Got wheels finally...

After painful three weeks without a car, we finally brought home our new car, Maruti Zen Estillo. Everything I learned not to do while in US such as never buying a brand new car from a dealership, I had to do in my first three weeks in India. Buying (slightly) used cars is the only way to buy cars in USA. You don't pay the dealer depreciation and the one/two year old cars being driven on US roads are practically brand new. In India the road conditions are such that you don't want to go for an used car as you don't know how the previous owner may have driven it.

The financing rates in India are astronomical. Auto loan rates are whopping 14%, plus luck has it, the dollar to rupee exchange rate dropped to it's lowest levels in 9 years (it dropped by over 9% in last four months) So transferring whatever money we had in US banks was not a lucrative option. So we decided to go for an economy car such as Maruti Zen.

It is a cute little city car, perfect to navigate narrow streets and weave through traffic. Here is photo of the car with our friendly sales person, Ravi Gupta.

Even though this is my seventh car (first six being in US) it was the first car I bought from a dealer and first time to do elaborate "pooja" for it!