After I parked I realized that I made a mistake in not bringing with me an umbrella or raincoat. An unceasing frigid mist sprayed down from the dark sky. The wind pushed the mist into a sideways spray that soaked everything and made being outside an unpleasant, head turning, eye squinting affair. There was no way I was going to walk around the dealership lot browsing cars in this weather. I already didn’t want to be there. The misty rain and low temperature made me really not want to be there.

This weather was a sign. Today is not the day to be here I told my wife. She responded with her eyes and I turned the car off.

Before I got out of my vehicle I could already see the hungry salesmen eyeing us from inside their fishbowl display floor. Hands in their pockets. Huddled beside each other in idle fascination of their new prey. I never liked car dealerships. I despise heavy handed sales tactics. I can’t help but feel like a salesman is trying to get over on me somehow. Even when I want what they are trying to push onto me.

This disdain I feel for car salesmen I can truly lay on the shoulders of my father. Not that we bought a bunch of new cars all the time when I was growing up. But the few times we did browse a dealership lot have stuck with me through the years. Before a salesman ever approached us in my childhood, my dad would give me and my brothers a quick rundown of how we were supposed to act in front of the salesman. Don’t look happy or excited. I’ll tell him we’re just looking and we’ll get him when we have questions, don’t engage with him. Even if we like it we aren’t going to buy it today.

Now that I think back to it, it wasn’t just car salesmen, its was any type of person selling something that drew my father in a defensive position. That attitude rubbed off a bit on me.

I bought my one and only new car from a dealer eleven years ago. And since then as I’ve gained wisdom through the years, especially discovering the personal finance world; I swore to myself never again. Even back in 2013, I was pretty proud of myself for how I handled the purchase. I did my homework and it paid off. I knew exactly the car and package I wanted. I knew the MSRP and package price, and I added in 5% for profit. I told my salesman this when we sat down at his desk. I said I was pre approved, ready to do business here, but I was prepared to walk if he countered with anything higher I felt he was wasting my time.

It worked. He did his thing where he left to the sales office for fifteen minutes then came back smiling. “You were pretty damn close.” He told me and offered me a price within a hundred dollars of my offer. I shook his hand. Then fended off another round of sales pitches from another office and an older more experienced salesman. Good thing I researched online and knew this was coming. This salesman was like a gentle father like figure, trying to give life advice as his main tactic. His age masked his threat. His low soft voice more assuring than aggressive hid well his intentions to win this battle against the 30 year old opponent sitting before him.

Warranty extensions? Are you sure? We can cover you for six years instead of two? Then proceeds to do a bunch of math for me. I know I can change the oil myself or a pay a quarter of the price at a oil change shop.

We can spray a sealer over your car. $1000 dollars. It will protect your paint. Rust proofing. Really?

Gap insurance. Oh, let me tell you a story…all this money you’re going to be spending, you look like a smart young man, you probably know to protect your investment (did he really think I thought of my car as an investment?).

Tire and wheel warranty.

Nitrogen filled tires.

VIN etching.

This guy was pretty upset I didn’t get hooked with any of his heavy handed sales tactics. Once he realized I would hold my ground he left me in his office and I was reaffirmed of the predatory nature of buying a car at a dealership.

So the January weather seemed to perfectly capture how I felt inside about going back to a car dealer. Cold. Stormy.

Why was I back? You might ask?

In part because, we lost our beloved Honda Civic last summer. We’d agreed to live with only one car, that new car I’d purchased back in 2013. Which was working out fine…as long as the car was under ten years old.

My wife recently qualified for her employer’s car program. The program would pay her gas, tolls, maintenance, and a car lease up to $400 a month. But to qualify for this program, her car needed to be under ten years old. Her Fortune 500 company is a big service company headquartered in the midwest. They have a very old school ‘yesterday’ approach, in how they conduct business. Part of that is ensuring their management employees aren’t driving around beaters.

At first glance this car program seems like a no brainer. Gas paid? Tolls paid? This would mean both of us have our employer pay our gas, tolls, and maintenance. This could mean a savings of $140/month on bridge toll for her. Gas would be an easy $200/month. Easily saving us ~$350 a month. Quite a boost in the savings department.

In the end I decided that the benefits outweighed the cons. The cons? Yes, well, there are a few caveats that caught my attention and could be potentially horrendous to our high savings rate. The biggest potential problem was that the car lease needed to be in my wife’s name, not the company. So in theory, she could be laid off at anytime and we would still be on the hook for the lease.

Second, we are constrained by our goal to retire early. Car lease minimums are 24 months and my wife is a regional manager traveling across the greater Bay Area. Meaning she needs the highest miles available in the contract. The lower the months on the term, the higher the monthly payment. The higher the miles in the term, the higher the monthly payment. With these constraints, the $400 monthly subsidy wouldn’t cover the full lease payment.

But we did find a good deal for $500. So we’d be out of pocket $100 a month.

The math still worked out.

Personally, I struggled with the whole ordeal, even knowing the math worked out. I hated that I would be going into contract and owing money to someone. I’ve fought so hard these last few years for financial freedom. Paying off all debt, save the mortgage. Investing aggressively to be free from my employer. Now here I was locking myself into having to work. And doing so for an item I wouldn’t even be able to own at the end of the day.

Turns out I didn’t need my umbrella or rain jacket anyway. We walked right up to the glass doors of the main lobby, protected by a large overhanging roof and driveway under the roof. Being this was my wife’s deal, I purposely took a back seat to what was going to go down and followed my wife to see how she would handle the process. Instead of heading to the group of men who were eying us, my wife chose the only female salesman. A woman about her age.

The process was straightforward. The still kept us waiting for near an hour as they went back and forth to the sales office trying to get better numbers. God how I hate that sales tactic. I dislike waiting in general, and to wait to spend money, when I’m already on the fence, was like a dagger half sticking out of my chest the entire time.

They still kept asking us how much we could ‘really’ afford to spend each month after we told them our price range.

I tried my best to hide my irritability.

I couldn’t help but feel like that dealership was a dream killer in disguise. Nice and shiny in the inside. Free tiny water bottles and hot coffee in small thin cups. Taylor Swift and other pop music gently playing from the speakers in the t-bar ceiling. I watched as other customers eagerly sat down with salesmen near us, digging into how much they could really afford per month, before being left to wait, then taken into the back rooms for the kill. We had a plan at least, a company would be subsidizing our spending here, but I was sure that everyone else was forking hard earned money over from their own pockets. Did they know they were hurting themselves in the long run paying $700 a month for a depreciating asset?

Who was I to judge? I did there same thing in 2013. Maybe this is part of growing up. Maybe buying a car from a dealer is like touching a hot stove for the ones who don’t take advice easily. I’m the sort to learn the hard way, in more ways than one. Maybe those who don’t trust easily are destined to go through life learning things the hard way.

I’d never leased a car before. Growing up it was ingrained into me to never lease a car. But this was a different situation. It wasn’t even truly my situation. This was my wife’s thing more so than me. Being an equal partner in marriage means compromising in decision making. She was the one driving all around the bay in our high gas consumption vehicle, putting wear and tear on our car. She was the one having to show up to different locations and needing to keep the company line of driving ‘respectable’ vehicles.

And the math worked out.

So most of my internal dissatisfaction was kept internal. It just didn’t feel right to me, signing on this line and taking on all the risk. It didn’t feel right locking ourselves into work for two more years. But we did it anyway.

It helps that the car is pretty nice. It’s a Kia K5. It smells new. It has a turbo 1.6 liter. More importantly my wife likes it. I subscribe fully to the happy wife happy life mantra.

This move also saves mileage on our own car. And potentially will give us better value where the time comes to sell.

We are locked into this lease till January 2026. Meaning my dream of retiring early in 2025 is effectively out of the window for good. My hands are tied. Chained. Bound by contract to remain working till 2026.

Maybe this is what I needed.

Now that I’ve had some time to digest this whole thing, maybe I needed this car lease more than my wife. Maybe I needed some subconscious outside factor keeping me here a little bit longer. Something I could point to and say it’s not me staying longer, I’m here because of the lease. Now that time has healed me from this return to the dealership ordeal, I strangely feel a weight lifted from my shoulders. I’m no longer debating internally about whether or not I quit next year or work for a fatter money cushion.

I feel relief.

The math works out. (If I keep telling myself this I feel better about the situation).

My wife’s employer gets what they want, a manager in a shiny car. We get what we want, reduced monthly expenses. And all parties are happy.

It’s funny to think that as much as employers try to retain employees with perks, the basic nature of compensation slowly frees us from employment, if we play our cards right. The more a company gives us to work for them, the more we are positioned to free ourselves from the employer.

In the long run, the Civic dying was a win, again.