Most bad deals you can see miles away unless the hook is big enough.

Well, we hooked into a real crummy one last night.

My lovely wife, myself and my in-laws, Fortuna and Isaac went out for an appointment at this place called “DirectBuy”. If you have watched much tv, you have seen the ads. People doing home remodeling (yup, that’s us) are gushing (no pun intended) about saving $30,000 or more on kitchen cabinets and other home furnishings.

In a nutshell the deal is that you become a member, go to the showroom and can then order all sorts of everyday and luxury items right from the manufacturer at the price they sell to stores at. No markup or middleman.

So we view the showroom, listen to the silly presentation and finally the guy gets down to the membership and casually says it’s only $4991 for the first 3 years! Isaac was ready to leave at that point, but Ruthie and I wanted to find out some more details. Fortuna was graceful as ever and waited outside with Isaac.

It got worse from there. turns out they want you to decide right there and then if you want to become a member. Can’t come back ever again if you turn them down. If you want to finance the small amount of $4991 they want 17% interest. Just to get a price quote on an item for comparison so you know if it is even a good deal they want a yes or no to membership right then!

This place was like 30 miles from home and they expect you to come running out there both to order something and to pick it up. Are they nuts?

So we had a quick and dirty little huff and puff with the “director” (the guy was so nice before the presentation and so pushy afterwards) assigned to follow us around and skeedaddled out of there!

Unless you just have lots of money and time to burn, I suggest staying away from DirectBuy. jmho, oy.