Car Delivered .... Finally

Despite promised return phone calls that never eventuated, the bending of facts by the Sales Co-coordinator despite being too busy to get back to us, we have now taken delivery of the new Honda HR-V with all hail damage fully removed.

We first went in to pick the car up around mid December as I mentioned in my previous post.  A cheque was passed over, car registration completed and we were chatting away to the sales person.  I mentioned we were planning to have the hail damage (the 7 dents indicated to us on first seeing the car) when the sales person mentioned the dents on the bonnet!  We hadn't noted any dents on the bonnet!

We hastily headed over to see the vehicle which had now been fully detailed, all new and shiny! The detailing now revealed the hail damage was more extensive than we had first feared.  There were multiple minute dents across the bonnet that we could now see.

It was mentioned that they had a dent repair guy repairing many of the vehicles at the request of their new car owners.  So we joined the list, paid over an amount to have all dents fixed prior to our taking the vehicle.

The pickup date was set for January 2nd, soon after our return from Melbourne for Christmas with the family.

We contacted the dealer ship upon our return for the January 2nd pickup.  Oh no, you have the wrong dates said the sales coordinator.  Our salesperson was enjoying her Christmas break and was not contactable.  Your car will be ready Monday January 6th we were told!

The salesperson returned from her holidays on Tuesday 7th and rang Trish immediately.  Our car was to be ready for collection at 3 pm that afternoon. Being fully repaired by the dealership meant the car would be sold to us as a 'new' car an meant we could now get new for old replacement insurance.

Trish was very keen to drive it everywhere until after either the first or second trip there was a nasty white paint scrape on the back door where a car door had been opened onto it!  A little bit of polish soon had that all sorted.

Our trip to Melbourne was tinged with some sadness.  Eddie Riordan was a principal of mine when I taught at Hampton Park East.  We always got on very well and remained in close contact after we had both retired.  We always catch up with Eddie and Patsy usually for a Vietnamese meal at Springvale.  I rang on a Friday to set a date for our outing when Patsy answered the phone and told us Eddie had passed away early that morning.

Eddie had had body parts replaced, survived heart surgery and numerous other health issues so he had done well to get to 85 years.  Trish and I attended the funeral which was a full Catholic affair.  A couple of other colleagues were in attendance so we kicked over old stories from days gone by at the wake.

Christmas with the family was great and we caught up with everyone.  It was extremely enjoyable.  On the drive down we spent a short time with Mick and Janet in Newcastle.  It is always great to catch up with them.  Mick enjoys his beers and introduced me to Balter Doctor Sensible, a mid strength Pale Ale.  Very very nice I must say!

We drove to Melbourne this time and again used our now 12 year old Hyundai Sonata.  It handled the job perfectly and being a 6 cylinder car, passing triple layered B-Doubles was a breeze when traffic permitted!  Just put your foot down and off you go and all with space to spare!

Right now we are looking forward to Wednesday of next week when Kate and the two grand kids come to stay for 6 nights.  It will be pool, beach, eat and sleep for those 6 days.  We reckon they will love it.

Then a few days later Trish and a girlfriend are off to Melbourne and will keep an eye on Kim's St Kilda flat and the cat while Kim heads off to Bali.  They will have Kim's car to use and will get to the tennis for the Australian Open as well I am sure.

I will stay back at home and watch it all unfold on TV.

My sister and Peter live at Omeo Victoria which is in the recent zone for serious bush fires.  They are keen caravaners and loaded up their van and fled the area when they were advised to evacuate..  The fires were close to Omeo and we are hopeful that everything escaped the fires and their home on 20 acres is safe and sound..

New Year For New Car

Yesterday (Friday) Trish and I headed off to pick up the new car.  We believed the hail damage was around seven or so small dents on the roof and on one side.  At around $100 to repair each dent, we reckoned we would get it sorted sometime in 2020 for well under $1000.

So during the final sorting of signatures and payments, the car salesperson mentioned the small dents on the bonnet, dents we knew nothing about.  Our new car had been fully detailed and any even very small imperfections really stood out.  So over we went to where the car was waiting for us so we could have a closer look.

There would have been at least double the number of dents now easily seen on the polished finish. So at around $100 per dent for removal, the cost would have been doubled to what we had expected.

When sorting car insurance prior to picking it up we found some insurers would not touch the policy because of the hail damage.  Those that would cover it would not do 'new for new replacement', but they would only do 'market value'.

The car dealer quoted us $2,000 to remove all dents and then they would be legally be able to sell it to us as a new vehicle.  This would qualify us for new for new replacement, something we felt more comfortable about.

As we are about to head south to Melbourne, the new car would only be sitting in our garage.  Now we expect to collect our 'new' car early in 2020.

Even after paying the $2000 for dent repairs, we are still getting a $2,500 discount on a new car price.

Waiting, Waiting!

At the moment of writing, we continue to be the owners of 2 vehicles.  We would have expected the damaged Honda Jazz to be on the back of a tow truck by this time of the day but it stills sits out front waiting. It was due to be collected between 8:30am and 12:30pm today.

We've sorted things out and now just await notification from the local Honda dealer that our new car is ready to collect.  We suspect it will be around Wednesday but it may be later in the week.  Our insurers had arranged to have the Jazz collected today but we still haven't seen any sign of a tow truck.

The guy over the road has lost his older Prado to the wreckers as it was written off.  The guy next door does parcel deliveries for Australia Post and he is awaiting for the insurers to get back to him.  He seems to think the roof of his delivery van will need to be be replaced.

The photo above shows one of the supports at the front of his pergola of the guy next door.  When you click on the photo you get a bigger view and you can easily see how the hail has belted and marked the timber during the recent storm. You certainly would not have wanted to have been caught not under any cover during the storm.

A brew went on on Friday and I have been busy bottle washing today.  As it is now well and truly into summer the daily temperature (and humidity level) has risen substantially.  The pool was around 28° this morning first morning and we have had a couple of days around the mid 30's which is pretty hot in this part of the world.

It went at around 1:30pm

Decision Made, Deposit Paid

We have now purchased a new car, though slightly hail damaged.  It has a few dents which we feel we will have fixed during 2020 when the current rush (and higher prices) have subsided.

Eventually it came down to a 'top of the range' Honda Jazz' or a slightly hail damaged $3500+ reduced in price Honda HRV (but at the bottom of the range).  Though the HRV had fewer bells and whistles it drives perfectly, is brand new and a 2020 model.

We took the top of the range Honda Jazz for a test drive and were immediately impressed with the ride and comfort of the car.

We are now busily driving the old hail damaged Jazz to use all the fuel in it prior to informing Youi that they can have it and in return forward us the payout.  Most likely we will inform Youi on Monday for them to collect the Jazz that afternoon.  This allows a full 48 hours for the insurance money to come through.

We are not in  hurry to get the new car as we have the Sonata for around town driving.

As it turned out it was the Kona that eventually got the sale over the line.  As soon as we mentioned that we were also looking at a Kona to the Honda sales person, it raised the possiblity that a smaller SUV could suit our purposes.

So we set off for a second Test drive for the day, this time with a Honda HRV.

It was a line ball decision between the upmarket leather seats and all the bells and whistles of the Honda Jazz and the Honda HRV.  It was possibly that the SUV was a more versatile vehicle with extra room easily accommodating 5 passengers that tipped the decision its way.

It is a reddish orange color and should be a perfect fit for us.  Being a "Honda" and that it was at the same price to us as the Kona was a determining feature in our decision.

With massive savings available on slightly hail damaged vehicles, Caloundra Honda has sold around 200 damaged vehicles since the recent storm.

It's a "Write Off"

It seems it is around $100 per dent for the Dent Removal guy to pull a  dent out of a car's roof damaged by a hail storm.  As we had around 100 small dents on the roof of the Honda Jazz, that made the possible insurance bill close to $10,000.  And this is too expensive on a 10 year old car with a market value of $6,400.  We have a couple of weeks to make up our mind as to what we want to do now it has been declared a "Write off".

The tank is still half full of petrol so we continue to mull over what we will do and we continue to drive the car. But we think we will go for a marked upgrade in vehicle.  We were a little miffed over not buying a new car when we bought the Jazz so this time we will go for something new.

The Jazz had been great, cheap to run easy to park but it was 10 years old.  The air con kind of worked, there was no cruise control or other comforts you now get in a new car.

So today we went looking at new vehicles in the Honda, Hyundai and Toyota ranges.  Trish had expressed an interest in an SUV or something to flit about town in.  We also loved the Jazz so today we looked at a Demo upmarket Honda Jazz, (a marked improvement on what we had), a couple of cars in the Hyundai range, the i30 and the Kona.  And we looked at Toyota where we checked out an upmarket Yaris and a run out model of the Corolla.

We certainly gave them the message we were on the lookout for a 'deal' of some sort and demo models would be a good starting point.

So at this stage it seems the front runners are an upmarket Demo Honda Jazz or Demo Hyundai Kona.  The Kona Go is registered as a "demo" but has never been used as one.  It has done 20 or so k's and costs around $26,900 new.  They would do it for us at $24,500 with a final set price still negotiable.

It is a bigger car than the Jazz but would make a very handy replacement if and when our other car, the Hyundai Sonata, begins to give us trouble.

So what else is news?  It has been extremely windy making fire conditions even more volatile.  Rarely we would get winds from the north west but that has been the regular everyday wind for the last few months.  I reckon I miss a bike ride or two most weeks just because it is windy.

After the recent storm (which has killed our Honda Jazz) there was shredded palm leaves all over the place.  With the hot weather these leaves have all dried out and fly about in the wind ..... and in to my pool.  Keeping the pool clean has been a consistent everyday task exacerbated but the uncommonly strong winds!

But beer brewing, bottle washing and bottling must go on! It takes no heed of the weather conditions.

Despite our recent misfortune we continue to enjoy our lives on the Sunshine Coast.  Now we have the excitement of a new car not far away.  But this does mean my beloved 2006 Hyundai Sonata Elite will soon shift to the drive way while the new car takes pride of place in the garage and away from errant hail storms!