The story of the Bean families first mini-van……(special post from Daddy)
Our Jeep is 13 years old with 160k miles and is the main vehicle for our family. Recently Mommy had made several comments about wanting a mini-van, but still loved our Jeep dearly (like a family pet). But she never pressed the issue with me because she knew my "dream" to get a 4-door Jeep Wrangler (best vehicle ever). But truth be told, those awesome machines are just way out of our price range. So unless I quickly became a Orthopedic surgeon, I knew it wasn't an option. I also knew that if our Jeep was going to have any re-sale or trade-in value that we needed to consider doing something soon. So in an attempt to win the husband of the year award (again) I started looking for our first mini-van.
I decided to make it a surprise for Charity (since she didn't know that I was willing to go along with the mini-van idea anyway) and waited to try and sell the Jeep. After searching Autotrader.com and other on-line used car searches I quickly got an idea of features, styles, and average pricing for mini-vans. But knowing that we couldn't afford much (any payment would need to be less than $99 per month) I quickly narrowed my search to just a few vehicles. Well among over 1,000 listings was one right here in Muskegon. Now it had a few dings and scratches; it was 4 years old, and its car fax looked like it had been a rental with 1 accident. But it was what we could afford, and with only 91k miles I thought it could be a good van for a while. So I snuck our Jeep out to have the dealership review it (knowing that they probably wouldn't offer us much) and drove the mini-van home to surprise Charity.
Well she was surprised, but "shocked" might have been a better description, since she knew our finances and also didn't think I would be willing to "go mini-van". She described it as a great "basic" van as it didn't have any bells or whistles. She agreed that it was all we could afford and acknowledged that "beggars can't be choosers". But as we haggled at the dealership on value of our trade-in and price of the van we couldn't get the numbers to where we needed them to be. We left wondering if God was showing us that we needed to remain thankful for our Jeep and just drive it until it would drive no longer. But the next morning, I noticed a big price change in one of the vans I had been watching. I assumed at such a low price it must have been sold, but when I called it was still available. And better yet it had ALL the bells and whistles, many of which I knew would move my wife from "shocked" to "very happy". But the best part: it had been reduced to the EXACT SAME PRICE as the one in Muskegon!
So just when my wife had agreed to be thankful for whatever God would provide, He chose to bless her with more than she could have ever hoped for! To give us even more confidence I was able to locate the original owners on the Internet. And they shared over the phone that the only reason they traded it in was because they went to Florida several times a year and were worried about it making the drive with 89k miles (which made my step-father-in-law and I laugh). It also meant that not only did they take good care of the vehicle but that many of its miles were highway miles, furthering its potential for long life. And speaking of my father-in-law, he not only graciously agreed to sell our vehicle, but within 2 days had sold it for $1,000 more than what we had planned. Thanks Keith!
So all in all, we're very thankful. And even though there will come a day when it won't work anymore, for now God's used it to make my wife very happy, and give her a very memorable Mother’s Day. What’s my favorite part of our new mini-van you ask? “Smuggling compartments”; just like the Millennium Falcon.
PS Did I mention where we had to go to get the van of my wife's dreams? Barrington, IL (4 hours away!) She's worth every mile. :-)
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