Idiot. This is not true, as has previously been explained to you. Price, prejudice, style, ignorance and other factors lead people to buy the "home team's brand". Any knowledgeable person knows that GM lags in quality.
Yeah but the Cummins turbo diesel is a real engine, and will walk circles around that HEMI.
Well, you have to admit 90 miles a day adds up fast.
Charles of Kankakee
For many people, this is true. However, these people are, let me try and put this delicately, stupid.
Minimum lifecycle cost should be the determining factor. The purchase price is just one component:
Purchase Price Depreciation Maintenance Expense Repair expense (incidence rate times cost of repair) Insurance Fuel Mileage
We bought a minivan in 2001. We looked at the mid-range models of the Dodge Caravan, the Chevy Venture and the Toyota Sienna. They were very comparable in purchase price (the Toyota was actually least expensive and the most expensive was the Venture, with the Caravan next most expensive). Edmunds now puts the private party resale prices at:
Venture: $7249 Caravan: $8858 Sienna: $13034
Which one turns out to be least expensive if you keep it for 5 years and sell or trade it to buy something newer? We bought a Sienna. I'm probably $5,000 ahead at this point over where I'd be if I'd bought the Caravan.
Of those things that make up the lifecyle cost, the depreciation and the repair cost are not known and have to be projected. This is partly subjective and partly regression. If Toyota has a good track record for repair cost, consistently, for the last 10 years (something you can get from Consumer Reports or other sources) and Toyotas consistently have higher resale values (Edmunds.com or KBB.com can help you there), which otherwise equivalent $25,000 minivan do you buy?
Lexus may well have measurably better quality and/or lower projected repair expense than a Toyota but not enough so to justify the extra $5,000 or so it costs to buy one. However, not everyone does attempt to minimuze life cycle cost but some prefer to spend a little more for intangibles (prestige, style) or extras of arguable value (a better zero-to-sixty time or genuine wood trim). Well, these differences do make life more interesting.
"blow the doors off" - You mean....like in a race?
Actually, he may be right about some GM/Ford/Dodge truck buyers, but he has no idea why he's right. Some people require cargo accessories that may not exist yet for the Tundra, for carrying stuff like ladders, etc. And, what's the arrangement with 4 wheels in the back called? Not available on Tundra.
But, these people are not the majority.
You draw some rather bizarre conclusions from your observations. If a single guy gets married and has a kid, and then trades in his Toyota pickup, do you suppose it's because he didn't like the truck? Or, could there be another reason? Read sentence #2 several times if the answer eludes you.
If it still eludes you, then you are a living example of why the No Child Left Behind idea is a good one.
Thank you for supporting what I have been saying all along. Toyota makes good dependable vehicles but so do most other manufactures today. Your last paragraph says it all. The premium that one must pay to buy ANY of Toyota products, compared to what is available on the market, does not justify any perceived advantage they may offer the average new car buyer. One of the buff mags came to the same conclusion when they did head to head tests of a V6 Camry and five other comparable midsized vehicles. They rated the Camry SIXTH because of the $7,000 premium it cost was not worth any advantage it may have had over the others. Four of the others outperformed the Camry in their test. That is the reason I personally no longer buy Lexus V8s. I have bought other luxury cars that have proven to me to be just as dependable, for thousands of dollars less to own annually, than when I was buying Toyota products. In fact when I first switch from Lexus to a domestic I saved enough money to cover nearly the total cost of a second vehicle that I bought from the dealership. To me the total costs of ownership are only the acquisition cost, insurance, scheduled maintenance, fuel and replacement vehicle cost, I haven't needed to repaired any car domestic or foreign for many years
You can believe whatever you wish but in all my years in retail I can affirm that the last question a customer will ask before signing on the bottom line is 'How much is my monthly payment?' ;).
mike hunt
"dh" wrote in message news:1128574967.c01a6f598ab8095605b8755b9afe29ad@teranews...
I see you sniped the bulk of my post when your replied, did the facts get in the way? As to your suggestion the guy may have needed a larger truck, one can only wonder why did he not buy a larger Toyota truck? ;)
mike hunt
You are assuming he wanted a truck as his next car. You can assume absolutely NOTHING about a car you see in a used car lot.
And, it's "snipped", not "sniped".
Seems like you may be spending too much time on the net LOL
mike hunt
Beats me I always buy new. Why would anyone want to buy anything that someone else did not want? ;)
mike hunt
As others have suggested, I think it's time for you to start backing up your wild claims with facts from organizations whose job it is to provide useful data. Powers & Associates would be one. Magazines are useless unless they get their data from a source that's skilled at collecting it. And, what you've said about your service business - pointless, too. You only saw the broken cars, so you have no data on the ones you did NOT see.
Ya think?
Natalie
Actually, if I were shopping for a big, wasteful vehicle, I'd go domestic - nobody does that better - not even the Japanese
Natalie
They're lined up like fat soldiers at all the dealerships around here - the morons have finally noticed that their Escalades and Navigators really, honestly do NOT get 25 mpg as they hoped they would, and that the 12 mpg figures on the window stickers were not invented by tree hugging vegetarian East Coast commie elitist scientists. :-)
LOL - some don't mind paying a fortune for gas, when they can strut their genital inadequacies around for all to see. My hubby drives a sub-compact; no issues there ;-)
In Phoenix, I saw one of those 6-tire monstrosities, with the vanity plate "NTBGENF" No kidding, micro-man
Natalie
Seriously, my father actually believes that his Navigator gets over 30mpg, and that the window sticker is "just an approximation". Jeez.....
"Doug Kanter" >
Now, don't be so harsh on your dad. He sounds like a perfectly logical, reasonable man (Tell him I said so). And please, also let him know that if he should ever want to move to my native Florida, I have just the spot for him at a very good price - near a sinkhole....um LAKE!
Yeah, that's it.
Natalie, whistling innocently
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