How not to buy the car in the U.S.

About buying a car in the US I already wrote – first post from our roadtrip. After reading it, you probably think that this is a piece of cake. Well, we thought so too. Did I say that we had tried to prepare ourselves very carefully before the trip? Well ... despite the hours spent on books, blogs, forums, etc., we did not avoid mistakes. Costly mistakes.

So how not to buy the car in the U.S.?

The first and main principle, always stick to the agreed budget!

Just before the trip I made a fancy file in my favorite spreadsheet tool (yes, in this family, I'm the accountant), where I noted down our savings, projected expenses and any confirmed incomes during the entire trip. Then, special formulas calculated for us how much we can spend on the purchase of the car and how much money will remain to allow us to survive this whole trip. Up to this point everything looks simple, easy and fun, is not it? Well…, Daniel found a camper truck, which met almost all of our expectations. I mean almost because it did not fit in a price, we could spend. Of course, we started negotiations, but finally we paid 34% more than we planned. We were lucky enough that Lisa and Ken, from whom we bought our camper, gave us a lot of extra things, which anyway we would have to buy.

If you do not stick to the principle No. 1, be prepared for further unplanned expenses ...

After making the deal, holding in hand 2 sets of keys and taking a photo for the social media ;-), it's time for a paper work. First insurance, well… in this regard, we were totally unprepared. It turned out that the lack of a local driving license classified us in the group of high risk drivers. And consequently, not all companies could offer us the insurance or premium was "adequately" high to protect the interests of the insurer. You know that feeling when you fall on your ass, you feel a strong blow to the tailbone, and for a few seconds you can not catch your breath? We just felt this lack of breath, after we heard how much we had to pay for the insurance of our 4 wheels. The time stopped for a minute, we looked at each other and we felt like our travel wings were cut off with blunt cleaver. Apart from insurance, we had to cover the costs of registration of the vehicle. This formality was not the cheapest also. So we paid 6.5% of purchase tax, additionally, there were costs for the title, whiteboard (one!) and a fee. At least we did not have to register trailer which allowed us to save the rest of the money held by us.

Look at the mechanic's hands and does not agree to anything over the phone.

Our ideal camper unfortunately had some faults that we thought to remove before traveling. Of course, repairs were not necessary, so everything depended on costs. We left the car in the RV shop on Friday and we agreed with mechanics that on Monday they will let us know exactly what needs to be fixed and how much it will cost. Only for the same check we knew that we had to pay $120. On Monday morning, we were told that we need to replace the water pump, add oil in the water generator and remove a small leak under the sink in our "kitchen". Initially we were talking about total costs of $200. But we were pointing out that there is nothing to be done until the final price is given to us. Unfortunately, after arriving at the RV shop we were told that all defects have been removed, and we have to pay $600! We said we will not pay. That we do not even have that much money and we waited for some discount. We managed to reduce the amount of the invoice by $150. Small "success", but we still felt this repair in our empty pockets.

Always can be worse... a stingy loses 2 times.

Our financial reserves dwindled in the blink of an eye. We had to catch a few breaths, count to 10,000 ... and think about all this trip once again. We made a new calculation of the budget to make sure that we can handle. It was just about but we believed that it could not be worse. Oh, how we were wrong. After less than an hour after leaving Sanford, we completely blocked the highway exit. Our dream car stood in the middle of the road and did not want to move. Fortunately, the police rode behind us. They quickly organised the traffic so the pressure went down. I and Eryk ended up in a police car, two policemen pushed our camper on a sideroad and called the gun-carriage to tow us to the nearest mechanic. And so we landed in Oviedo, only 18 kilometers from our start. For towing we paid $75, believing that the insurance at Good Sam will refund it. Oops, another mistake ... buying a package we chose the option for the car only, and because we also have a camper a good Uncle Sam could not help us and they did not cover the cost of towing. Of course, for the further trip we had to buy the insurance for our camper ($40 extra). The end of the end we landed at a garage for tractors. There we were told that alternator is dead and for the new one we would have to pay $300. Not having much choice, we spent the night with heavy machinery and car oils. On the second day we had a brand new alternator, and again we were ready to go. With fear, luck of energy and without another large sum of money, we drove to our adventure.

  

As you can see we had a difficult beginning, and we still have a lot to learn. After 3 weeks on the road, it still happens that I hold my breath when Daniel turns the key in the ignition and breathe with relief when I hear that everything works fine.