I have a few requirements: wagon, cause they get better gas mileage and have storage for bikes/gear internally. Manual, cause driving manual is more fun. A little style and a decent sound system. Good safety features. Also I had to buy in May/June, cause I won't have time later.
I'm replacing a '96 Honda Accord with 230k while still on a pretty tight budget. I live in Colorado and spend a lot of time driving in the mountains, especially in the winter, so I was looking at wagons either AWD or FWD. I had it narrowed down to the Honda Fit (09 redesign and up), and the Subaru Impreza wagon, but those are expensive used, Subarus can get pricey to repair, and the Fit doesn't have much power for the hills, nor stability control unless it's a really late model. I had to widen my search and stumbled across someone selling an '09 Vibe GT on here. I hadn't considered the Vibe, but it didn't take long to convince me it was a great option. I found one to test drive and was really impressed!! In hindsight, it did in fact take a little too long to convince me cause the seller received a higher offer just after I bought my ticket to Georgia to pick it up! He was very cool about all of it (offered me the car at the higher price/offered to refund my ticket) but I decided I couldn't stretch the budget to his new price.
Forlorn, I spent a few days reflecting, and realized that all I really wanted was an '09-10 GT manual. So I used CL, carfinder.com and a bunch of other sites and couldn't find a manual, let alone a manual GT in any nearby states. Nor had there been any on sale in the last 6 months! The ones that were for sale were way too expensive from dealers and had auto trans. I really started despairing at this point.
Early one morning carguru.com (great site) lists an '09 Vibe manual that just (as in, that morning) had it's price lowered by $3000! I could afford it! I called the dealership, asked all the questions, looked at Carfax, and it seemed to check out. Two days later my girlfriend and I were on a plane to Houston Tx! Yeehaw! We test drove, did the paperwork and got on the road for a mini vacation/car honeymoon! I've never been to Texas, and what a fun trip it turned out to be: We stopped to see some friends who were "drinkin' at the lake and gettin' rowdy on jetskis", a scene complete with giant mud spewing camo trucks, many Keystone Lights, and tornado wrecked houses in the background. We saw West, Texas (of fertilizer plant explosion fame), Waco (need I say more?) and Dallas. Had the best BBQ in my life in Fort Worth. Drove on Route 66 and stayed in the famous Tucamcari, NM. Visited friends and stuffed face with green chili and sopapillas in Santa Fe, then took the scenic route past Sand Dunes national park in the San Juan Valley.
With 1,200 miles under my belt in this car I can say I'm very pleased with the Vibe. I would not have found it without the help of this forum! I'm still in the process of fixing up the car, it's missing some hub center caps and new tires will be on it in a week or so. I will post pics then.
Things to do:
- replace missing wheel well shields/covers
- 3m spray on paint protector for one spot with missing clearcoat
- Replace summer tires - Sumitomo HTR Z III 225/45 R18 (extra 1/2 inch width for better traction!)
- Changed cabin air filter
- Installed K&N Typhoon engine intake
- 20% tint all around
- Removed crazy giant Texas emissions sticker from windshield
- Installed Bushwacker rear bumper protector for Toyota Matrix
- Replace missing center caps
- Replace faulty radio knobs
- Replace head unit to get bluetooth and USB functionality
- Replace missing center console divider (the one with the "Y" shape) - $37 is too much for that little thing.
I did notice that they dropped the price from about $13K down to $11K during the time I was watching, I'm sure due to the manual trans. I saw it was gone last week, and figured someone got a great deal. Wish I had known you were in town, we could have had a mini Vibe meet someplace. I'll bet you drove right by my house at the tollway & Hwy 290!
! I am dying to know what color it is and I'm assuming it's a GT? I'm also impressed to see that you have already added the K&N CAI to it. I'm sure you agree it's a must-have for every 2009-2010 2.4L owner 
! Looking forward to seeing pictures...
) Regardless I saved enough money to more than make up for new tires, the trip, and a few other repairs. 
And for the record Tom is my cousin .... I'm Tim 
