Buying a car for your kid

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My oldest was taught to drive when he was about 12, and bought his own car when he could. My oldest daughter bought her car and learned to drive at 19 when she had to drive to college. My youngest son is 18, 19 in the spring and I think I'm gonna get him a car this year with our tax money. He's the one with ADHD and who I think has some AS.

He says he will take anything, but he's very, very picky about his stuff and about image. One of those kids who has to have certain brands of clothes and all that. So, some Toyota that's in good shape or a pickup truck that gets good mileage won't cut it. He seems to be my one kid who got all the Italian heritage, or most of it. He's very much a guido, and that isn't a slur, it's a term for a type of Italian guy. I'm going to get him, if I can find it, a late 80's model Iroc Z 28. Finding one will be the problem. I want a 6 cyl cause he has a temper but I also want one in good condition. T tops aren't that important, and I can get it painted cause it's got to be red or black, but the problem is finding one that hasn't been driven to s**t or the interior trashed. One that isn't also restored so well that it's out of my price range.

He's going to be picky and he's also not wanting to go with me to get it. So, it's all on me. Anybody else dealt with this? This is a big investment and ya'll saw the worry I had about which phone I bought him, so imagine all this responsibility.

How did you deal with it? Did you convince your kid to go with you and test drive the car? Did you bring it by so he could ok it first? How did he react when he got it? I got about two months to find this car.

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Have you considered giving him the parameters and then letting him do the research/choosing.

For example, if your limits are: $X, has to be w/in X miles to pick up easily, has to cost no more than X for car insurance, has to be able to pay for with cashier's check...

Then give him some places to start looking that are okay for you and you guys can go check them out together.

That's how I would do it. (basically, it's how I handle clothes shopping with my darling NT daughter as well)

It is very nice of you to want to get him a vehicle, but he is old enough to do the legwork on it. I agree - give him the parameters (price, location, etc) and maybe a list of places to look (craig's list, Carmax, Car Soup) and let him do the legwork. You may not find what you want right away and since you want a used car you could actually post a 'looking for' type of add online too and see what kind of response you get.

Good Luck

Wow, a Camaro, that's really nice. Don't you think his first car should be a bit more beaten up though. He'll probably only crash it. My first car was a Lada.

I would offer to buy him a beater and tell him to "take it or leave it."

Getting him something "nice" will only feed that materialistic "image" driven attitude and validate it on your end. I wouldn't do it.

Call me old fashioned, but if you buy him the awesome car, what incentive will he have to work hard and succeed?

My son wanted an iPad for Christmas, so we told him he had to save up half the money himself. He saved up £130 doing jobs round the house. He's pretty proud of himself.

When I got my license, i got my grandparents crown victoria. That thing was a mess. No AC, fabric coming off, guzzled gas, and had a coffee can fashioned into a container for some of the engine electronics. It was an awesome car, and a POS.

But It made me appreciate my 1st new car all the more.

I would copy the other people's advice. I would say "I will give you X amount of money to spend" and let him do the leg work. It's an important skill to learn how to buy a car.

If you pick out and buy him the car he may think you should be the one to pay to fix it. Either way I wish you were my mom!