apenay

the end of the year is a great time to look for deals on the existing inventory of cars. dealers usually offer HUGE discounts to get rid of them. this is especially true if the car you're looking at happens to be completely redesigned for the up coming year. i recently walked into an infiniti dealer on the last day of november, just out of curiosity. i wanted to see how much an '06 G35x with all the options (i think they called it package C) except Nav can be had for. msrp on that car was over $37,000. i'd figure that if i was to part with my A6, it has to be for a car that's somewhat comparable in luxury, style, performance and must have AWD. i think most would agree that the G35 is a comparable car to compare with an A6. i've always preferred the looks of the coupe over the sedan, but AWD is only available for the sedan. oh well.

i walked in with my wife and we took the G35x for a test drive. first thing i noticed was that the brakes were super sensitive. every time i tapped on it slightly the car came to a sudden violent stop. i made the adjustment and proceeded, no biggie. next, i was expecting a noticeable difference in acceleration since the G35 has about 30hp more than my 2.7T but that extra kick was not there despite the absence of any turbo lag. (i must admit though, i do drive like a "grandma" as my wife would say. perhaps if i had a heavier foot i would enjoy this car more, but since that's not my style i didn't think it was much better than my A6.) as for the interior, it was all plastic and cheap looking in my opinion. there were 2 things that i really liked about the car and that was the reclining back seatings and the intelliKey features which came with the package C.

we come back from the test drive and they asked if i had a trade in. i told them possibly two. i gave the the specs for my two cars. one was a 2001 civic sedan LX with 66K on it and the other was my 2001 A6 2.7T with 85K on it. blue book on the civic was $7,500 and on the A6 was $11,500. now i know blue book is not that accurate so i took it with a grain of salt but at least i had an idea of what to expect. the salesman comes back to me and says "now without looking at the cars this is just a ballpark figure. for the civic we're looking between $5K-$7K." i'm thinking ok... that's fair, even if it's more towards $5K. then he kinda grinned and said "for the audi, we're looking at $5-$6." i can't say i was too surprised but i was taken a bit off guard. he goes on to explain that audis costs them money to prep and resell, blah, blah, blah...

anyway, the rest of the visit consisted of some haggling with the rookie salesman and the snobby senior sales guy that used a lot of sales jargon that irritated my wife to the point of disgust. even though i hardly like anything about the car at this point i had to admit it's still an intriguing value. and hey, it's not exactly a car to scoff at so for the right price why not right?. i told them that for $31K i would buy the car on the next day and just trade the civic. they said can't do $31K but will do $32K. i said no thanks and left kinda glad they weren't that desperate enough to accept my offer.

we went home and all i can think about was how much more i liked my 6 year old A6 than the G35x but at the same time got this feeling of despair that i'll never be able to sell my car. i've come to the conclusion now that if i take care of the A6 and nothing goes terribly wrong there's no good reason to get rid of it since it has basically no value. there's nothing that i can get in return that would offer as much. i can't even trade it for a civic if i wanted to! that's a damn shame. so why not just keep it forever. it'll be my second safety car for years and years to come.
but for now it's still my pride and joy.

btw, i got a call from the same dealer about 2 weeks ago and they said the car can be bought for about $30K now. i told them no thanks. =) now if that was for the '07.....

saabSean

I ended up disliking that car. The acceleration was nice, the ride a bit brittle, the interior was cheap feeling, but it was the highway dynamics that killed it for me.

I was never able to get comfortable with the idea of a high speed highway trip because it felt, well, twitchy. Whereas the A6 can gobble up highway miles while you one-hand the steering wheel when you're changing the radio station and drinking an iced coffee... you're completely at ease.

No. The G35 is not in the A6 market. It's more of an A4 competitor.

apenay

granted it's not as nice of a car. size-wise i think the G35 is more towards the A6 market of mid-sized sedans than the A4. although price-wise you are right it's definitely in the A4 range.

btw... i saw your post earlier about possibly selling your car and thought it was funny that i've basically came to this conclusion that i'm going to keep mine forever. i'm in the northeast also, so having a AWD as a second car is pretty practical. and besides you know you car inside out at this point and you know you love it so why get 'ripped off' by selling or trading in? unless the jag is the better of the two cars, if so keep the jag. =)

schnellmb

the C is a good car, but is just a little too uncomfortable. I was pretty impressed with the 525's ride and a big plus the dealer is only a few miles away.

i still very much like my C5 Avant.

LeftLaneA6

AudiSean: what a great looking signature w/ car profile. Luv'n that! Ohhh!

5speed6 v.2

drove a 325xi for a week, and all it did was suck down gas and not go anywhere.

The 3 liter engine is much better suited for the power loss due to AWD.

Egil A64.2s - S6

It is tough to find another car a nice as an Audi.

saabSean

I really enjoy both cars; the A6 and the VDP. My car has more toys, but I love the engine and drivetrain of the Jaguar, not to mention the old world feeling of the interior.

I can't make up my mind.

Selling either car won't be pretty. Neither the A6 nor the VDP have great resale values. Ever try to sell an older Jaguar in the winter before? Ugh.

saabSean

Thank you! :-)

Press

i should have bought an audi....