Unfortunately, one day in 2013 while driving from work in Oneonta to home in Albany I came up over a hill and ran into a snowstorm and an unploughed freeway, one of the far too occasional “joys" of living in upstate New York at the time. I tried to slow down. However, the car hit an ice patch hidden under the snow, skidded, hit the railing, and died. RIP.
I should have purchased another Honda Fit and would have if I had known that several years later Honda would cease selling the fit in North America. The issue at the time, however, was that I wanted a heavier car than the Fit because the drive over hill and dale and through ice, rain, sleet and snow from Albany to Oneonta sometimes proved to be too much of an adventure. I initially thought about getting another Honda but I, not very deep of me I know, really didn’t like the look of either the Civic or the Accord. Idiotic me.
My neighbour had a Ford Focus which I liked the look of and the compact met my criteria of a bigger car than the subcompact Fit. So, I started looking at Focus’s. I was able to get what my neighbour said was a good deal on Focus from Crossroads Ford in Ravenna. So I bought it and paid more than half down on the car and took out a car loan for the rest with SEFCU, my credit union, for the rest. It was my first car loan ever.
The Focus wasn’t a Fit. Not even close. Two years after I bought it the brakes had to be replaced. A year after that the motor in the door for the driver window had to be fixed because the chain had gone all wibbly wimey. A year after that the air conditional died. This was partly my fault since I didn’t run the a/c periodically even during the winter. And while I should not have assumed that you treat a car a/c the same way you treat one in your window, I would prefer not to have an air conditioner in the car if the technology requires that it be run periodically including in the dead of winter.
In the winter of 2019 I got a have we got a deal for you mailer from DePaula Ford in Albany. It offered me, or so they claimed in the missive, a great deal on my long in the tooth Focus, which was sitting on 90,000 miles plus at the time, and a deal on a new car of my choice. Given my age and health I had been thinking that I needed a car that was easier for arthritic me to get into and out of and a car with four wheel or all wheel drive given historic upstate New York weather even before the “invitation” arrived. So I got the Escape. Part of the deal was an interest free payment plan so I arranged to pay the Escape off over a five year period.
Just like the Focus the Escape needed new brakes within two years later. A year of two after that it required extensive transmission work. Later in the same year an axle and a bearing had to be replaced. This summer—it always happens in summer doesn’t it?—the air conditioner went bust.
I almost sold the car to DePaula when the axle and bearing were replaced in November of 2023. I thought I could get a decent amount for it since it had only 8500 hundred miles on it. I tried to find a Fit with less that 50,000 miles on it, one of the neo-labours of Herakles at the establishment I bought my old Fit from. Though Ren Honda said they would contact me if a Fit came in they didn’t when a Fit came in so I sent them packing. I also looked at a Kia Soul. In the end, however, I decided to wait until the car was paid off in full, which just happened this month, before exchanging the Escape for a Soul.
At this point I must say that I have really had it with Ford motor cars and not only for the reason that they periodically break down and have to be fixed even when they have few miles on the odometre. Late last month, to note yet another example of why I am fed up with Ford, I got a letter from Ford Credit. informing me that my title was about to revert to me. A week or so later I received another letter from Ford Credit telling me that my title had been lost or destroyed.
Now I have, as I said, only bought two cars on credit my entire life and I was naive about how titles and liens worked. When I did not receive my title in 2019 I assumed Ford Credit had it. When I went to DePaula for my annual inspection TODAY, however, I learned that this was not true. DePaula assured me that they did the title and registration work when I bought the car. And admittedly I did receive my registration renewal by email and mail after that so they clearly did get the address on the registration right or they just simply merged it into my already existing Focus registration at the New York Department of Motor Vehicles. As for the title, DePaula blamed the DMV for me not getting the title to the Escape I now own. The DMV, of course—don’t you just love the bureaucratic blame game merry-go-round?—blamed DePaula.
Now it is certainly possible that the DMV is to blame. Did the DMV mess up the address on my title? Did it post the title at all? Did they post it to the wrong address? I do know that I had problems with my New York State EZ Pass after I had DePaula upgrade my licence plates to the new Excelsior ones on the Escape. I could not link my EZ Pass to my new licence plate number when I tried to do this. On the other hand, it is possible that DePaula somehow messed up the address on my title since I never received it at the flat that I have been living at since 2007. Whatever the reason I had to pay the DMV $20.00 dollars for a car title I never received. Can you say Ron you have been screwed over again?
To make a long sad story short I think I will be looking to trade in my Escape, which now has around 9500 miles on it, for a Soul once I get my errant title. My experience with Ford has not been a good one. I no longer trust Ford vehicles and I am not sure I trust DePaula any more though they have admittedly done a good job inspecting—this took an hour and a half today— and repairing the Escape over the years.
Such is the absurdity of life.
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