Ockey Family Adventures: New Car

Dad with his new car.

Five years ago, Dad crashed his car on the way home from Church. Since the car was totaled, Mom had to take him to work until we could get a new car. Well, Dad did something he'd never done before and rushed getting a new car, which was not a good thing. For five years, Dad hated that car, even though the payments were pretty reasonable.

As the final payment came due, Dad thought a lot about cars. Yes, he could continue driving and hating this car until the wheels fell off, but he really didn't want to. To complicate things, our van, which is the greatest vehicle the world has ever known, now has 210,000 miles on it. We love it dearly, but we worry, too. If Dad bought a new car, we'd likely end up with two payments at some point.

Also, Dad got into his head that he really wanted an electric car, not so much to save gas, but to save the air. Though he was pretty sure he wasn't going to buy a car, he did a lot of research. Then, on a whim, he and Mom went and drove a fully electric Chevy Volt. It drove beautifully. However, fully electric cars need special charging ports, and they are more expensive to begin with. Dad didn't want a hybrid, which is basically an efficient gas engine. He decided he wanted a plug-in hybrid. This car had a very limited range (around 30 miles) on an electric charge, but when you exhaust that, has full hybrid capabilities. Plug-ins are a little more reasonably priced and charge in a regular outlet, though it takes eight hours to get those 30 miles.

So after family pictures, we took the family down to the Hyundai dealership. We had a coupon for a $50 cash gift card just for driving a car. It seemed worth it. Dad walked in and said, "I want to buy a fully electric or plug-in Hyundai Ioniq." Everyone just looked at him. Then they explained that since Utah doesn't really have the infrastructure for electric cars, they don't have any on the lot. They can't order one, or get one, either. In fact, other than the rare circumstance of someone coming in from California and trading one in, they don't ever even see electric or plug-in vehicles. So, to earn the $50, we drove a hybrid. Dad was totally deflated and entirely not interested. When we got back to the dealership, it was nearly 8 o'clock, and we needed to get the kids home. The dealer ran in to see if he had anything in the entire inventory that was electric, and we got ready to go.

It may have been a dealer trick, but he came back saying that they'd received a plug-in Sonata from California auction that morning. When he pulled it up, it was absolutely beautiful! The exact pearly white color Dad wanted! We got in and discovered that it was high-end, which meant leather seats, driver assist, everything. There was no way we could afford this car. Then we got the good news that the car was a lemon-law car. This meant it had been returned to the dealer and fixed. Dad had bought a car like that before and used the money he'd saved to extend the warranty with no problems. The cost of the car was in our price range. Not only that, though it was a 2016, it only had 24K miles on it. Dad sent Mom home to put the kids to bed and drive his old car back.

To make a long story short, Dad traded in his hateful old car, got his dream car with five years or 75K miles of warranty, and saved a little piece of the environment. He could not be happier! Now we are praying for the van to make it another few hundred thousand miles.