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Short blog posts, journal entries, and random thoughts. Topics include a mix of personal and the world at large.

Everything wrong with my GTI

When you buy a used car of a certain age, you expect it to come with some flaws. Cosmetic flaws you can largely live with. Because if they were a deal breaker, you wouldn’t have bought the car. Minor mechanical flaws - again, if the flaws were major, you’d skip the buying, you have to fix rather quickly. Because presumably you want to keep the car for a bit of time, and you have more plans for it than being a static museum piece.

I bought my one-owner 2019 Volkswagen Golf GTI Rabbit Edition, about 56,000 miles, from Carvana back in October of 2025. The nice thing with Carvana is there’s a seven day money back guarantee. No questions asked, so long as you don’t get into an accident with the car. (At which point - it’s yours now!) Should your used car purchase from Carvana proved too flawed to keep, just drive it right back to one of their wondrous vending machine locations.

Obviously the GTI wasn’t too buggered to need returning. However, there were many fixes that needed doing to get the car up to my personal standards. Here’s a comprehensive list of things I’ve done to the Golf to get it to par.

The front sway bar end links were tattered and making a horrible clunking noise with every up/down motion. The pair got replaced with OEM units from FCP Euro.
Engine and cabin air filter were replaced. I cannot trust when they were last done. The parts from FCP Euro were cheap.
On that same vein, all fluids - engine, transmission, differential, brake - and spark plugs were replaced with proper replacements. The folks at ZTF Automotive provided the labor that I paid for.
Windshield wiper blades front and rear replaced. Again, cannot trust when those were last serviced.
During the reconditioning process, Carvana seems to have fit the incorrect front brake pads. They were plenty meaty, but clunked terribly when going over bumps. A fresh set of OEM brake pads went in. No more clunking.
The front windshield moldings on either side were cracked due to sun damage. OEM replacements purchased from FCP Euro and installed.
Equally sun-damaged was the windshield wiper cowl. An application of Solution Finish did the job.
Tires were mismatched front and rear, with the fronts on Bridgestone that were half worn. The back set was seemingly brand new, but unfortunately a no-name Chinese brand. All four were replaced with a fresh set of Vredestein Ultrac Pro tires.
The new tires were wrapped around a brand new factory set of silver Pretoria alloys. The original set on the GTI were expectedly curbed and trashed. One of the wheel even had a visible bend. Not great!
Armed with new wheels and tires, a wheel alignment check was done to protect that investment. Also done at ZTF Automotive.
The Golf has a great greenhouse full of airy glass, excellent for visibility. What it is not excellent for is heat rejection. All windows sans the windshield got 3M tint applied. GraphixLab performed the work.
The hatch area was missing the tonneau cover and the VW CarGo mat that most certainly would have been sold with the Golf when new. Used items of each were purchased on eBay. The tonneau cover is over $700 if I wanted a new one!
Previous owner appears to be an avid hauler of things, which is commendable because I love seeing cars serving their purpose. However, that meant the rear hatch cover on the GTI was in a mangled shaped; some panels didn’t even fit correctly. A used junkyard replacement was bought on eBay.
Still in the hatch area: the drain tube that leads water away from the multi-function VW badge (it doubles as a hatch handle and rear-view camera) was perished. Gone. When it rained, water was getting inside hatch floor. This is apparently a common issue. At least the part is available and cheap.
Speaking of water leaks, my GTI was plagued with the other common defect: rear speaker gasket failure. After a weekend of heavy rain, I noticed the rear driver-side carpet was soaked, and that was a the culprit. A tube of bathroom sealer did the trick, though in the process of removing the door skin, I broke the handle. A junkyard door skin on eBay was surprisingly cheap: $79.
With over 56,000 miles, you expect a good amount of stone chips on the front end and on the lower sides. My favorite touchup paint manufacturer is Dr ColorChip. The Golf’s Pure White is a solid color, non metallic, so the paint match is exceptional.
The steering wheel leather was absolutely slimy and full of scratches. Even after multiple rounds of cleaning with diluted all-purpose-leaner, it was a dreadful sight. For something that I hold the entire time I am driving the car, the $450 spend to buy a fresh OEM replacement from a dealership was worth the expense.
Carvana recondition team did a horrible job cleaning the interior. Of course the previous owner likely never cleaned it at all, but you the selling dealer has got to do a better job than that. It was so filthy that it took two rounds of deep cleaning to get it to my admittedly high cleanliness standards.
The front lower control arms squeaks noticeably when moving slowly on uneven pavement and going over speed bumps. This is apparently a known issue with MK7 GTIs. At least the solution is simple: a blast of silicon grease onto the control arm bushings. Enjoy the silence for six months, then re-do like it is a maintenance item.

The waiting game

Before you buy anything on Amazon, it’s smart to check camelcamelcamel on an item’s historical pricing. Has it been cheaper in recent weeks? Is the discount really a discount, or did the vendor simply raise the price then handed out coupons? If you’re able to wait, it’s good strategy to ensure you’re getting the best price. All the randomized savings here and there can add up bigly.

Amazon, not content to let a third party service get all the ad revenue, have rolled out historical pricing check right in the item description. The “Rufus AI” doesn’t go as far back as camelcamelcamel - the past 90 days versus for as long as an item has been listed, but I reckon three months is sufficient data to see if you’re getting ripped off. Who cares if a thing is $20 cheaper back in 2021. Inflation comes for everything and everyone.

I however am incapable for waiting. The worst part of online shopping is the lag time between ordering and the package arriving at the door. Especially if the item is part of a bigger project I am working on.

I bought a used VW Golf GTI back in October, and I’ve been slowly fixing the flaws left behind by the previous owner. The goal isn’t to make it perfect again - as much as I want to. The goal is to refresh the car to a level where it would be as if I had owned it the entire time. A portion of that is buying new parts to replaced worn out ones. And the worst thing that can happen to me is seeing that an item is backordered.

It seems I don’t get satisfaction until something is done. This in between process stuff is merely an annoyance. Good things come to those who wait? Forget that! I want a project done as quickly as possible so I can move on to other things. In the meantime I’ve got to look at an unfinished - to me - car, and it bugs me every time.

That backordered set of wheels cannot come soon enough.

There's another problem

For the obsessive compulsive, buying a used car has one big advantage: it comes already imperfect! Having purchased three new cars in my life thus far, I can say the agony of that first flaw - usually a curb rash on the wheel - hurts a metric ton. The car is no longer perfect, and it is all my fault.

A used car solves that problem. The previous owner(s) blemished the car already. It’s physical impossible to keep a car perfect, short of trailering it from the factory right into a hermetically sealed, climate controlled garage. Forever.

Sadly, the compulsion to keep something perfect rear its head in another way. A few months ago I bought a used 2019 Volkswagen Golf GTI. Ever since delivery, I’ve been fighting a battle to refrain from making it perfect again. Existing curb rashes on the wheels? I should buy a brand new set. The leather steering wheel is excessively worn? A replacement isn’t that much money. What’s another interior trim piece to “fix” the unsightly scratches?

See the problem? Instead of obsessively trying to keep a new car perfect, I am instead obsessively trying to make a used car perfect. Both are bad, I do not recommend. Soon as they figure out a pill for this malady I shall be first in line.

The financially conscious part of me is doing its best to keep the spending in check. The goal is to have a functioning car, properly maintained. Perfection is optional. Replacing wear items like perished rubber window trim is entirely appropriate. Replacing an interior button because the lettering has worn down? I shall not go that far. Not in this economy.

I will be replacing the wheels on the GTI. Because one of them is bent. I’ll allow the extravagance of buying four new wheels, even though I could easily buy just the one to replace the broken rim. We car enthusiasts sure love new car parts, straight from anywhere, not just Japan.

Too dark too soon

While I greatly enjoy this time of the year of cold and coziness, the whole getting dark super early thing is not the business. Who really wants to be commuting to work in the dark, and then heading home also in the dark? If they ever manage to get rid of daylight savings time, I hope they keep the set time to be whichever provides the most sunlight hours towards the end of the day during the winter months.

Because when it’s dark outside but it’s only 5:00 PM, I feel weird eating dinner at my normal 7:00 PM hour. We’ve evolved to equate darkness with sleepy time, so it’s disconcerting to be two hours into darkness only to then start making supper. If they ever manage to make permanently below-ground living a thing with artificial sun technology, I hope they keep a consistent sunrise and sunset hour.

Perhaps I should move to somewhere on the equator. Word on the street is $100,000 USD can buy a Thailand residency visa.

You how when you buy a brand new car you tend to be super careful about it? Agonizing over the perfectly harmless parking space, and worrying about the slightest hint of dust laying on top of the painted surface. This motivation to keep something perfect - is it rooted in evolution, I wonder? Did caveman get traumatized from a lightning strike destroying their once intact cave facade?

What we do know is that nothing keeps perfect forever. After the first rock chip on the hood, or the first scrape from another parked car, we tend to relax into not caring much about the car anymore. The solution then is to buy used cars instead of new. Second-hand vehicles already come pre-blemished! Who cares if I chipped the wheel on a curb - there’s already existing rashes.

What you don’t want to do though is to fall into a trap of making a used car “perfect” again. That scratched interior panel because the previous owner hauled something carelessly? Leave it be. Even if a replacement panel is only a hundred bucks or so.

Inspect the used car

The method to get really familiar with a new-to-you car is to give it a good hand wash. All the intimate details will appear in front of your eyes as you slide the wash mitt over every single panel. Details you’d otherwise miss on first inspection during the purchasing process.

It’s how I found out the windshield side moldings on my recently-bought 2019 Volkswagen Golf GTI are surprisingly perished. It’s going to cost $100 to buy brand new OEM replacement, which isn’t too bad. The car must have been parked outside constantly with its previous owner. I also found out one of the wheels has a slight bent, though it balances just fine with the new tires I put on, so I’m not going to worry about it. For now.

Minor flaws are what you must tolerate when buying a used car. Even the most stringent of owners cannot avoid some form of deterioration to their cars. What isn’t tolerable is major flaws that are detrimental to mechanical operation. These days it’s far too easy for people to offload cars to CarMax or Carvana that are in need of major maintenance or fixing. Used car buyers have to perform due diligence.

Good news for those of us in California. A new law states buyers of used cars under $50,000 - from a dealership - can now return the vehicles within three days. That’s ample time to schedule a visit to a mechanic to look over the purchase. Any major red flags found is then an easy decision to give the car back. For what remains a person’s second biggest monetary purchase in their lifetime, a purchase inspection is a must do.

I bought the GTI from Carvana, which has its own seven day no questions asked return policy. After picking up the car, it went the very next day to the local Volkswagen dealership for inspection. There were some items needing fix, but none out of the ordinary, or catastrophically expensive. Needless to say, I still have the Golf.

It is done

It took almost seven weeks, but our family’s 2018 Hyundai Tucson - which was a lease - is finally sold off. Made a decent bit of profit too, which is nice. The car market is indeed super crazy right now: the absolute worst time to buy a car, but the best time to have a car to sell. The local CarMax gave us $25,000 for the three-year old Tucson that had an MSRP in the $28,000s. The lease buyout was only $16,500, including tax. Do the math!

It had to be said though our Tucson has relatively low mileage (~18,200) and is practically pristine. Your mileage (pun intended) will vary. Don’t look to get around the same money if your Tucson had significantly more miles.

The $8,500 in profit isn’t without some excruciating waiting and patience. Due to the aforementioned crazy car market, leasing companies have stopped the practice of lease buyouts by a third party. No longer can you take your lease vehicle to CarMax (and the like) and have them cut you a check for the difference in present value and the payoff price. The contract buyout price the leasing companies has is with you; they are not legally obligated to sell to third party for that same price.

And at present time, the lease companies aren’t willing to sell at all. They want to impel the customer to return the car to the brand’s dealership. Because there is an absolute dearth of new car inventory due to the chip shortage.

In order to sell the Tucson and get some money back, we had to do it the roundabout way: buy the car outright from Hyundai, then sell the car to CarMax ourselves. Paying for the car was easy - electronic bank transfer - but then we had to wait over two weeks for Hyundai Finance to mail us the title. With the pink slip in hand, there was another problem: CarMax (and the like) only accepts a clean title: the paper cannot include the leasing company as a registered owner, even though they’ve signed it off to you, and there’s a bill of sale.

Getting a clean title required a trip to the local DMV. After paying $25 to transfer the title to my father’s name only, it was then another prolonged wait for the unencumbered title to arrive in the mail.

That took another three weeks, but thankfully the new pink slip came last Friday. We immediately schedule an appointment at CarMax the very next day. Two hours on the premises later, and finally we unburdened ourselves of Tucson. A whole month after my father have already leased another car! Thank god I had the parking space at work to store the Tucson during this time.

So yeah, if you have a car to sell, now is the best time! I just hope you’re not also looking to buy one as well…

Sell the M2?

Due to a global semiconductor shortage causing, amongst many other things, a shortage of new cars, the used car market is absolutely on fire. A twitter friend recently got offered more than what he paid on his Jeep Wrangler. Granted, he didn’t pay MSRP, but still: to have essentially driven the Jeep for only the cost of gas and insurance is pretty nice. It goes to show how desperate dealers and wholesalers are for vehicles.

The return of tourism and the demand for rental cars are also a contributing factor.

I’m massively tempted to check the value of my own BMW M2 Competition. I wonder how much I can get for a six-month old car, especially when German luxury brands like BMW are notorious for rapid deprecation. If it’s only a few thousand dollars (I paid about $63,XXX), that would be amazing. Amazing enough to make me think hard about actually selling it. If I do, it would be the shortest amount of time I have ever owned a car.

Truth is, I just don’t put that many miles on the M2. Being that I walk to work, and there’s a mall with a Target and Trader Joes three blocks away from home, I hardly ever need to drive. That’s by choice, of course, but nonetheless that means the M2 is parked on the street for about 90% of the week. I am paying way too much in insurance to have the car sit for so long. But then, what am I to do? Drive around in a loop for the heck of it? The recent high gas prices aren’t conducive to that, either.

I’ve gone without a car before, but that was in the process of saving up for a Porsche 911. The M2 is likely the endgame of internal-combustion cars for me. My next car - if I ever do purchase another - will be fully electric for sure. As a car enthusiast, I don’t think I can go car-less on sheer principle.

Good thing then that whenever I do drive the M2 Competition, I am reminded how much of a riot it is. It truly is the best modern M-car this side of a BMW 1M. I simply can’t sell it, even if its actual utility factor is very little these days.