I Did it Again! Snagged Another Good Deal on a Used Car

Hi friends. Thanks for stopping by to read how I snagged another good deal on a used car.

This is all about an older single female going car shopping and not wanting to get ripped off by a used car salesperson.

We’ve been here before on this blog. I talked about my first solo experience at buying a car. For most of my life my father or my deadbeat ex had accompanied me when buying a car. That first solo car buying experience I missed my father more than the deadbeat – that’s for sure! But I did it. I bought a used car from a dealership just after it had arrived on the lot as a trade in.

A nice 2012 Mazda 3 hatchback with a sunroof. I really liked that car. The picture below is just after I took it for a test drive at the dealership.

And below the car is parked in front of Cranberry Sweets in Coos Bay, Oregon.

And below the Mazda is parked in front of a hotel in Osoyoos, BC. The steps are how my senior dog got in and out of the car in her later years. Can you see her inside?

As you can see, that little car got around. I took many road trips with it.

What happened to my Mazda 3?

When I became a nomad and left Canada in the summer of 2023 I signed my Mazda over to a friend to sell for me.

He didn’t sell it. In fact was considering buying it off me to give to his son. When it became clear in the spring of 2024 that I would be returning to Canada and to BC to spend time with my horse, I asked my friend not to sell the car because I’m coming back for it.

Yay! Me and my Mazda to be reunited!

As it got closer to me returning to BC, my friends with the car were forced to move as the house they were living was being demolished to make way for a new subdivision. They had to be out by December 1, 2024 and were struggling to find a rental that would accept their two dogs. They were putting stuff in storage and were a bit concerned about what to do with the car.

I had a friend who said the car could come to her place. Also where I was housesitting, the homeowner said my friend could bring my car there to wait for me.

I tried to get hold of my friend in mid-November to tell him where to bring the car. He was quite busy when I phoned. He’d found a place to move and a friend had just arrived to help him build a fence.

A month later he calls to tell me my car was parked on the street and a neighbor crashed into it. The car is not driveable. He feels horrible and is dealing with ICBC (Insurance Corporation of British Columbia). At that time it was unknown if ICBC would have the car repaired or write it off. Due to the car’s age – 2012 – I doubted they would repair it. Body shops are so expensive and ICBC will write off a car if the repair bill exceeds about 65% of the car’s value.

Aftermath

The final verdict is ICBC wrote the car off. My friend has never had an accident or a vandalized car in his life and this is his first time of dealing with ICBC. That’s always an extremely infuriating experience and they jacked him around for a couple of months before settling.

It took so long I’d already bought another car!

Almost every car I’ve owned has been written off by ICBC. And almost always because some jackass man drove into it while it was legally parked. Yes, parked in front of a house or in a mall parking lot.

How do you hit a parked car? In this case it was an elderly neighbor. Reflexes worsening with age. Just drove into it.

It really pisses me off. I liked that car. It was in very good shape.

Then there’s the financial hit. I have to go into my savings to buy another car which won’t be cheap. Used cars are holding their value.

What cars should I look at?

Seeing as how I hadn’t expected to go car shopping, I hadn’t really given much thought to what cars I should narrow my search down to.

When I took my road trip to New York and New England I’d rented a car – a Toyota Rav 4 or similar. I got the “or similar”. A Toyota Corolla Cross. I took a couple of photos of it after I left the rental agency just to confirm its condition, ie no dents.

But I never really took any more photos of it.

Nice little SUV. I enjoyed driving it. This car was good on gas and handled well.

When I picked it up at Thrifty rental there was a man in the office on his phone who was very agitated with whoever he was talking to because he had returned a damaged car and was being charged for the repairs. Another man who was just checking his car back in also was being dinged for damage. Literally a parking lot ding and they charged him $50.

My strategy was if they found damage to the car when I returned it, I was going to haggle to buy the car. But it never came to that. My undamaged car return was very smooth and quiet.

I checked out prices on used Toyota Corolla Crosses and Rav 4s and they were over my budget.

My car search leaned towards buying a Chevrolet Equinox. A YouTube channel that I watch features a woman driving the states in her Equinox. It seemed like a good choice for me.

Used car shopping

When I came back to BC, I stayed with a friend. Originally my housesit was supposed to begin early January, but the homeowner’s plans changed and it was changed to February.

But it was fine. My friend became my chauffeur as we went car shopping. We checked out some dealerships that had Chevrolet Equinoxes for sale. I saw one that one that was in very good shape and was on my short list. Another Equinox that was on a used car lot wasn’t even clean when I showed up to test drive it. One of the employees was using it and his briefcase and other belongings were in the car.

WTF? If you’re selling a car you want it to look good. I did like that car, but the cleaner car was above it on my shortlist.

I returned to the dealership where I bought the Mazda 3 in 2016. My old salesman was still working there – as a manager. A salesperson took me out to see an Equinox and also a Nissan Qashqai. I was interested in both, but they were both priced on the high side compared to similar cars I’d researched.

So now the Qashqai is also on my radar. I saw a dirty one at an independent used car lot with a rude saleman. I didn’t even test drive that one. Another Qashqai had just come into a Kia dealership I visited, but wasn’t available for a test drive yet. They wanted to clean it first. Hmmm. Other dealerships take note!

The salesman shows me a 2013 Ford Escape that recently arrived as a trade in. Would I like to test drive it?

It was a little older than what I was looking for, but sure, seeing as how I’m already here…

Ford Escape

The car looked good. It was clean inside and out. But it is 12 years old. However, it has low mileage, 96,000 km, and was owned by a senior couple who drove it on average about 8,000 kilometers a year. That’s about 5,000 miles per year for my American friends wondering about the conversion to metric.

The car currently has winter tires on it with good tread, and riding in the back are four summer tires on rims with good life left in the tread. The Carfax history showed regular maintenance on the Escape.

I believe they were asking $13,000 for it. Plus taxes. Plus the dreaded documentation fee – $750. I really hate paying a fee for someone to write up their own sales contract. And that fee varies with each dealership.

After a quick convo with my friend, I decided to make an offer. Mostly trying to lose that documentation fee. These days there’s not a lot of negotiation room on used cars.

After a couple of go rounds we agreed on a price that ended up at $13,500, taxes, fees, all in. I think that was fair, especially with 4 tires on the rims to go with it. That’s about a $1,000 value right there.

An hour later I drove it back to my friend’s house.

Everyone likes getting a good deal, and getting a good deal on a used car is always a win for me!

Issues?

The car didn’t come with a warranty. They wouldn’t agree to me trying to write into the contract about having my mechanic check it out either, basically bragging about their 250 point inspection.

Luckily for me I bought this car early in January when it was cold outside and getting frost on the car. Almost right away I figured out the rear defroster was not working. And that was one of the things that was checked off on the inspection.

Now to be fair, probably all they did was turn on the defrost button and saw the orange light come on. If there’s no ice on the back window, it’s pretty hard to know whether or not the rear defroster works. But also to be fair, they have electric testers that should have been used to see if any power was coming to the back window.

I returned waving the inspection papers that had checked off the rear defroster works. And now they check to see if power is coming back there. It ended up they replaced the back window for me. The company that replaced it busted the rear wiper to get the window off, so that had to be replaced too.

There is also an on and off again issue with the car’s audio system. I think I’ve traced this problem back to the free offer from Sirius Radio.

But that’s a story for another blog post because this one’s getting a little long!

Snagged another good deal on a used car

Being an international housesitter and a nomad I get around on public transit and sometimes drive the homeowner’s car. That’s because I’ve been staying in places with good transit like London, England and Toronto, Ontario.

The Greater Vancouver Area does not have good public transit, especially if you’re out in the boonies. If you want to travel between two cities, you really need a car in this part of the world.

I didn’t expect to be buying another car, but I’m glad I bought the Ford Escape. I will be housesitting around British Columbia, and this little SUV will get me where I need to go. I’m setting it up for car life and will camp in it inbetween housesits.

Subscribe to my YouTube channel to see where this little SUV takes me next!

All in all, I got a good deal on buying this used car.

Have you snagged a good deal on buying a used car? Leave a comment below and tell me about it!

Published by Cheryl @ The Lifestyle Digs on March 26, 2025

More reading:

First Solo Experience at Buying Car

BC Nomad Life: Is it Right for Me?