The Baby And The Breastfeeding - How A Car Dealership Tried To Milk Us Dry

Everybody's got a car-buying story. This one tried to rob me here. This one tried to pull the wool over my eyes. This one really dropped the ball and I stole a new car right from under them.

Yeah right.

But here's one that I'll be you've never heard before...

A few years back, my wife and I had our second child and decided it was time to trade in the car for a roomier, more practical SUV. A couple of years of broken backs lugging car seats in and out of a Grand Am will do that to you.

So we did our research, drove a few vehicles, and made our decision. Luckily for us (or so we thought) it was the end of a calendar, year, which we had read was a primo time to get a great deal.

So we set out on New Year's Eve day to try and dicker our way into a new SUV. And as fate would have it, there was an ice storm the previous evening.

End of the year. Holiday weekend. Ice storm. Everything was falling into our favor. These guys should be BEGGING us to buy a vehicle.

So we walked confidently into the near-empty dealership, 1-month old daughter in tow, to try and buy a new SUV. I had done so much research that I knew almost to the penny what my car was worth, what they had paid for their SUV, and how much we wanted to pay.

Now, before I go any further, I want to state for the record that my offer was fair and reasonable. Car dealers are in the business to make money, and I had no problem with that.

The problem was with their first offer. To say it was ridiculous was...well, ridiculous. They tried to pull the old "your old car has a lot of problems" schtick after some flunky drove it exactly 77 feet across the lot.

So we balked. And they promptly moved on to pressure tactic two--the Sweat Out.

Back and forth this sales girl went from manager to our cubicle and back. We were hammered by closers. Hammered by managers. And every time they left to "see what they could do" we waited another 20-30 minutes.

Which brings me to the interesting part...

After about 3 hours of this baloney and our frustrations rising to a peak level, my wife leans over to me and whispers, "If I don't feed the baby soon, I'm going to literally burst all over this desk."

That was all the cue I needed. We bundled up and headed towards the door. And the most amazing part is, only one of those salespeople actually made a move--a tiny one--to stop us.

You'd think after all this time--especially in an empty dealership on the last day of the year after an ice storm--they'd be willing to do anything to sell us a vehicle. But they didn't. We just walked out.

Afterwards, we received no follow up call, no mailing, nothing. Amazing. It was like we were never there.

Luckily, my wife did not "bust" (no pun intended) and our little Suzanne got the lunch of a lifetime. But the moral of the story is this...

Regardless of all the how-to-buy-a-car stuff you read, be prepared for anything. You never know what's going to happen once you walk into the lion's den. These guys read all the same stuff online that you do...and are slyly trying to change tactics.

And above all, remember these two lessons:

Lesson One: Don't believe anything they say about your trade-in, especially when you know it's not true. To throw it in their face even further, have a trusted mechanic look over your trade and put everything in writing. That'll bring a few blushing cheeks to the party.

Lesson Two: If they try and sweat you out, just get up and go. We wasted 3 hours (and darn near had a major explosion) at this haven for crooks and walked away with nothing to show for it. That was almost 7 years and 3 vehicles ago, and needless to say, they still haven't received a cent of my money. So don't let them sweat you out. No vehicle is worth it.

And finally, bringing a breastfeeding wife and a new baby along is a great negotiating tool. It gave us a great excuse to bail, and it may work in your favor as well--especially if the baby is wailing and the mother is about ready to do her best Mt. St. Helens impersonation.