this link - doesn't look like anything in CO but a couple of neighboring states.

http://www.carmax.com/dyn/companyinf...locations.aspx

The site also has some good research tools.

BTW, if you're not getting a new MINI, don't you need to keep the old MINI for transportation? So you wouldn't be without a MINI?

john

 

Thanks for the info - right now, I think I just need to regroup, see what's going on automotively. . .

Oh, and the MINI is car #3 for just two licensed drivers, so transport isn't a problem. 'Motoring' may be a problem, but transportation isn't.

 

No!!! Okay - what am I missing here? Have you actually sold the 04'? If not, can't you just keep that and not be MINI-less? Okay - so the Cabrio was your dream for now....maybe in the future...but what about your current MINI....


Donna

 

before the gas spike Schomp had quite an inventory of used Coopers; now, zilch. supply and demand, coupled with gas prices being as high as they are, allows dealers to call the shots, esp. with high demand/low supply cars like the MINI. And that used cars are the #1 money-maker in any car business. good luck Jimbo

 

When I visited Roadshow a few weeks ago I noticed they have "36MPG" written on the windshield of several of their MINI's. Using gas mileage as a sales incentive works, especially since the MINI looks as if it would get 50MPG.

 

I sold my Stratus to CarMAX. They tried to sell me one of the two 2003 MINI that they had in stock oine with 40,000 miles for $19,000 or one with 21,000 miles for $20,550. I told them no thanks and drove down the street to D&R MINI here in Indy. Bought a 2006 MINI for $20,750.

But next time I have to sell a car, Going straight to CarMAX!

 

What's the problem here? Sell the MINI to a used car place, buy the Cabrio. The dealership has NO incentive to give you a good deal on the trade-in. If you don't buy the cabrio, they can sell it in no time on the lot.

 

I agree, Bill. Try selling the '04 yourself before you give up on the Cabrio. See if you can stall it a little. People are SEARCHING for used MINIs and having trouble finding them! You are in a seller's market. Give it a go!



Clover

 

I'm confused here. You have an '04 MCS, you were thinking of trading it on an '06 MCSC, but the dealer only offered you wholesale for your trade, correct? This is what dealers do, deal. Buy cheap, sell dear. Either 1) sell the MCS yourself and pay cash for the MCSC with the proceeds or 2) walk away from the MCSC (maybe motor away from the deal in your MCS). Either way, you're not MINLESS unless you don't get the MCSC and sell your MCS. What gives?

 

Yeah, I'm confused too. Did the "previous" MINI disappear in a puff of smoke?

 

For some reason there is an obvious desire to become MINIless. Can't imagine why, not like an 04 MCS is a bad thing.

 

Wow - even more replies. . .

Actually, no, not an obvious desire to become MINI-less - in fact, I'm sure I'll be back in one within a year or two. Let's just say that, currently, we don't have time to effectively market the '04, and through admittedly limited marketing, there have been few to no nibbles - SO - the right choice for us at this point in time is to trade the MINI on another 4-seat fun car with an automatic. I know it's easy to 'armchair quarterback' things, but in our situation (kids, dogs, commutes, hours, etc.) and right now, this decision, although difficult, is the right thing for us to do.

We've had a good time on NAM over the past year, and we'll be popping in to keep up on all things MINI, but let's not overanalyze the situation - the MINI was a third car for us, and it was a lot of fun, but it was time for us to roll out the '04 and take a different tack for a while.

Thanks to all for the insight and suggestions - we appreciate your concern. Be seein' ya around. . .

BP

 

But, but...

You have to live your life to suit our priorities - you're being awfully selfish



Hope to see you back soon! Maybe you can win a MINI from Tidy-whatever cat-litter, like the guy that just one a MINI from Dr. Pepper! Or the MINI contest from that Arizona-based website hosting company.

john