u/Cold-Priority-2729

I'm in the market for a new car and just went to try using Costco's car buying service. I thought it would be some thorough process where I input my information and get a list of already-negotiated OTD offers without having to talk to or haggle with a dealer. But all I can do is select my desired make and model, and then it asks me for my phone number so it can send it off to dealerships.

I don't really want to get spam calls from 12 different dealers. I thought that was the whole purpose of using Costco's car buying program - to avoid exactly that. Reddit reviews of the car buying program seem generally very positive, so I feel like I must be misunderstanding how this works.

I owned a 2010 Mazda up until last month and then sold it private party. I'm hoping to buy a new CX-30 later this summer. I have a friend who works for Mazda in another state, and he told me to screenshot my active insurance card before selling the 2010, because then it can be used to qualify for the $500 loyalty credit later in the year.

How do they typically verify current Mazda ownership? Do they just ask to see an insurance card screenshot? Or do they ask for the license plate and look you up to see if you're the current owner? My insurance card that I screenshotted (although it is now cancelled) is shown as active until August 1 2026 in the screenshot I took.

Considering buying one later this summer (Connecticut) and wondering if I should expect to be able to negotiate and haggle at all. I was looking at the RAV4 but I keep hearing that they’re so popular that you can’t get one for below or even at MSRP.

I grew up being told that you should never go into debt for a car. Just pay cash for a beater and drive it for a few years until it dies, then rinse and repeat. Or, if you can afford it, pay cash for a lightly used car, because a car loses 20% of its value as soon as you someone drives it off the lot, or whatever they say.

To this day, I continue to see these sentiments echoed all over Reddit. It seems like many folks on here would do ANYTHING to not have a monthly car payment. And if that monthly payment is something like $1,000 a month at 10% interest over 72 months for a $55K truck, then yeah, I agree that's a terrible idea. But owning a beater car and pouring thousands of dollars into maintaining it can be a money sink too.

I want to throw some numbers out there from my wife and I. We both drove older, used cars that we paid cash for several years ago and just recently sold because we are about to move across the country.

ME: 2010 Mazda 3

• Purchased 3 years ago for $6K at 105K miles.
• Spent $1000 on initial repairs (fluid changes, spark plugs, belts) since it was at the 100K mark and the previous owner didn't have many maintenance records.
• One year in, I spent $1000 to replace the engine mounts because the engine started shifting all over the place when changing gears
• 18 months in, I spent $1,400 to get the AC fixed because that stopped working (we live in Texas, it wasn't really optional)
• 2 years in, I spent $1,200 to replace some lose tie rod ends that the mechanic said were at a dangerous point, as well as a CV axle that was slinging grease.
• 2.5 years in, I spent $400 to replace and reprogram two of the TPMS sensors, since the tire light was always on even though the tires were properly inflated.
• 3 years in, I had a bunch of lights come on and a mechanic diagnosed it with a transmission leak. I decided to cut my losses and sell it private party for $1,500.
• So, I spent $6K to buy the car, $5K on non-routine repairs, then was only able to get $1,500 for it. That's about $9,500 to own a car for 36 months, which comes out to about $264 per month - and that's NOT including all of the routine maintenance (oil changes, filters, tires and rotations, brakes, etc.).

But wait, surely that's just because it was a Mazda, right? Hondas and Toyotas NEVER have problems, right? Well...

WIFE: 2010 Toyota Camry

• Purchased 5 years ago for $10,000 at 70K miles.
• 2 years in, she spent $800 to replace a leaking power steering hose.
• 3 years in, she spent $1,000 to replace the throttle body due to a violently rough idle.
• 3 years in, she spent $1,500 to replace all the engine mounts (same problem as my Mazda above).
• At the 100K mile mark, she spent around $1,000 getting new belts, spark plugs, coolant, and PS fluid.
• 4 years in (at around 130K miles), it started making a weird noise at startup. It turned out that the timing chain and VVT actuator was messed up, and after paying for diagnostics at 4 different mechanics and getting the same opinion from each one, she spent $4,500 to fix it. So $5K if you include all the diagnostic fees. This is the kind of thing that you buy a Camry for - because a Camry usually avoids these pricey repairs.
• Now at 5 years, the front struts are leaking, so she's about to spend $1,200 to get those replaced.
• Adding this up, we get $20,500 spent on this Camry, and if she were to sell it today, it probably wouldn't be worth much more than $5K. So $15,500/60 months and you get about $258 per month - again, not including any of the routine maintenance.

So, even if you pay cash for a car, you're still going to end up averaging several hundred dollars a month in repairs. Not to mention, we incurred a number of costs (financial costs and opportunity costs) by having to leave our cars with mechanics, sometimes for several days at a time, and taking Ubers or alternative transportation.

In retrospect, it would have made way more sense for us to just go and get brand new Corollas for $26K out-the-door. We could have done 50% down payments and probably gotten really good interest rates since we have 800 credit scores, paid $300 a month for a few years, and then they'd be paid off. We wouldn't have had to worry about repair costs for the first 3 years since they'd be under warranty. Even after the warranty, we'd have been able to enjoy the best years of the cars (sub-100K miles) with likely minimal repairs. By owning older cars at or over 100k miles, we've been bearing the brunt of those repair costs.

And that's not all. By owning a car from 0 miles, you get to ensure that it gets driven wisely and maintained properly, avoiding costly repairs down the road. My wife's Camry that needed the full timing job for $4,500 was, according to the mechanic who fixed it, likely a consequence of the first owner (for the first 70K miles of the car's life) who didn't always take it in for oil changes every 5K miles.

A common counterargument would be - well don't buy an old beater! Just buy a lightly used car that's a couple years old with 20K miles on it! Let someone else take that depreciation hit! In 2026, I'm just not sure this still holds. Lightly used cars seem to be hardly any cheaper, sometimes no cheaper, than their new counterparts. And, you STILL don't know how that first owner treated it for those first 20K miles - did they do all their oil changes? Did they drive it recklessly? Because if not, you might be paying for the consequences of that down the road.

Anyways, this is the math I've worked out in my head. I do agree that buying used cars can be slightly cheaper than buying new cars in the aggregate - but it's just not a guarantee, and in the meantime, you incur all sorts of inconveniences and headaches dealing with repairs. If you can comfortably afford a new car at a reasonable price, and buy it in cash or qualify for a good interest rate with a hefty down payment, then I don't see why buying new cars is the financial suicide that Redditors make it out to be.

Please, someone tell me what I'm missing.

I live in Connecticut and was browsing prices for new CX-30's in my area. I came across one dealer that appears to have a whole bunch of 2022 and 2023 new CX-30's for sale. A few CX-50's as well. I checked a few other Mazda dealers in the area and none of them had anything like this.

Could this be some kind of mistake on the website? I would get it if they still had some 2025 or even 2024 models left over that they were still trying to get rid of, but I'm not sure why they'd still be sitting on new 2022's...

Moving to New Haven from Texas and trying to find a decent two bedroom, dog friendly place for under $2,300 a month. Seems like Westgate Townhomes is one of the few places where I can get that, and it still looks decently nice in the pictures.

Am I missing something? Is it in a dangerous area or something?

For the last 5 years, I’ve had a home security system with Vivint. It’s paid off, so I own it now. But I just sold my house and will be moving across the country. I’ll likely be renting for the next year or two and then hopefully buying a home again.

What is my best course of action? Should I just sell the equipment on eBay, or should I have a Vivint technician come disassemble it so I can hold on to it for a year or two, then have them reinstall it when I buy another house?

My 2010 Camry has 135K miles on it. I bought it at 70K miles and don't know much about its history before that (so no idea if the trans fluid was regularly serviced or not). I did a drain & fill at 70K miles when I bought it, and again at 100K miles. So naturally, it's due up for another one right about now.

But I've also heard that with these older Camry's, sometimes at a certain high mileage it's best to just leave the trans alone and not touch it. Am I right to keep doing the drain & fill every 30K miles?