Nissan Versa - I Bought an Economy Car
I know, I know. I just posted 2 weeks ago how I was not 
going to spend the money on an economy car. As a recap the main reason for not getting a car with better gas mileage was that I could not get anything with less then 50K mikes on it for the $8k that my Xterra was worth.
I was going round and round in my mind trying to figure out what I as going to do while I saw the gas prices going higher and higher. In talking with my wife we finally came to the conclusion that trying to get a car with 50K miles on it for $8 was not going to happen. With that we decided that we needed to spend more and take on a payment. Also, if we were going to take on a payment then we might as well get something that is pretty new that was we can keep it for a while. Our online parameter was we wanted to stay under $200/month for a car payment.
The wife and I went to look at cars.
The first place we visited was the Nissan dealer. The Versa was a 4 door compact that came in either a hatch back or a sedan. The sedan was pretty appealing and we took a test drive. The car had a solid feel to it and had a great turn radius. The interior had a European look to it which made it feel more expensive then it was.
We test drove the SL version of the car that comes with all the bells and whistles but settled on pricing out the S model. The S model had power windows and door locks but lacked cruise control. The sticker for the S model was $15,015. The dealer was willing to give me $8181 for my Xterra which put our amount to finance @ around $7800 (included tax and license).
We thanked the salesman for his time and told him that we were going to look at Toyota and Honda but that there was a good possibility we would be back.
We headed over to the the Toyota dealer to look at the Yaris. My first impression was that the car was very “no frills” as the inside seemed so basic compared to the Versa. Also the price was the same as the Versa but lacked power windows and door locks. The salesman said that he could match the deal that Nissan was offering in price and features on a Corolla instead but the Corolla also seemed kind of generic compared to the Versa.
From there we went to the Honda Dealer to see the Fit. The did not have a Fit in stock due to their popularity but I was not that impressed with the 5 minute presentation that the sales person did outlining its features. We inquired about the Civic but it was out of our price range.
We headed back over to the Nissan dealer to pick out our Versa. I opted for a Silver exterior with black interior. The had to get it from another local dealer since they did not have that combination in stock.
As of today I have put almost 500 miles on it an am getting about 26 miles a gallon for around town driving. From my research they say that they true mileage doesn’t kick in until 3000 to 10000 miles. That really doesn’t matter to me though. I am only spending $30 to fill up the car @ $2.77/gallon. Oh it feels good to be under $40/tank on fill ups.
Anyway, I have now joined the ranks of the 30mpg club and I am liking it.
Technorati: Fuel Economy, Nissan Xterra, Scion XB, Nissan Versa, Toyota Yaris, Honda Fit, Saving Money, Cars, Buying a Car, Finances