(This post is mainly for my friend Becky.) In May we got the Dave Ramsey c.d.'s and book from my in-laws. We took his course. Some things he suggests are saving up for items that you know you'll need so that you can pay cash and have no payments. Two items that we knew we needed to save for were a car and new fence. We had looked at vans for the last year and the Honda Odyssey and Toyota Sienna always switch between being ranked 1st and 2nd so we wanted one of those. Dave Ramsey also says not to buy a new car but a 3-4 year old car because in the first 3-4 years a car depreciates extremely. Well, we looked to see how much a 3-4 year old van would cost and since May have been putting money aside in a separate account so that around August 2009 we could pay cash for a van. Well, my in-laws came to visit the first of November and told us about a man in their church and personal friend who's used car dealership was having trouble due to these hard economic times. Any-e-way, long story short is that his cars where taken back by the bank and sent to auction. He didn't want to lose any money so he offered us the van for the loan amount. So, we purchased a 2005 Toyota Sienna with 22,000 miles for $11,000. WHAT A DEAL!! That's why we couldn't wait until our original plan of August 2009 to purchase a van. We had debated getting a 2008 Sienna but we would have had to dip $7,000 into our savings for that and it violates one of Ramsey's rule (3-4 year old car). Now we are still saving for the fence but will have to continue saving for a car b/c Travis will need one fairly soon. Hopefully, his car will last until we have saved enough to pay cash so we can continue to have no car payments. Here is the van. A plus to it is that it has air bags all down the sides. We were told that was an extra safety feature but that seems like it would be a given. 
Also, Becky wanted to see Harrison cooing so we made this video just for you Becky.
6 comments:
What a steal of a deal!!!! I love Dave Ramsey - thanks to Becky! Boy she sure is getting a lot of attention in this post!! Sure miss her! I hope Travis is as enthused about cruising around in a mini van as Ryan was. It has grown on him...
Awesome deal! I should look at Dave Ramsey's stuff!
You will LOVE having a van!!
Oh, I feel so darn special right now!!! Thanks for the shout out to me!! You know how I like to have all the attention. :) I love the van. When I get back and we go shopping then you can drive and we can all fit in one car again! Unless you have another kid before I make it back.
What are you going to name her? All cars do need a name. I will try to think of some good names for you.
I can't believe how alert Harrison is. He is going to be almost Bimmy's age when I finally get to meet him. Are you sure you don't want to fly out here for a few days? I sooooo wish that I was there to squeeze him and kiss him. You are right that he makes all those fun baby sounds that Dougie just didn't do. Tell Dougie Hi from me and Bimmy!
Wow Crystal!!! I had no idea you guys were wanting another car! It looks great. We'll have to take it for a spin one of these days...:)
What a steal! That's amazing! Congrats!
That is a great deal. We got a van earlier this year and it is SO nice! We didn't get quite your deal but we learned SO MUCH about bargaining when buying a car...like you can get it for SO much cheaper than the sticker price. We made a totally low offer thinking they'd laugh us right out of there and we got it...in the future we'll offer even less.
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