Category: My Life

More About Car Buying

//begin ranting….

GOD! I’m so fucking Indecisive about this SHIT!

Like I said, I’ve been wanting a new car for years! I keep looking and looking. I bargain them down to great prices. But I just _CAN’T_ actually buy anything!

This has to be the MUST FRUSTRATING thing in my life! All over a fucking car!

I just always feel that no matter what, I’m getting ripped off in some way.

Cars are just money pits, no matter how you look at it. They go down in value, they cost soooo much to keep moving in gas and maint and registration and insurance and who knows what else might happen to them! I may as well just throw my money in a black hole!

Jason brought up the excellent point the other day that. “What if you were still in Iowa, what would you do”.. I’d probably have bought a USED Ford or something by now. But my mind is being tainted by the California consumer culture that I’ve fallen victim to.

I keep trying to fight it off. But it’s a losing battle. The only reason I want an entry level luxury car is because EVERYONE else has one. It’s the whole Keeping up with the Joneses shit!

But I’m not going to be able to get over it and move on till I have a new car myself, I’m so sick of everyone making fun of me because my car is such a POS! I make a GREAT living. I’ve saved TONS more money then anyone else in my age range, I could EASILY pay cash for this car and STILL have enough left over for the down payment on the house my dad and I are trying to buy….. Why can’t I just treat myself to this!

AHHH!! And to top it all off, Constantine is just an amazing boyfriend and is supporting any choice I make he says. Which doesn’t make the decision any easier, because if I simply go with the best/most car for the price, that’d be the one that I would hate myself for buying.

Ahhhhahahhahhahhahhahhhhahhhaaaaaaaahhh. I’m gonna go crazy over this!

Why is this one of the hardest things for me to make a decision about. Usually I’m so fucking opinionated that it gets me in trouble, but when it comes to buying my own car, I can’t make a decision if I had a gun to my fucking head.

//end ranting.

Car Shopping

Sooo, everyone knows I’ve been car shopping. I have been doing that for like the last 2-3 years! Well I’ve been at it again. It seems that everyone I know has either already gotten a new car, or is looking at getting one. And they all have WAY newer cars then mine already! So I feel left out. Plus my car has been acting up lately. The Check engine light keeps coming on and then going off, and it’s been making really funny sounds after I get off the freeway.

Anyways, I also talked to my mom about buying one and she was like. “Just do it already. One of these days your car is just going to die on the freeway”. Another big factor is that this is the last year you can write off the sales tax on a new car purchase, plus I _think_ that the laws this year still allow me to write off the 50% depreciation as a business expense. (I can’t remember if it was this year or last year that the laws changed on that) This year I could really use all the write offs I can get.

Well I’ve been out test driving basically anything and everything that catches my fancy, here’s the list:

1) Honda Civic Hybrid – It’s a great car, don’t get my wrong. But I don’t think it’s what I want any more. A year ago, I would have bought it. But after driving it a few times, there’s just to many little things that would annoy me. The same as with my current Saturn. There’s these wierd little bumps and cubbies that make no sense and the seats just aren’t comfortable enough for me since I spend 2 hours a day in my car.

2) Saab 9-3 – Don’t get in this car… As long as you stand on the outside, it’s great. Great looking, Great warranty, great options and free maintenance for 3 years.. Just so fucking ugly once you get in. It’s like most great looking things… Nice on the outside and ugly on the inside. And plus why did they link the ONLY way to connect your phone to the car to be that you HAVE to have verizon wireless? WTF is up with that. So once I switch away from Verizon, there’s no point in having the OnStar shit. Though they did make me a great offer. A 2007 9-3 with 4,000 miles for only $23k. A demo car that is still basically new, never even been registered.

3) Saturn Aura Hybrid – Yes. I looked at another Saturn. I thought I’d give it a try and see how they’ve done in the last 7 years since I bought my car. The Aura is pretty nice overall. But it just still feels SO CHEAP still. And I’m not sure I could trust Saturn (aka GM) to build a hybrid that will last. Plus, for the price you’re paying for a “hybrid” you really don’t get THAT much better gas mileage.

4) Toyota Camry Hybrid – Another great car. I really like this one, however, I’m just not sure I could see myself driving it. It’s so big and feels very “old man”. Also, for the premium you pay for the hybrid, it’s really not worth it. I thought I had found a GREAT deal on a slightly used one, but the dealer… HUTCH wouldn’t fucking budge on the price. So I walked away.

5) BMW 3 series – The ultimate driving experience. That’s exactly what it is, but it’s just too much for me. Plus it seems like everyone here has a BMW. I want something at least a little different

6) IS 250 – I’ve loved this car since it came out in 2006. Back then, I was nearly ready to walk into a dealer and get one. But I just couldn’t bring myself to buy one at that point because I was making a lot less back then. I went in and talked to my local Lexus dealer and got them to come down $6,000 on a fully loaded IS 250 with navigation. Which would bring it into my price range that I’ve set and at 4.9% interest. I just can’t bring myself to spend that much money even though I could easily afford it.

7) Infiniti G35 – Yes, even though I gave Constantine sooo much shit for this car. It’s amazing. I went and test drove one the other day, just to see it and play with it for myself. I have to admit, I love this car now as well. I was never planning on even seriously looking at one after everything I said to Constantine. But my local Infiniti Dealer had an IS250 listed for sale on Cars.com or one of those sites. So I called him about it. We got to talking and he was like. “We also have a brand new G35 with navigation”. The deal is though that it’s anothe demo car, 3,000-4,000 miles on it and it’s a 2007. The final price he quoted me was under $30k which is exactly what I was looking for a year ago for a price range. 2.9% interest…. It’s the exact same color as Constantine’s too. I just can’t do that, I would be the biggest asshole ever. But it’s SUCH a fucking deal too.

8) Audi A3/A4 – I’ve loved the A3 since it came out, and the A4 is just a great car. However, I have a few friends who have A4’s and they say that once they hit 50k miles they just eat money in Maint. Which ever car I’ll buy, I’m going to keep for another 7-10 years. And the more money I spend on it, the longer I will probably keep it. Plus other friends are telling me that they are coming out with a new more fuel efficient engine “soon”. So I’m not sure how I feel about these.

9) Toyota Prius – Another great car and again, I probably would have bought one a year ago. But now they are just getting so old, they are in need of a major redesign.

10) BMW 1 series, A1, etc. – Oh! they aren’t out yet! But they both look like GREAT cars!

Edit:// Sorry forgot one:
11) Volvo C30 – It’s a great little cute car.. But really? It gets the SAME MPG as the Lexus or BMW, it’s smaller, and it costs about the same with fewer options… Are you serious Volvo? Comon! I know you _think_ you can compete, but you really can’t.

12) VW Jetta – This is another car I’ve heard lots of mixed reviews about. So I’m a little leary. Though I really did like it when I drove it.

13) Acura TSX – Another great car that is tops on my list. I don’t know how I forgot it! Really nothing wrong with it!

Ugh. Ultimately, I’ll probably keep the car I have for a while longer now… I’m just too indecisive about this, I need someone to just go out and buy it for me!!

So don’t be surprised when a blog post comes out about how I’m really pissed that I was stuck on the side of the I-405 for 2 hours waiting for someone to come pick me and my busted ass car up! 🙂

Gays and Financial Planning

So, this past weekend my mom bought a new iMac for the family computer… GO HER!

But, she’s not telling my dad about it till the credit card bill comes. This was brought up between Constantine and I while we were driving somewhere this weekend. I mean, does that really seem like the right way to do it? If you are spending the family money, you should really discuss it with the other family people before you go out and buy it, right? This happens all the time in my family and it’s really quite frustrating.

So Constantine and I were talking about it and it’s been on my mind since… How would you handle the financials in a gay relationship? When you are straight and married, there’s precedence for how these things would work out in the legal battles of divorce, especially if there are children.

I have a few ideas on the whole matter. First, if you are just living together, a newly formed household, after only dating for a year or whatever. Money matters should probably be kept separate. This would be a time of testing still to be sure you are compatible. Once you move in there’s tons of things that can change or you might realize while you are just dating. Did you know that he or she gets a $5 cup of coffee every morning? Did you know that even though they say they are making and saving a ton of money that they actually just spend it all?

I don’t really feel like it’s my place to ask to see my partners financials until we are very serious. IE although I have an idea of how much Constantine makes and what he spends, I wouldn’t flat out ask him to see. These are pretty personal things, and although I feel you should ask BEFORE you move in together, sometimes that just doesn’t happen.

During this first year or so of living together, the household expenses should really be split based on how much money the person brings in. Lets say that person A brings in $100,000/yr and person B brings in just $50,000/yr. Your rent is $1,000/mn. In this situation, person A would pay 66% of the rent, or $666. While person B pays $333. This will tend to keep things fairly equal to how they were before the move in and they should both still have a fair percent of income to live on. It would be unfair to make person B pay an equal share in the rent in this case because it would take a larger portion of their income.

Also during this time, you should really try and discuss any major purchases with each other before they happen. Even though the money is still technically, “MY” money and not “OUR” money, this will help you to work out the kinks in money spending. In this case, person A may be used to buying Gucci clothes and eating $40 lunches where as person B may be used to buying Old Navy clothes and taking lunch to work. During this time you can work out how the family money should be spent. Should person A still be getting $40 lunches and person B be taking lunches to work after the merger of money? Probably not as this would build up anger over the years between the two.

After a sufficient amount of time, the money should be merged. By now you should both be pretty close to being on the same page. Do we still spend all that money on Gucci clothes, or do compromise and both get cheaper but still nice clothes at the Banana Republic?

How do you handle big purchases like cars? Do you both get new ones at the same time, do you stagger them? It’s all so confusing!

All this stuff is really pretty standard between gay and straight….

But all this brings up the idea of, what if we split up? How do you un-merge a gay relationships money? Should both of them be allowed to get half of everything as if this were straight? What if it’s 20 years later and now person B is making $200,000/yr while person A is still only making $100,000/yr? And what if this huge increase in person B’s income is only because person A supported them while they got a masters or other education? On the other hand, what if the increase in income was all because of smart choices before the two got together?

This is all very twisted, in most cases people would say, “well what about a pre-nup”, etc.

But are those even really fair? Do they hold out? For me, personally, they are just asking for failure with those. It’s as if you are admitting straight out the door that you are expecting failure.

These are all just the millions of other thoughts that have been flying around my head the last couple days. I wish there were easy answers!

A Holiday Weekend!

So this weekend has been very holiday filled!

Friday night Constantine came over and we went out to Panera bread for dinner. I love that place. After that we headed across the street to the movie theater to see a movie. Neither one of us really knew anything that was out, and the next movie to start was “The Golden Compass“. It was an alright movie, I really liked the story but it was very slow moving. I wouldn’t really suggest going to the theater to see it. I head it really bombed in sales this weekend though.

Went home after that and we spent the evening drinking and talking and what not.

Saturday we got up and headed down to OC. We were going to go out to Death Valley, but it was raining there! Went to the Mission San Juan Capistrano and then headed to Laguna Beach to meet up with Nick and one of his friends! We had a really good time. After that we headed back to my place and hung out for a little bit and then went out to Hollywood and Highland to pick up christmas presents for my family. Got a lot of neat little things for them. I hope they like em! From there we headed to Sherman Oaks to see the movie “Juno“. I really liked this movie. Very funny! I highly suggest going to see it.

Got home after that and went to bed.

Sunday morning we got up and bottled our Raspberry vodka that we have been making for the last couple months. It’s very very sweet, so it needs to be thinned out, but it tastes really good! 🙂 We got 5 bottles of it!

After that Constantine left to go Christmas shopping for me! I can’t wait to see what he got me! I really hope that he likes what I got him tooo!

That evening I watched Snow, Santa Baby, and Holiday in Handcuffs. I’ve seen the first two before, but the last one was new and I really liked it. It was soo cheesy, but very cute.

At some point this weekend we also watched Bad Santa. Which was a funny movie too.

Anyways, I’m out. Laters!