Aug 2006

Congratulations!

I was also picky about the color and package # and refused to settle for anything other than what I was sure I wanted. I also opted to wait until 2006 to take delivery for the tax credit~I ordered the car back in August of last year so my total wait time was 5.5 months. Very worth it for the car of my dreams! I'm afraid I'm not of much help with the carpool lane sticker question. I saw another thread floating around here where folks were checking in with their sticker #'s when they received them, maybe do a quick search? It took me almost 2 months to receive mine, and I mailed in the application the day I got my car.

 

I live in Florida right now and am probably not going to be able to participate in the CA HOV stickers until I move back next June. I bet by then, that I won't be able to become a user. =(

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(neronetus @ Jul 27 2006, 02:06 AM) [snapback]293053[/snapback]</div>

So what color did you wait for? I know you got package 8, but you don't mention the color...

 

My wife and I thought we were picky about the color(s) we wanted until we started to do the research and inquiries with dealers around our area and got the familiar $500 wait list speeches and even had one salesman say, and I quote, "These cars are hotter than pancakes at IHOP!". <_< :huh:

Suffice it to say, once my wife called an old high school friend who happens to work at one of the internet brokerage companies (carsdirect.com, autobuytel.com etc.), we had a dealer call us 2 days later with a Prius in the package we wanted at MSRP (the ONLY price we were going to pay other than anything less than) but in a color we didn't consider at first.

The HOV stickers aren't of any interest to us for various reasons so that wasn't a motivating factor. However, the tax credit is, so we decided to not look overlook our good fortune in the ease of finding and buying our car in a very short time (maybe 2 days since the first conversation to the "yes, we'll take it" moment) and suffer a little with our color preferences.

As for our buying experience thus far (the car is going to be delivered tomorrow), I consider ourselves fortunate even though the color wasn't one of our initial choices. This transaction was about as "gift horse" as we were going to get, I think.