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Tell Them What They've Won, Bob. . . .

It's a NEW CAR!!!

After a week of test driving cars/smaller SUVs after work, Amy and I had both fallen in love with the Honda Pilot. It's smaller than the Big Red Party Barge, but large enough to haul some ass. It accelerated and handled well, and hey, it's a Honda, so it's safe, reliable, and should hold its resale value. The only problem was that since it's a pretty popular ride, the first dealer we went to wasn't encouraging about getting a break on pricing or financing. We liked the car, but not really enough to pay bank rates around 5% for it when all other vehicles we were looking at were offering 0% financing and/or serious cash back.

Other vehicles we'd driven were the Saturn Vue, Subaru Legacy Wagon, Toyota Highlander, and Chevy TrailBlazer. We also looked at the Honda CR-V and Element, which were just too small and used space poorly in non-seating configurations. The Vue was a decent contender considering pricing, but it just lost on space to the Pilot and Highlander. The Legacy was not only small, but a bit of a dog off the line, and that was empty. I couldn't imagine it getting up to highway speeds and out of the way of crushing semi trucks when fully loaded down with our roving petting zoo. The TrailBlazer was too truck-like for Amy - she didn't even want to test drive it. The Highlander was a close runner-up, but limitations on configuration options, smaller cargo space, and less standard options all put it behind the Pilot. So we really wanted the Pilot, but again, it would have ended up costing quite a bit more than we wanted to spend once interest was factored in.

On Thursday night, we'd decided that we'd take a spin up to Carmax the next day to see if there were any good used options available. While I was futzing around between edmunds.com, carmax.com, and hondacars.com, not quite ready to give up on a Pilot, I was reminded of carsdirect.com. A friend had purchased a Toyota 4Runner through them, and seemed pretty happy. The deal is, you put in what kind of car you're looking for, you get a 'guaranteed low price' and if you chose to go ahead, a 'consultant' will call you to tell you what s/he's found in the area, discuss financing options, etc. If interested, you can apply for financing through them as well. I was curious about what financing they'd swing so I decided to use the Pilot EX as an example and get a quote. I was hoping they'd be able to beat 5% but wasn't holding my breath.

When my consultant, Russell, called me, he let me know he'd found the color and trim options we were looking for. He was ready for me to tell him to put a deposit on the car and hold it for us when I asked, "What about financing?" He said, "Oh yeah, that's the other good news. . . ." I was expecting some kind of lame sales pitch about how he'd found us a great low rate of 7.75% with only $10,000 down or something like that. I'm such a cynic. What he actually told me was that Honda had just announced that for THIS WEEKEND ONLY, they were offering 2.9% on all of their cars up to 60 months and with zero down.

It didn't take too many e-mail exchanges with Amy to decide we were going to go for it. I let Russell know, put down a $250 deposit, and arranged to go pick up the car that night.

There are only two complaints I have about the whole process. The first is that the dealer ended up being about 80 miles away on the west side of Chicago. It was a little annoying to get to then, and will be annoying to pick up plates, but it's not a major deal. Just know that if you go through CarsDirect, you might have to hike for your car.

The other complaint is that even though the pricing and "ordering" of the car was no hassle and easy as pie (and was a competitive price to boot), finishing off the sales process was just as annoying as if we'd worked directly with the dealer all along. We just wanted to sign the papers and be on our way - it had been a long week. However, the "Business Manager" gave us the full court press to try to upsell us on extended warranties, additional security options, etc. I think we COULD have just said no and moved on relatively quickly, but we're both really polite and humored the guy. The whole "dealer time" took about 1.5 hours, a good bit of that spent waiting for a finance guy to free up (the dealership was pretty busy).

And one last tid-bit about the car itself - don't believe brochures or web sites when it comes to color selection. In both cases, this car looked green. Even the dealer's tag on the key fob said "green." But it's really only green under very specific lighting. Other times it looks gunmetal blue. But mostly, it just looks grey. But that's fine, since we're not picky with regard to car colors. But just so you know, "Sage Brush Pearl" might look green on paper, but it ain't.

Lest you think it's all in our heads about the Pilot, here's what Consumer Reports had to say about the vehicle:

The Pilot manages to combine the best of a wagon, SUV, and minivan at an
affordable price. It's a car-based SUV like the upscale Acura MDX. The
Pilot's a bit roomier, though, and less costly. It's currently our
top-pick SUV for this price bracket. It has a less powerful version of the
MDX's smooth V6, and shares its five-speed automatic and full-time AWD
system. The Pilot delivers spirited performance yet respectable fuel
economy; a comfortable ride; and secure, responsive handling. Pronounced
road noise was our only qualm. The standard 60/40 split third-row seat
folds neatly into the floor, creating ample cargo space. Access is easy,
and fit and finish are impeccable. Crash-test results are impressive.

Their only qualm was the road noise. Compared to my convertible and the Big Red Party Barge, both of which suffer from intense wind noise, we thought the Pilot was silky smooth and quiet. We love the new car. We test-fit it for a dog crate (we need to throw the bunny and bird cages in there, too). We drove it around all day on Saturday. We kicked the van out of the garage. Yay for new car smell!!!