Soon to Be...

Hello --

I know there has been a lot of posts like mine in the last few weeks, but I can't resist. This Thursday, my wife and I will take delivery of our first Prius. And I can hardly stand the wait!

The journey began not too long ago...

My wife and I just married 15 months ago. Both of us had SUVs before marrying, and used them frequently for what they were designed to do. But once together, we quickly learned there was no reason to have two SUVs in one household. But since both cars were paid for, it was hard to justify selling one and getting a new car. So we trodded on and went about our merry way.

Then one night this May, I woke up just after midnight and could not go back to sleep. Out of nowhere, and I do mean nowhere, I started thinking about the Prius. Why, I don't know. After rolling around for 45 minutes, I snuck quietly out of the bedroom and headed off to our home office to crunch some numbers. It didn't take long to realize that for our particular situation, the Prius would in fact save us money. I spent 3 or 4 hours that night researching all that I could find (I hadn't discovered PriusChat yet) and I ended up getting an hour or two of sleep when it was all said and done.

Over dinner the next night, I mentioned my new discovery to my wife and asked her to review the numbers. She confirmed what I had found and we decided to look even further into the Prius. And that is when I found the wealth of knowledge that is PriusChat. After hundreds of posts and countless hours, I knew that on paper, the Prius was right for me. Now came the next challenge -- actually finding one to test drive.

By this point, it was a few days before Memorial Day weekend and we were traveling from Kansas to Houston for an extended weekend trip. Like most dealers in the country, my local dealer did not have a Prius in stock. So we began calling every dealer from Kansas City to Houston during our drive. As luck would have it, we found a Silver Package 3 in Oklahoma City that became available that morning and was available for a test drive. And even better luck was the fact that we were just outside of Oklahoma City at that point and time and the dealership was just a few miles off the highway. An hour later, we pulled into the dealership and test drove the car. It was everything and more than what we hoped for.

We were set on wanting a Magnetic Gray Package #6. Considering that the Prius comes in 64 combinations, what would be the odds of finding what we want? Pretty slim, but one has to try. This particular dealership did not get Package 6's on a regular basis and would have to order it, putting us on a 3 to 4 month waiting list. We could do that back at our local dealer, so no dice. The wife and I went back to our 3 state dial-fest.

About 20 to 25 dealerships later, I was on the phone listening to a salesperson trying to tell me all about the Hybrid Synergy Drive. :blink: As I was trying to tell her that I already knew all about the car, my wife began poking me in the side. She was nodding her head up and down with excitement and signified that she may have found one. I hung up with the salesperson that wasn't listening to me anyway and my wife handed over the phone. Riverside Toyota of Tulsa was on the phone and they assured me that they got Magnetic Gray Pakage 6s in all the time and our wait would only be 2 to 4 weeks. I had him repeat it to me several times because I could hardly believe my own ears. And to top it off, the salesperson was easy going and quickly adapted to our style. He could tell that we had already done our homework and was ready to answer our few remaining questions intelligently and wihout the usual salespitch that you often find at other dealerships.

Sure enough, they delivered as promised. And quite honestly, up to this point, this has been the easiest car buying experience to date. Our Prius just arrived in Tulsa and is getting the windows tinted as I type this.

PriusChat has been an enormous help. Thank you Danny for creating and managing such a wonderful site, and thank you to all of its members for making it what it is today. I look forward to contributing to these forums and reading many more posts.

I've never found myself passionate about a car before, but there must be something special about the Prius, huh?

Pics to follow on Friday...

Bryan

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(M. Oiseau @ Jun 27 2006, 10:48 PM) [snapback]277866[/snapback]</div>

The windows are being tinted by Alta Mere. Hopefully they'll turn out alright!

I can see why you were frustrated when talking to the dealership. Perhaps I got lucky and got a great salesperson.

Thanks everyone for the warm welcome!

Bryan