🏎️ Max bought a car in the middle of the night in an IKEA parking lot

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Good day dear readers!

Before we dive into how the MaxFindsCars household has a new car in the stable that was acquired in the middle of the night on a Thursday in the parking lot of my local IKEA, check out our new sponsor below!

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Okay shameless shilling complete! Below is the pure, unadulterated, unadvertised story of the car I picked up Thursday night, in an IKEA parking lot after a very jumbled text message from the truck driver at 10:30pm.

And… yes, I thought there was a chance I shipped a German performance hatchback across the country only to be robbed in front of a budget Swedish furniture franchise.

(btw, if you are here for the maxfindscars.com/roadmap update, that’s at the bottom!)

Luckily, if I survived, I thought the story would be funny enough to make the whole experience worth it. So I went anyways (and I took my 5ft tall wife with me for protection).

So… the story begins with some news. I am moving back to New York. Partly for work, partly for friends & family, but mostly because I just cannot WAIT to be paying more money in taxes.

And, with this move there was a minor detail that needed tending to: I will no longer be able to daily my 1982 Porsche 911 year round. I’m heartbroken, trust me. The thought of leaving my trusty steed to sit in a garage for months on end is truly sad, but there’s nothing I can do about it. There’s salt on the road in NY at least 4 months of the year and I don’t want to risk rust accumulating in the many nooks and crannies of my 42 year old car.

This meant I needed to find myself a winter car, & that winter car needed to be a few things:

• AWD or 4WD

• Reasonably reliable

• A 4-door

• Around $30k or less

• Automatic so my wife can drive it if needed

• Fun to drive

• Something that temporarily satiates my everlasting hunger for unique, cool, and weird automobiles.

The list of cars that fit all of the above criteria is probably shorter than you think. Let me guess the immediate things that spring to your mind, and refute each in turn…

• A Subaru WRX STi? No. I don’t own any flat brim hats so I am not allowed to purchase one.

• Some kinda Audi? Nope. Unfortunately I do not work in finance, so they would not let me into the dealership.

• A Ford Raptor? Nah. I don’t want to be the friend with the truck that always needs to help people pick up appliances from Home Depot and shit like that.

Initially I was stuck on a couple options in particular. Both are vehicles I’d still like to own at some point in my automotive lifespan.

The first option was an old Land Cruiser. Like an 80 or 100 series. And… to spice it up, I was looking at right-hand drive ones imported from Japan. There’s a great dealership in Virginia called Japanese Classics that does exactly this. They even have a really nice looking one for sale right now: https://www.japaneseclassics.com/vehicle/1998-hdj101-land-cruiser-3/

I was really close to pulling the trigger on one of these. They’re legendary for their reliability, you can use it as an adventure vehicle for camping, skiing, or beach days. They have these great cloth seats that just remind me of my first car - A 2002 Mazda Protege 5 that I absolutely loved.

Honestly, describing all the pro’s of these make me a bit sad I won’t be owning one just yet.

The sticking point was really that I rarely would actually be using it for all the fun stuff it facilitates. 99% of the time my driving is going to be to and from the gym or friends houses. Did I really want something that would only be exciting to drive on 1% of my automotive excursions? No.

The second option was a Mercedes E63 AMG Wagon. Not the new ones, but the W212 generation. These are crazy cars. Nearly 600 horsepower, super luxurious, spacious, and special daily-drivers. The problem is really the price. To get one in my price range, I’d have to get one with 90k + miles (like this one).

While I’m sure these cars will go well past 100k, I simply don’t want a second vehicle that I need to dump money into maintenance for, especially since I just had a full engine out reseal on the 911. My car maintenance coffers are a bit light at the moment.

But… while I was looking down the Mercedes AMG rabbit-hole, I stumbled on another AMG car…

One that has 375 horsepower from a tiny turbo 4 cylinder engine, has 4 doors, has 50/50 AWD, and is the hottest hatchback to come outta Stuttgart since the Porsche x Audi RS2 Avant collab of the mid 90s.

Here it is, folks… the newest member of the MaxFindsCars stable:

A 2018 Mercedes-Benz GLA45 AMG.

And this is the one I actually bought: https://carsandbids.com/auctions/KPLaVqXk/2018-mercedes-amg-gla45

A couple things to note from here:

1. This was my first ever car auction victory. Needless to say my heart was pumping about 190 bpm during the final moments.

2. I got totally lucky that the sellers, Ryan and Echo, were awesome to work with. Really cool people. Communicating during the transaction was super easy.

3. I now had to figure out how to ship a car across the country.

On that last point, carsandbids.com makes it super easy. Basically they can give you a quote right on the site. When you say yes & pay they put you and the seller in touch with one of their shipping partners. That company figures out a pickup time with the seller and then about a week later the car shows up to your door.

Or… in my case, it didn’t exactly show up to my door. In retrospect it makes sense - apparently the tight streets of random neighborhoods in Charlotte, NC are not the preferred delivery locales for a trucker hauling 6 different vehicles across the continental United States.

So anyways, I receive a text from the trucker Thursday night & my wife and go to meet him in the back lot of my local IKEA like a couple of junkies looking to get our fix on economically priced Swedish furniture.

He drives the car off the truck, we shake hands, I sign some paperwork, and the deed was done. I wasn’t robbed. I was now the proud owner of what is, in my opinion, quite possibly the perfect winter car (for my very specific budgetary, opinionated, and uniquely illogical situation).

Its seats would make the exec’s at La-Z Boy shake in their overstuffed leather boots. Its faster than my old M5 in a straight line. It has a slew of modern amenities. TWO sunroofs. Absolutely sick special option matte paint.

I’m pretty psyched about it. But… what do you think? Did I make the right choice? What would you have picked instead? Let me know! And, while you’re thinking, let’s move on to the final piece of this email.

The MaxFindsCars.com Roadmap Update:

As you all should know by now, MaxFindsCars is delving into the world of ~software as a service~. Basically my goal is to make finding your dream car easier by sending you every new listing of your dream car via ONE single email each morning.

That way, you never miss your perfect car. And you don’t have to scroll 14 different sites and subscribe to 9 different email notification services to do it. MaxFindsCars.com is the most simple, easiest way to find your dream car.

BUT, as of now its only for Porsche 911’s. Opening this up and allowing you to receive emails for other cars is my biggest priority right now. And… good news, its coming damn soon. I’ve been working on this feature every day and late Saturday night hit a major milestone in the development process.

My guess is you’ll be able to subscribe to whichever car you want via MaxFindsCars.com sometime this July. That’s the goal, and I’ll be working on it every day to try and make that happen.

That also means, however, that the price will be going up. As soon as that feature is turned on, MaxFindsCars.com is going to increase to $2/mo. So, if you want to get in before that increase, pull the trigger soon! Once you’ve subscribed at the current price tier, your price won’t change EVER. You’ll get all these new and future features for your same price.

Everyone that’s paying $1/mo right now will still be paying only $1 when this feature is turned on.

That’s it for now, more updates soon!

And remember…

MaxFindsCars.com is not, technically, free! By subscribing, dear reader, you have agreed to tell your friends about it.

In fact, I believe the contract specifically stated you had to each subscribe 100 of your closest friends, colleagues, enemies, exes, priests, pets, & sugar mommas. I’ll have to check the fine print to be sure, but you all may as well get started spreading the word in the meantime.

IF YOU’RE FUNNY, MEAN, OR NICE ENOUGH, YOUR REVIEW MIGHT GET FEATURED IN A FUTURE NEWSLETTER.

That's a wrap for today. New Editions come out RANDOMLY! While you wait, go out and drive! And if you want more, be sure to follow Max’s Twitter (@maxjzin)

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