[Jairman]

Hi,

Joined a while back, figured might as well tell my Pontiac story.

It was 1987, I'm 17 years old. My dad comes into a little money ( I do mean little ) and decides to buy me a car. We'd been looking for 2 weeks or so and for the money we were trying to spend, found a lot of junk. We were hoping to stay under $2500.

So after driving a lot of Regals, Skylarks, Grand Am, etc... we found a lot that had a few muscle cars on it. Wow, I thought, could I really get one of these.

First one I sat in was 1978 Camaro, that had been "overhauled"... it was nice... black, chrome wheels, big, big motor.... as my dad said, "too much car for me" and once we asked way too much money.
We told the guy we didn't have a lot to spend, he turned us to another Regal... yuk, it was yellow and horrible looking... then out of the corner of my eye, I saw it....

1974 Firebird, Crager 5 spoke rims shinning nicely... she was being cleaned up, they had just gotten it. I asked about it and the guy said he'd make a great deal on it. My dad said again, probably too much car for me,but lets look. We drove it, it was fast, I'm not sure, but it was either a 350 or sb400. It was fast though....

We get back to the lot, and my dad said, "i just don't know, it's a lot of car"...
I'm so excited and can't stand it... I promised everything, from all the yard work to straight A's the upcoming school year.... Now comes the negotiating.. the guy said they were going to put $1595 on it. My dad really is a good guy, he lowered his head and said, "oh, I can't spend that...", At first I didn't realize what was going on... but the guy said "would you take it for $1350?" Again I became excited, knowing how much my dad would really spead, but my heart almost stopped again... my dad says " I don't know... it's got a lot of miles on it and needs tires... I couldn't believe what I heard next.. the guy said I can take $1100 for it bottom line... my dad says, to him "I have one offer for you, if you take it great, if not, maybe we can do business next time" ... "I have $970, in my car over there, I'll give you $950 for this one and that will leave $20, for my boy to put gas in the Firebird, do we have a deal?".

I was ready to walk away... the guy looked at me and said "your first car?", "yes I answered", "are you really going to help your dad and get good grades this year?" ... "yes I answered", then the impossible.. he held his hand out to me and said "deal"... OMG... I'm getting a Firebird.....

A few minutes for paper work and I was on my way.... I couldn't believe it.
It was Blue - Lucerne Blue I think is the color, with White leather interior, no console, shifter was on the column... had an 8 track player.... I didn't care, I loved it....

Left there filled it up and was off to pick up my friends and show off... picked up Mike and got pulled over for peeling out from a stop sign... was let off with a warning...

I loved that car... miss it to this day... we ended up selling it about 1 year later... I'll tell that story some day....

hope you enjoyed reading my experience...

[goatmanmitch]

Liked the story, my first car was a 70 LeMans back in 87 also, 16years old. This was at a car lot with my money only, I had $251 in my bank. My dad did the same thing, they accepted the money and the actual price of the car was $179, then the rest was the lot fee, tax and title. Can you imagine paying that for a car now? Hope you find another bird to replace the one you sold, I sure as heck hope I find a decent replacement to go with my current 66. Mitch