My wife and I thought our search for a vehicle for our younger son had ended when we bought this cute-as-a-button, 2002 Honda CR-V. Adorable, isn't it? And I was so proud of myself for buying something staid, responsible and, I guess I'm finally growing up, practical. Looks can be so deceiving. I blame my myopia for this near unmitigated disaster when it comes to Japanese anything. Especially Honda's. Despite this CR-V having some 124,000 miles on the clock and priced a couple of grand less than comparable CR-V's of its vintage with similar mileage, myopic me ignored its rusty underbelly and dove in head first. I plopped down checks totally more than five grand and drove off with a seventeen year old cute-ute that came with a warranty. How could I go wrong? Best was our twenty year old son, who could care less about what he drove, was ecstatic. Win-win.
I didn't notice a thing wrong on several test drives one of which included a fairly long traipse at speed on I-480 south of Cleveland. Solid as a rock with an interior that looked like it was freeze dried and teleported from the late '90's, our "practicality first" little cross over seemed like a dream come true. Oh, and she came with a thrusty and thrifty, 2.4 liter four cylinder engine that pulled like a freight train. I liked this thing so much that I thought about using it myself and giving our son my Monte Carlo.
After I bought it and with the ink on the temp tags still dewy I dropped it off at our local service center and for a mere fifty-three dollars, had them check the thing out bumper to bumper. Armed with warranty, anything really, really wrong would be covered under warranty. They did the same thing on our Mustang after we bought it and it got straight A's. For the most part; we are talking about pretty old used vehicles. Seeing what a savvy used car buyer I think I am, I fully expected close to the same grades on this Honda. After all, it's a freakin' Honda, right?
Imagine my horror when the report came back that our little Honda needed repairs totaling almost what we paid for it. Bad brakes, calipers, brake lines, CV joints and boots (on both sides), leaky coolant lines, leaking AC condenser. tires that were misshapen and dry rotting. Worn out struts. Gosh, what else was there? My mechanic said it looked as though it had been submerged in ocean water or a long time. He was amazed at that too considering how pristine the body and interior were. Underneath, though, you could tell that something was seriously off about this thing. I saw that too before I bought it but a little voice inside my head said it was nothing to worry about since it was a Honda. Yeah. And the Titanic was unsinkable.
I could certainly do the work myself but Honda parts are expensive and with my starting a new job with a monster commute, my time was going to be limited. Worst was, nothing that needed to be done was covered under the warranty that came with the full asking price I paid for. I felt foolish and that I had been had. Good grief. What was I to do?
Enraged and panic stricken, not a good combination for rational conversation with a used car lot, I vehemently demanded I get a refund. And to my surprise, I did. Armed with erroneous information from my wife that buyers have "three days" to change their minds when it comes to vehicle purchases, I contacted the dealership and told them about the issues with what they had just sold me, with receipts and a video of the inspection that clearly showed the under carriage of the CR-V to look as though it had spent a hundred year plus at the bottom of the Atlantic.
Again, to my amazement, the dealership caved and took it back returning the checks that hadn't cashed yet. Wow. They did, to their credit or discredit or whatever, did ask me if there was anything else on the lot I'd be interested in. Thanks but no thanks. I was happy as a sophomore to have the damn thing out of my driveway and out of my life.
Funny thing is, there is no rule about buyers having three days to change their mind when it comes to buying a used vehicle. At least in the state of Ohio. While a return policy on purchases is a staple of outlets like CARMAX, in most cases, any such thing is clearly up to the dealership. If anything, what tilted things in our favor was that we had a reputable, name brand repair shop do the inspection and turned over receipts and the video to the dealership. That was overwhelming. Also, time was of the essence. I believe if we waited even a week out chances of getting a refund would have been greatly diminished.
All in, my wife and I owned this Honda CR-V for a total of, give or take a half hour here or there, thirty six hours. Seeing that we have a tendency to keep vehicles for two to three if not four times longer than most people do, our owning this bowling ball on wheels amounted to a one night stand.
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