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Racnad · 12-09-2007, 09:14 PM

All:

My wife & I need to buy a car soon. At this point we are want to be conservative financially, which means we'd be looking at either a new cheap car, or a nicer car a few years old.

I recently rented a car and got the hard sell from Enterprise to buy one of their retired rentals. I was told they are typically 2-3 years old with 20-30K on them

We're under he impression that buying a former rental car is a bad idea - that rental cars "aren't treated well." On the other hand, my guess is that they do get good maintainance and that any problems are quickly repaired. Also, when you buy a used car from a dealer, you never know how the first owner treated it anyway.

So lets say I wanted to buy a 2004 or 2005 Camary. My options are:

1) An nearby independant used car dealer that has an excellent reputation (yes, we do have one).

2) A "certified pre-owned" vehicle from a Toyota dealer.

3) Enterprise (or other car rental company) fleet sales.

Is one option substantially better or worse than the others? Or should go go for what seems to be the best vehicle at the best price?

12-09-2007, 09:14 PM	#1 (permalink)
Racnad Crazy Location: Washington State	Used car: rental or dealer? All: My wife & I need to buy a car soon. At this point we are want to be conservative financially, which means we'd be looking at either a new cheap car, or a nicer car a few years old. I recently rented a car and got the hard sell from Enterprise to buy one of their retired rentals. I was told they are typically 2-3 years old with 20-30K on them We're under he impression that buying a former rental car is a bad idea - that rental cars "aren't treated well." On the other hand, my guess is that they do get good maintainance and that any problems are quickly repaired. Also, when you buy a used car from a dealer, you never know how the first owner treated it anyway. So lets say I wanted to buy a 2004 or 2005 Camary. My options are: 1) An nearby independant used car dealer that has an excellent reputation (yes, we do have one). 2) A "certified pre-owned" vehicle from a Toyota dealer. 3) Enterprise (or other car rental company) fleet sales. Is one option substantially better or worse than the others? Or should go go for what seems to be the best vehicle at the best price?