[speaker002:] well what what kind of car did you just buy a car or are you in the market to buy a car or
[speaker001:] actually I'm real close to being in the market to buy a car I've got uh a couple older cars they're both over ten years old
[speaker002:] uh um-hum
[speaker001:] and uh they've served me well but I kind of would like to get a more uh gas efficient car and a newer model something looks a little nicer
[speaker002:] uh-huh yeah
[speaker001:] uh I've got three children at home two fourteen year olds and a twelve year old and so I need to make sure I've got one that I can fit all five of us into and if you if you know anything about teenagers it's kind of hard to get them to sit together for any amount of time
[speaker002:] um-hum yeah I I seem to remember when I was young that was a problem but no no car was big enough for that
[speaker001:] well uh I've kind of been leaning towards a Caravan
[speaker002:] uh-huh
[speaker001:] uh now I know that that uh they've gotten quite pricey in the last couple of years but uh I like the Dodge products and uh been uh couple times I've had a opportunity to rent one
[speaker002:] um-hum
[speaker001:] uh I've been really pleased with its performance and with the size and because if you get the seven passenger version you can put some space between the kids
[speaker002:] yeah yeah
[speaker001:] and uh I think that would that would serve us well plus it's got uh good storage capacity in it for you know taking things along going to the store
[speaker002:] um-hum which is the one that has modular type seats you know which one I'm talking about they have the commercial on TV where you can you can pull some seats out and you can move around
[speaker001:] um-hum exactly correct yeah if you want
[speaker002:] is that is that the Dodge Caravan that does that or
[speaker001:] yes yeah it uh the Dodge Caravans will do that uh you can take the uh uh usually there's a uh a double seat behind the uh front buckets
[speaker002:] uh-huh
[speaker001:] and then if you get the and then there's a three seat that goes or three person seat that goes in the back now what you can do is you could take that middle seat out and just have the three seats in the back and the two seats up front or you can take the uh three seat out and just use the two seat or you can take the two seat and move the two seat to the back
[speaker002:] uh-huh
[speaker001:] so it's very versatile you can move the seats all around that's the only thing you can't do is take that three person across seat and move it forward
[speaker002:] yeah uh-huh well the one that I can't remember one it is but it's the if it's the Toyota or or one of the other ones I don't know if it's one of the Americans or the import ones where uh they actually have like um some bucket seats in the back but you can actually pull them out I mean they're really easy to pull out
[speaker001:] uh-huh
[speaker002:] um and you can uh move them around and stuff and it it to me that that would be real good for us uh my husband and I uh like to go camping and stuff and right now we have a van which is it's an older van and we're we're thinking about buying another sedan
[speaker001:] uh-huh
[speaker002:] um probably next year um right now motorcycles is takes precedence since that that's what my husband really wants right now
[speaker001:] yeah
[speaker002:] but uh next year we'll probably buy a new car and we're looking at uh possibly the Honda Accord um that's kind of uh as far as far as the interior it's got the luxury interior but doesn't it doesn't really have the luxury price tag that a lot of the other cars have which is one of the things that we were looking at you know finding something that's that's fairly affordable but yet has all the nice luxury items that we want
[speaker001:] uh-huh yeah I think that's getting to be kind of important now that uh you know the price is becoming the driving factor and then you look at once you realize how much money you've got to spend then you start looking around at at what you can buy with it where before I think you
[speaker002:] yeah
[speaker001:] you looked at the car you wanted and then you looked to see how well you could afford it
[speaker002:] uh-huh
[speaker001:] or how you could afford it
[speaker002:] yeah well I think it's going to be a lot easier now I just heard that they lowered the prime lending rate so I think it's going to be a lot easier to to be able to get a car now and finance it
[speaker001:] yeah
[speaker002:] I think banks are going to be a lot more a little bit more lenient
[speaker001:] yeah I know they're trying to do everything they can to uh end the recession
[speaker002:] yeah
[speaker001:] and dropping the prime is probably one of the things I just bought a new house so I got a a uh nine and a half percent interest rate
[speaker002:] uh-huh
[speaker001:] not sure I could do much better today but uh that is also effecting buying a new car
[speaker002:] yeah I can imagine you got to kind of work work that into your budget that balance that and the house payment and of course uh is if you buy a new car you're going to are any of your kids driving age yet
[speaker001:] well that and there uh two fourteen year olds will be uh fifteen on the fourth of July so
[speaker002:] are so are they twins
[speaker001:] yeah they're twins born on the bicentennial you're going to have twins have them on the bicentennial is our motto July fourth seventy six
[speaker002:] oh wow
[speaker001:] so uh uh I've still got another full year and three months before they're going to be behind the wheel of a car so America's safe for another fifteen month
[speaker002:] uh-huh
[speaker001:] and uh after that now I may keep the uh one or both of the two cars I I currently have for them to drive you know they're they're they're small enough that a first time driver could handle it yet big enough that I feel safe feel safe that if they were in an accident they would survive
[speaker002:] uh-huh uh-huh
[speaker001:] you know what I mean it I don't get that kind of feeling with the kind of car like you talked about the Honda they're just
[speaker002:] well the the Honda's have been have been very safe in in accidents uh more so than a lot of the American cars as a matter of fact I just heard something today on on the news about
[speaker001:] uh-huh is that right
[speaker002:] those uh automatic seat belts that are attached to the door um they're questioning the safety of those now
[speaker001:] uh-huh right
[speaker002:] saying that and they showed uh a simulation where there were they had a dummy in the car and the door opened and the dummy actually fell out of the car and the car rolled out on top of him
[speaker001:] jeez
[speaker002:] so they're saying they're not as safe as they give the appearance of being safe but they're really not as safe as they as they uh appear to be so um I'm kind of concerned about that as far as you know what the seat belts
[speaker001:] well
[speaker002:] uh I don't know if Marylan d has a uh a seat belt law but they do have one in Texas and you're you're required to wear them
[speaker001:] yes definitely the thing is that they're I think it's a two part seat belt though there's the uh door belt and then there's one a lap belt
[speaker002:] exactly but ninety uh probably about well I don't know about ninety but probably fifty percent of the people that have those probably don't wear the lap portion of it I know my brother doesn 't and he has one in his car
[speaker001:] then make sure you smack him around then
[speaker002:] so I mean it it kind of gives you a false sense of security you think oh I've got one portion of my seat belt on um but if your door comes open you know it's not going to do you any good
[speaker001:] yeah
[speaker002:] so that that that's a concern of mine as far as uh what I'll be looking at with with buying a new car um I'm not really sure if I would want the seat belts attached to the door I think I would feel better with them attached to the actual car the inside where they're normally attached to like behind the door
[speaker001:] yeah yeah the uh the supports um a good source of information I've found has always been these uh used car manuals
[speaker002:] uh-huh
[speaker001:] because you can flip through the used car manuals and they'll give you a list of all the problems that the car's had in the past
[speaker002:] hum
[speaker001:] and you can look at the uh the track record on a car over the year and you usually notice uh a lot of problems at the beginning and then things kind of iron out to where there's fewer problems and you get an idea on how well
[speaker002:] yeah yeah yeah
[speaker001:] the the next car's going to be now as long as they aren't changing the model you know like when the uh Pontiac Grand Prix went from being a huge car to a small car they had a lot of problems with the smaller car as long as they aren't
[speaker002:] yeah yeah the the Le Mans is like that too uh we used to have a Le Mans when I was in in high school um and it was a big car I mean it was like the uh the Grand Prix
[speaker001:] uh-huh
[speaker002:] and in I think around nineteen eighty um they changed the model and it like went went to half the size
[speaker001:] yeah sure
[speaker002:] literally I mean it got chopped in half and it wasn't even the same car anymore didn't even remotely resemble the old car
[speaker001:] uh-huh yeah I remember when that happened so unless they're really changing the model um yeah chances are that it's probably going to have the the fewer mistakes than it had the year before
[speaker002:] yeah well everybody that I've talked to who's ever had a Honda loves them and my husband had a Honda
[speaker001:] uh-huh
[speaker002:] uh and it was a lease car and he had to turn back in uh a year and a half ago uh and he had it for four years and never had a single problem with it and it was great um and the only reason why we ended up not buying it was because we didn't feel the at at the time the residual was like sixty five hundred dollars and it was a four year old car with seventy thousand miles on it and we thought that was a little bit too much to pay for
[speaker001:] yeah
[speaker002:] um a four year old car
[speaker001:] yeah I agree
[speaker002:] so so we ended up just went just went ahead and just turned the keys back in and and got out of the lease um one thing that I that I am curious about is um reading information on air bags do some of the vans I think I don't know about the Dodge Caravan but some of the vans now now have um driver side air bags
[speaker001:] uh-huh
[speaker002:] which I think is a good idea
[speaker001:] yeah