$7000 rebate on Saab 9-2X Aero (==Subaru WRX)

[knightc2]

This is a great deal on a great car. I am really trying to think of a way to afford to do this.

 

[McPhreak]

Originally posted by: Robor
The only thing I don't like about this car is the MPG. The performance of this car is nice but getting 20 around town and 26 on the highway just isn't good enough for me. I drive too much for my job and I'm sick of spending so much time and money at the pump. The accord Hybrid would be sweet but I don't have $30K lying around. I'm leaning toward a Civic, maybe even a hybrid if I go new.

Those are some pretty optimistic numbers. I think I get about 17/24 on a good day.

 

[SnOop005]

I have never trade in my car b4, but If i were to trade in my car how does it work? I'm still paying monthly payments on it (2001 Acura 3.2 CL). Will i get a much lower price than if i were to sell it?

 

[govtcheez75]

Originally posted by: SnOop005
I have never trade in my car b4, but If i were to trade in my car how does it work? I'm still paying monthly payments on it (2001 Acura 3.2 CL). Will i get a much lower price than if i were to sell it?

Yes. You would get the trade in value, which is much less than resale value. If you really want to trade it in, then I would suggest that you look around for a Carmax. They will give you a quote to buy your car on the spot. You then check out how much they will give you in trade in at the dealer that you're buying your new car from. Generally, Carmax will give you a few hundred, maybe thousand dollars more to buy your car. They'll cut you a check on the spot. You can use that amount to pay off the remainder of the car loan, and the left over (unless you have negative equity, meaning that you owe more than what your car is worth) to pay for your down payment. If you have negative equity, then I would strongly suggest sticking with your current car until the amount has been paid off, because you'll pretty much lose money on the transaction.

 

[oslama]

Its a shame that American carmakers are destroying unique european brands.

 

[Don Vito Corleone]

Originally posted by: oslama
Its a shame that American carmakers are destroying unique european brands.

I agree wholeheartedly, but it's worth pointing out that Ford has been a responsible steward, IMO, for Jaguar, Volvo, and Aston Martin. GM, OTOH, seems to be doing everything in its power to homogenize and generally ruin the traditionally iconoclastic Saab. GM really makes me sick . . .

 

[monkied]

Originally posted by: AMDZen
I'm pretty excited right now, I don't know if I will do it but I'm definetely reviewing all the avenue's. I will have to see what they will give me for trade in, because dealers always give you jacksh!t. I might be able to finance the whole thing, sell the Civic privately and do it that way, we will see. And also what interest rate I can get since I've owned and paid for my house now for 7-8 months. I'll check with my Credit Union and also the dealer. Anyone have some tips on how to get the best rate?? Or is it based solely on your credit score?? I'm sure the dealer will suck in comparisson, and my Credit Union is around 4.5%, which isn't as good as I was hoping for.

AMDZen,

If you own a house, you can borrow from your equity to purchase the car. The advantages of this, depending on the type of loan, is that your purchase could be completely tax deductible (up to $100k on a home equity loan or line of credit) and it would be stretched out on a longer period.

For instance, most car loans are financed from 36-60 months, but a home equity loan/line of credit would stretch that period longer, making your monthly payments smaller. Of course, you end up paying more for interest the longer your financing is. Just something to consider.

 

[codeyf]

Originally posted by: monkied

Originally posted by: AMDZen
I'm pretty excited right now, I don't know if I will do it but I'm definetely reviewing all the avenue's. I will have to see what they will give me for trade in, because dealers always give you jacksh!t. I might be able to finance the whole thing, sell the Civic privately and do it that way, we will see. And also what interest rate I can get since I've owned and paid for my house now for 7-8 months. I'll check with my Credit Union and also the dealer. Anyone have some tips on how to get the best rate?? Or is it based solely on your credit score?? I'm sure the dealer will suck in comparisson, and my Credit Union is around 4.5%, which isn't as good as I was hoping for.

AMDZen,

If you own a house, you can borrow from your equity to purchase the car. The advantages of this, depending on the type of loan, is that your purchase could be completely tax deductible (up to $100k on a home equity loan or line of credit) and it would be stretched out on a longer period.

For instance, most car loans are financed from 36-60 months, but a home equity loan/line of credit would stretch that period longer, making your monthly payments smaller. Of course, you end up paying more for interest the longer your financing is. Just something to consider.

Just the interest of a home equity loan is tax deductible. I wish our whole loan was deductible!

 

[artist99]

does it come with a beautiful woman?

 

[AMDZen]

Originally posted by: monkied

Originally posted by: AMDZen
I'm pretty excited right now, I don't know if I will do it but I'm definetely reviewing all the avenue's. I will have to see what they will give me for trade in, because dealers always give you jacksh!t. I might be able to finance the whole thing, sell the Civic privately and do it that way, we will see. And also what interest rate I can get since I've owned and paid for my house now for 7-8 months. I'll check with my Credit Union and also the dealer. Anyone have some tips on how to get the best rate?? Or is it based solely on your credit score?? I'm sure the dealer will suck in comparisson, and my Credit Union is around 4.5%, which isn't as good as I was hoping for.

AMDZen,

If you own a house, you can borrow from your equity to purchase the car. The advantages of this, depending on the type of loan, is that your purchase could be completely tax deductible (up to $100k on a home equity loan or line of credit) and it would be stretched out on a longer period.

For instance, most car loans are financed from 36-60 months, but a home equity loan/line of credit would stretch that period longer, making your monthly payments smaller. Of course, you end up paying more for interest the longer your financing is. Just something to consider.

Awesome, thats good information to have, thanks. All of the cars I've ever purchased, I purchased with cash. And when I bought my house, it was the first loan I ever took out. Thats why my credit sucked, not because of bad credit but because I didn't have any.

But I've only owned my house now for 7-8 months, so how much equity would I really have built up? I'm also curious to find out how much credit I've gained since my loan person said it would probably take 6 months and my credit should be really good.

 

[user1234]

AMDZen, you stated previously that "Then we get the same employee cash bonus = -$1,000 " (even though you are not a GM employee) which is on top of the $7K rebate. Do you know if anyone that is eligible for GM Supplier price (but not employee price) is eligible for this extra $1000 employee cash bonus ? thanks

 

[BadNewsBears]

Dad just got the non-aero 2.5l for $17,200 GMS bitches!

 

[Chrono]

Saab sucks ass. Maintenance is gonna cost you. Where's the nearest local SAAB mechanic? like, no where.

 

[BadNewsBears]

Originally posted by: Chrono
Saab sucks ass. Maintenance is gonna cost you. Where's the nearest local SAAB mechanic? like, no where.

At every gm dealership. And it has a subaru engine/trans. So. Stfu much?

 

[Midnight Rambler]

Iagree wholeheartedly, but it's worth pointing out that Ford has been a responsible steward, IMO, for Jaguar, Volvo, and Aston Martin. GM, OTOH, seems to be doing everything in its power to homogenize and generally ruin the traditionally iconoclastic Saab. GM really makes me sick . . .

Unfortunately, you don't have all your facts straight. Firstly, Ford has just about killed Jaguar, both financially and image-wise. Second, though GM owns the Saab marque, they still control their styling locally. Third, it wasn't GM's fault that Saab didn't have a new platform of their own ready and using the Subaru platform was a great choice both for Saab (they got a solid car design for $0 in R&D) and for GM (cause we own a chunk of Subaru). But then I suppose we're ruining Subaru too. Just make sure you don't read the latest J.D. Power results, where GM was awarded for the top three assembly plants in N. America in quality, plus top awards in quite a few categories. And whatever you do, do not read the Harbour report which rated GM as running two of the top five assembly plants in the world ... Porsche, Lexus, and Audi were the trailers. Funny, no Toyota anywhere ...

 

[octalon7]

Not to piss in your cheerios, but Harbour's report only captures North American production plants...of which, the large asian manufacturers, such as Toyota (the one you specifically mention), do not release their reporting figures; therefore, they aren't even in the report to rank. Outside of the report, it's generally known that the Toyota, Honda, and Nissan would still rank higher than the domestic manufacturers.

 

[knightc2]

Saab sucks ass. Maintenance is gonna cost you. Where's the nearest local SAAB mechanic? like, no where.

Yes Saab sucks, but this is not a Saab. This is a rebadged Subaru. Some GM dealers may be able to work on this car, but I don't know. Warranty issues may require a Saab specific dealership. If you were paying for the work yourself you could probably take it to a Subaru dealer.

 

[Don Vito Corleone]

Originally posted by: Midnight Rambler

Iagree wholeheartedly, but it's worth pointing out that Ford has been a responsible steward, IMO, for Jaguar, Volvo, and Aston Martin. GM, OTOH, seems to be doing everything in its power to homogenize and generally ruin the traditionally iconoclastic Saab. GM really makes me sick . . .

Unfortunately, you don't have all your facts straight. Firstly, Ford has just about killed Jaguar, both financially and image-wise. Second, though GM owns the Saab marque, they still control their styling locally. Third, it wasn't GM's fault that Saab didn't have a new platform of their own ready and using the Subaru platform was a great choice both for Saab (they got a solid car design for $0 in R&D) and for GM (cause we own a chunk of Subaru). But then I suppose we're ruining Subaru too. Just make sure you don't read the latest J.D. Power results, where GM was awarded for the top three assembly plants in N. America in quality, plus top awards in quite a few categories. And whatever you do, do not read the Harbour report which rated GM as running two of the top five assembly plants in the world ... Porsche, Lexus, and Audi were the trailers. Funny, no Toyota anywhere ...

As Octalon correctly states, the Harbour report is so incomplete as to be misleading, and to me J.D. Power has always been suspect (since Lexus, for example, has always shown stellar long-term reliability, whereas GM's is comparatively poor).

My beef with GM vis a vis Saab has more to with the Trailblazer-platformed Saab SUV than the 9-2X, although both represent a meaningful watering-down of the marque. As it happens, I think the 9-2X is a perfectly nice car (and, at this price, an awesome deal), but only to the extent it's basically a WRX. The interior is unimpressive, and the whole car a little insubstantial by Saab standards.

You're entitled to your own opinion of the way Ford has managed Jaguar - they have certainly had hard times financially - but IMO the models introduced under Ford represent a logical continuation of the Jaguar history, whereas the Saab entries under GM are a complete farce.

I have owned, over the years, a Buick, a Toyota, two Hondas, an Acura, and (presently) a Nissan. I honestly can't imagine what would motivate me to ignore GM's crappy fit and finish and painful resale (largely a by-product of their aggressive rebates and discounts) and buy one. As an American, I wish GM would pull their head out, but as far as I'm concerned there are only a handful of GM cars since the early '70s that I would want to own.

 

[wavshrdr]

This is a great deal on a nice car. I have the WRX Wagon and it is an incredibly tweakable car. I don't know what the 9-2x is so much slower than the WRX sedan or wagon. All the tests seem to show a bigger difference than the few hundreds pounds should penalize the car in 0-60 times or in the 1/4 mile.

With a few bolt on mods you can go out and hunt down Corvettes or 'Stangs! Drop on a new ECU, big turbo, injectors, exhaust, up-pipe, bigger IC core and for about 4K in upgrades (less than what you saved in the rebate) you can have an easy low 12 second 1/4 mile station wagon. Or to put it another way 0-60 in the low 4 second range even if it is raning out. Easy bolt-on's can get you solidly into the 13 second range.

My WRX will run high 11's (11.88) with the above mods and a small shot (40HP) of nitrous and that is not a sea level. At the track where I ran my car on the same day I was running a Z06 Vette was running mid 12's. Even without the bottle I was running almost 12 flat. This is flat out supercar territory. The WRX is one heck of a sleeper and has been very reliable.

If you DO buy one of these, don't abuse the 1-2 shift or you WILL have problems. So far I have about 35k miles on my WRX since the mods and I still have the stock transmission. Only downside to the car is the city mileage is about as bad as my supercharged MB (~17mpg). Also the insurance class hasn't been helped by all the people who crashed their WRX's. I spend as much in insurance a month as my MB and it cost many times more than the Subie!

If I didn't already have a WRX I'd pounce on this deal in a minute. Heck it is so good I might pick one up for another daily driver. One heck of a car for not much cash!

 

[user1234]

I am still considering this deal, even though I've heard dealers are running out of these cars. The thing is I wasn't totally blown away by the test drives I took, and I agree with DonVtio the interior is a little bland and the exterior is not as substatial as true Saabs (although I still think it's an attractive looking car). Btw, I think that the Saab 9-3, which was also introduced in the GM era, is a very good car overall (fun, comfortable, attractive) and is also a true Saab in every way. The only problem with it is that it's reliability is horrible, with things breaking and falling apart even within the first year. I have no doubt it's because of the use of cheap parts (like the watch which loses 10 minutes per week) which is undoubtedly "inspired" by the GM execs and their relentless cost cutting. When will they understand that is not a good way to retain customers.

 

[garkman]

Get a Mazda 3, that's what I'm doing...I test drove a 9-2x linear and the power was horrible, the trim was even shoddier than the Mazda 3 SP32 5-door I'm getting. Not to mention comparably equipped the Saab is STILL a few grand more after rebates.

 

[knightc2]

The Saab 9-2X Aero is the one to get. It puts out 227 HP and will destroy the Mazda 3 in terms of performance. Not that I think the Mazda 3 is a bad vehicle. It just can't compete with the Saab 9-2X Aero. Not to mention the Saab has AWD.

 

[Wahsapa]

Originally posted by: garkman
Get a Mazda 3, that's what I'm doing...I test drove a 9-2x linear and the power was horrible, the trim was even shoddier than the Mazda 3 SP32 5-door I'm getting. Not to mention comparably equipped the Saab is STILL a few grand more after rebates.

2 things:

1) turbo
2) awd

 

[MowSow]

Originally posted by: Wahsapa

Originally posted by: garkman
Get a Mazda 3, that's what I'm doing...I test drove a 9-2x linear and the power was horrible, the trim was even shoddier than the Mazda 3 SP32 5-door I'm getting. Not to mention comparably equipped the Saab is STILL a few grand more after rebates.

2 things:

1) turbo
2) awd

2 Turbos are always better than one
My Ride

 

[Thump553]

As a Saab owner (1996 900, bought new, only major repair to date has been a broken clutch cable) I totally agree with Don Vito's analysis of what GM has done to Saab. I'm very happy with my Saab and expect to get several more years out of it (hopefully until all the kids are out of college) but I am less than impressed with what GM has done to Saab now that they have totally taken it over.

My first car was a German built Opel, and it was a great economy car. A few years later GM took over Opel, replaced all it's models (in the US) with rebadged cheap Japanese cars and killed the brandname-at least here in the US. I expect the same thing to happen with Saab, which is a real shame. Saab built some great cars in the past.