Holy crap - I did it
 

Hey guys,

Want to say hello, and that I'm excited to join the club. I've been looking for a car over the past few months as my old 1997 Honda Accord has been giving out - my wife and I test drove a 370z yesterday... and WOW. We've been toying with the 135i for the past couple months, but the 370z had us at 2nd gear.

We bought a Monterrey Blue Touring w/ Sport and managed to use USAA's car buying service to get the car 1200 under invoice when it was all said and done, which I think is a pretty smokin' deal, combined with the great interest rates out here. I'm still in a little bit of shock as this is my first new car purchase and seems like a crazy amount of money, despite the great deal.

Super excited to hang out with you guys further - this forum has already been a huge resource for me in the past couple weeks as I researched the 370z, and I'm excited to contribute.

I know that no thread like this is good without pics, so I'll try to take her up on Mulholland tomorrow evening for some dusk shots. :-)

JS

Joe Stevenson?!

Oh and welcome. :D

If you don't mind telling us...how much is 1200 under invoice???

Welcome and congrats, look forward to seeing you around some of the meets :tup:

As in Joe Daddy? Awesome, welcome to the club Joe Daddy.

Congrats on the deal/car and welcome to the site!

That is a smokin deal! congrats.

Well done, sir! :tiphat: So, you're going from 97 Accord to 09 370Z? :eek: Your wife is going to have a very hard time keeping you off the Z! Have fun, drive safe! :driving:

Congrats
 

Congrats. The easy part is now over. Now convincing the wife that mods are a necessary evil is the hard part. Stand by to take her shopping alot!

I don't know the exact figure off the top of my head - but it was 900 under the invoice price of the car based on the sheet floating around here combined with the window tint being free which saved 300 bucks there.

*just grabbed the sheet* Ended up around 34550... before the great state of California jumped in.

"off"...you act like it's a physical attraction to the car!!!

Maybe it is :nutswinger:

So perhaps the honeymoon was a little short --- went down this morning and the z wouldn't start. Sort of fun trying to get it out of my complexes garage and onto the tow truck.

13 hours after I took possession, it doesn't start?

Back at the dealership. Hoping it's something stupid like their dealer-inventory-security system, but regardless, not cool.

ouch, guessing you checked the basics??
battery voltage
key in pocket
brake/clutch in when turning it on

did you hear the starter clicking over at all? if you did it's probably fuel or spark related...if not it is starter related.

crossing my fingers for you that it's something minor.

I have a 2006 Rav4 that had a similar problem the week after pickup. Turns out that we assumed the headlights would turn off on their own (auto, right?), but if you turn on the headlights after turning off the car, the headlights stay on. Needless to say, running down the battery was our fault.

Are you sure you didn't do anything the night before to leave something on?

Battery was fine. Showed 12 volts charge on the guage and radio and lights came up, headlights at full power etc. Just heard a buzzing sound when I tried to start it. The tow truck guy helped me try and jump it with a booster and the engine still didn't turnover.

Fortunately, the dealership just called, apparently there was an issue with the dealer inventory alarm system they had on the cars and it's good to go now. The tow truck guy said this dealership has this happen with their Altimas all the time.

So hopefully that's it.

$1200 under invoice is a great deal! Most of the SoCal dealers are at $300 - $500 over invoice (especially with Touring/Sport packages). You done good!

Very cool. Hopefully their botched alarm system wiring job won't cause more unexpected stuff down the road. Do you know specifically what they did wrong on the install?

Awesome! I felt the same way on my test drive, but the wife wasn't too happy! I'm also financed through USAA. Best bank I've ever used by far.

Actually, it was the wife's test drive that sold the car. She thought it was completely impractical before we went over there. We both had the same goofy grin afterwards.

USAA is awesome. Best car insurance I've ever had (and cheapest) and the bank itself is great. Totally customer focused. Still shocked by the deal they helped me get on the car. And how easy the whole thing was (besides this error)

Nope - it was whatever inventory management system they use not being disabled properly. So we'll see. Besides the being late to work on a busy day and the hassle of getting the car out, it's a small hiccup. They also called to see what they could do for me, so hoping we end up with a free oil change or something like that. I'd call it even then.