Mini-Van Owners

Technically, we could survive with the two cars we had, a 2005 Honda Civic and a 2008 Chevy Aveo. We checked and the car seats did fit in both cars. Both cars were paid off so we didn’t have any car payments to deal with. And there is nothing worse than car shopping (except maybe dealing with renewing cell phone contracts). However, I came up with a lot of reasons as to why we needed a new car:

• First, Robb was a little cramped in the cars with the car seats installed because he had to move his seat forward (he’s a tall guy – about 6’3″.) And if it was cramped with the infant car seats, I was really worried about when we will have to transition to the larger, convertible car seats.
• Second, the Chevy Aveo had an almost non-existent trunk. I’ve heard through the grapevine that when you have kids you’ll end up carting a lot of crap, from strollers to diaper bags, and you need space in your car to put those things. The Chevy is also a bare-bones car. It was really a cheap replacement car when Robb was in an accident a few years ago that totaled our previous car. I’m completely okay with driving a stick, having roll-up windows, and not having an air conditioner (you don’t really need an air conditioner in the Pacific Northwest but 2-3 weeks a year). But there were no anti-lock brakes and the car was super-small. I was worried about the safety factor of carting kids around.
• Third, the Honda had 150,000+ miles and the Chevy had 90,000+ miles; I wanted to sell/trade-in a car before it accumulated more mileage and lost even more value (or before a car needed even more money spent on repairs).
• Fourth, I figured if we were going to add a car payment to our expenses, we should do it now. Babies are going to really change up our budget. We need to find the money now to make a car payment work so that it is just a part of our lives, instead of a hardship later on. Plus, we also got a tax refund and some money from our flexible spending account that I didn’t want to magically disappear into our general account – I wanted to use that money when it was still fresh to add to our down payment.

After a lot of discussion with Robb, I finally convinced him that we should look for a new car and get rid of the Chevy. Yes, the Chevy is newer and has less mileage than the Honda, but see my concerns above regarding safety and size. In addition, because it was a bare-bones car to begin with, the value of this car was low and would only get much lower over the years. I needed to get rid of it before it went over 100,000 miles and while it still was worth something! As far as a replacement, we decided we needed either a small/mid-sized SUV or a mini-van. And because I wanted to keep a car payment low, we decided to buy used. I got pre-approved for a loan from my bank and decided my criteria was a 2011 or newer car, less than 50,000 miles, and I wanted to stay between the $15,000-20,000 range (closer to $15,000 if possible). Because my budget was low, that limited my options quite a bit. So I spent a couple of weeks looking at websites to figure out what cars were in that budget and then narrowed down my options based on reviews/rankings. I decided we needed to look at 2 types of mini-vans and 2-3 SUVs. Then I made a spreadsheet so I could track all the dealerships in the area that had the cars I wanted, so I could easily compare mileage, price, etc. (Thank goodness for the internet and being able to find all of this information from home! I can’t imagine going from car lot to car lot in search of a used car.)

The first weekend in March Robb and I finally had both Saturday and Sunday off. We decided it was the time to visit a few car lots to test drive the cars I had narrowed our options down to. We looked at a couple of mid-sized SUVs, but compared to the space in a mini-van there was just no contest. As Robb, said, if we’re buying a new car for space, we might as well go all out and get one with space! By the end of the day on Saturday, we decided on a 2013 Dodge Grand Caravan. Having the third row would be great for when we have visitors (i.e., the grandparents). And even with that third row up, there was still plenty of space in the trunk for a double stroller and other gear. (We did look at an SUV with a third row. It was a nice little mid-sized SUV, but the third row was really cramped. And with the third row up, there was no trunk space. We needed the third row for visitors AND trunk space. What’s the point of carting visitors and the twins around if you can’t use the stroller too?) The other great thing about the Dodge Grand Caravan was the stow and go seating. Every single seat folded down/into the van. Robb was envisioning how much easier it will be to pick up a Christmas tree or new furniture in the future! It was a very smooth drive and had a lot of amenities that our poor little bare-bones Chevy didn’t have that most people take for granted (such as air conditioner, power windows, front and back air control, a cd player, etc.) Robb hadn’t done any car research, so he was very surprised with how far mini-vans have come in 20 years.

So on Saturday evening we got home and I looked at all the websites for local dealerships within 30 miles and made myself a new spreadsheet to compare all the 2013 Dodge Grand Caravans that were available. Sunday we headed to a dealership that had a car with lower mileage (38,000 miles) and a lower price. And the van was black – which was a much more desirable color for us than the white vans we had seen advertised most places. We test drove the van and checked it out to make sure that all the functions worked. We then went to lunch to discuss if this was it and headed back to the dealership so we could buy the car. Initially I had wanted to sell our Chevy ourselves so that we could get more money out of it. But Robb and I decided that it would be better to just trade it in and not deal with the hassle of selling it ourselves. Maybe if I wasn’t 8.5 months pregnant with twins or if Robb was around more on the weekends to help me show the car or if we had started this whole process sooner, we would have tried selling the car ourselves. But we decided to trade it in and we got even less money than I had hoped for it (while Robb thinks we got more money than he thought they were going to offer.) At that point I had a little hormonal crying fit that Robb managed to pull me back from! After two full days of car shopping, I think I was just exhausted and bummed that we were losing out on some money. After signing all the paperwork we finally said good-bye to the Chevy and drove away in our new mini-van.

I’ve been driving the van for about a month now and still feel very pleased with the purchase. It was a well maintained van and I’m not worried about any unexpected repairs coming up soon – knock on wood! ( It was previously owned by a car rental company. Apparently that is why there are so many 2013 Dodge Grand Caravans on the used car market, they’re very popular for rental car companies). The van belongs with the kids. So while I’m driving the van now around town and for my appointments, when I go back to work in July I think that Robb will be driving the van more and I’ll take the Honda as my main car for the commute to work. The car seats bases are installed and ready to go. One of the strollers is already in the trunk. All that is missing is the kids!

You know, if we had unlimited resources/money, we probably would have chosen a larger SUV with a third row as our family car. We never really though of ourselves as mini-van people, especially because we only will have two kids. (Although I suppose no one really does dream about being a mini-van owner.) But having two babies at once and a limited budget makes you reevaluate what makes sense. So, we have a mini-van. And that’s our new life right now. And that’s okay!

Mini-Van