The First Thing You Need To Consider When Buying For Teens:

• Geting Insurance? We reccomend AIG Direct or 21st Century for the most relaible and inexpensive young driver insurance. You can also check NetQuote.com to compare Insurance Prices around the web. Also relate to our Complete Guide On Auto Insurance

• Buying Used? Read This First

• Need A Loan? We reccomend using MyAutoLoan.com
  or Any-Credit-Auto-Loan.com

• Have Good Credit? Why not check for Free with Equifax.

Buying The First Car For A Teen

• You've done all the online researching. You picked out the cleanest, safest, shiniest vehicle for your teen driver. Now, to your kid, it's a shining beacon of freedom, adulthood and new backseat boundaries. To you it looks more like the four wheels from the Terrordome—one ton, all deadly weapon. Now, more than ever is the time to drive home to your teen driver that driving is a responsibility that needs to be taken deadly serious. Your teen needs to understand that if you lose focus for one second, people can die. It seems that every time you wake up to teens who perish in car accidents, all avoidable. You hear about Prom queens being cut out of mangled cars, football heroes being scraped off of the median. We have more than enough visuals in our car crash gallery to make you give up driving altogether.

• All these horrific examples of shining, dewy teens that should have got the message, but didn't. The idea that awful things only happen to other people is rampant amongst teens. As an adult it is so easy to see that it CAN happen to them. The odds just aren't in your teen's favor.

• It seems every quarter mile there is a handmade grave marker. A cross fashioned out of plywood or dried green branches with dog-eared school pictures attached. It's not just every once and a while. South Florida has become a rolling cemetery of RIP's and "We Miss You" or "You Were Loved" with a few ironic "Drive Safely" signs. Right around major holidays, Christmas and birthdays, those death markers are bejeweled with ribbons and ornaments, flowers and trinkets of interest to only the dead. Knowing that parents must visit monuments to their children's lack of judgment, broken parents who would give everything for ten minutes more.

• The power lies in the hands of an empowered teen. Our kids are dropping left and right and it is our responsibility to lead the way. There is nothing more important than teaching kids the right path. Simply showing kids bloody pictures isn't the only way. We have to show kids that making the right decision is easy and at the same time not lame.

• Teach your kids this: every time a passenger enters that car, have them envision themselves at their friend's funeral. Have them imagine what their friend's mother would look like when they had to say that their son is dead because they were being an idiot. Make them terrifically aware of the fact that it is their fault and it is their responsibility. Precious cargo. Drive home the idea that every accident is preventable. Also, even though you may walk away from a lethal crash, you will always carry with you the ghost of a fallen child with a grieving family.This family who carried, bore and loved this child from the conception. All those packed lunches, the first tee ball game or lost tooth. Families are glad to make time for children, to spend money and time. But, all that love and hope just for some punk kid to rip it all away to text someone, or to goof around with the radio knobs. It's just infinitely unfair. I don't wish that guilt on anyone either. Any way you slice it up, everybody loses.

• It's an elementary Physics lesson, don't sweat it, I'll simplify it. Your body travels as fast as your car. That's easy enough to understand. So, when you slam on your brakes at 80mph you have 1/100th of a second to react to protect yourself. Yeah, do you even know how fast that is?! Unfortunately it's not enough time to even blink, let alone click your seatbelt. Your body has just slammed into a windshield at 80mph, you're an egg slammed against a brick wall. This is Newton's Law: objects in motion will remain in motion until stopped by an outside source. Egg. Brick wall.

• As mentioned before, don't wait til your careening into an inch of safetly glass before you pull out that seatbelt. It's played out to say that "most accidents happen a block or two from your home" but it's absolutely true! Its just easier to make a habit out of seatbelts. Ohh, they're uncomfortable, or, it's too hot for those. It won't sound like such a bad idea when your rolling around the mall in your wheelchair. You owe it to yourself, your family and your future to put on your dumb ol seatbelt.

• It sounds dumb, but, for crying out loud, use those turn signals. It cuts down on road rage—people behind you are able to maneuver around you. Those turn signals allow you to make lane changes much easier.

• Now that phones are so interactive, it's hard not to be complete consumed. Studies have shown that operating a phone while driving is the same as being drunk behind the wheel. Just because it isn't illegal—yet, doesn't make chatting on your phone any less dangerous. Your Blackberry going off? Got some sexy new email? Is it more important than digging glass out of your face? Need to find out which Starbucks your buddies are chillin at? Is it more important than seeing a dead toddler peeled out of their car seat? Plus, you know how annoying it is to be behind some old lady going super slow because they're on a cellphone. Or, have you ever been cut off by someone on their cell? Aren't you ready to rip their head off?! Exactly. Don't be that guy.

A few bullets just to memorize:

• Drag racing is dumb. You're not Danny Zuko, that's not Greased Lightning. Get a hold of yourself.

• Seatbelts are NOT NEGOTIABLE. It's the least you can do. How fun does being paralyzed sound like?

• You are in charge when you put that key in the ignition. What you say goes. Bottomline. Don't leave til everyone's strapped in. (Believe me, you'll only have to make a stand once, everyone will fall into line.)

• No cell phones. Just relax. Nothing is more important than being safe. It's the law now too.
  

• Try not to drive home super early in the morning hours, like after a party. It's 4am and you're ready to sleep not drive. Your reactions are going to be a lot slower.

• Use a 2 car or a 3 second rule while behind cars—giving yourself time to react.

• Teens that sneak out around 2am to cruise are begging for trouble. All the crazies are out and they're loaded. You have become moving targets for angry boozers. Just hang out at home, try to finish Zelda for Wii.

• Organize yourself. Speeding is for jerks. It's inconsiderate and rude. Plus, incredibly unsafe. You can't blow through red lights. Most people aren't paying attention to you. They aren't expecting a snot nosed kid to be in their way. Respect them, it's not your turn.

• Turn signals are a good idea. Always.

• Most cars have more than a few blind spots. Know them and adjust your seat and mirrors so that you are the master of your domain.

• Don't drive drunk. Are we still testing this theory?! Buzzed driving is drunk driving. Plan to sleep over and toss your keys, and plan to do it for your buzzed friends that are trying to drive while drunk.