Wow, that's one heck of an overriding factor! Color me impressed.
This is going to get long, but it's fun...
That warranty extension had to have been some kind of mistake somewhere, $350 to extend a warranty significantly beyond the manufacturer's is total business insanity. I often wonder if that warranty company is out of business, or at least ran themselves through the bankruptcy car wash and came out squeaky clean with higher prices after that big of a screwup.
I mean seriously. We went to buy the car. We had already negotiated the price OFF-site (did I mention I hate car dealers wasting my time) and they still tried the "upsells" during paperwork signing, which was damned close to me standing up and walking out the door...
The guy says, "I understand you don't want to pay anything other than already negotiated, the Internet Sales Manager already warned me, but you really should consider this..." and then showed me the price and what it covered on a simple one page piece of paper. I was honestly already about to say, "Put that stuff away and if you offer me any other upsell items, we are leaving..." when I looked down and saw $350 and a list of stuff covered that was insane.
Instead I said, "Is that price missing a zero, or is it monthly?!"
Guy shrugs and says, "Nope. It's a one-time price. We think it's a pretty good deal, too!"
This was also one of two dealerships who have claimed over time that they could beat my financing, which one dealership "lost" at and had to get their own dealership Commerical credit line involved to meet the terms we signed.
So he goes into that pitch next, and my usual response to that pitch is "Not [****ing] likely... but what have you got?"
These guys did it right. They had a DIFFERENT credit union on the hook to beat ANY other credit union's financing rate by a full percentage point at a minimum and they made the other credit union do it. I was impressed. I had to pay $20 to join it. Ha.
Sadly, the dealership that sold us the VW lemon was the best to do business with ever... and I've owned at least ten to twelve vehicles purchased at dealerships. Maybe more.
So... a side note. I was going to link to them and say if someone needed a VW, they should certainly go there. But as I was searching for their dealership I found this article instead.
http://m.gazette.com/heuberger-sheds-the-volkswagen-brand-penkhus-picks-it-up/article/60693
They dumped VW in 2009, switched to all Subaru, and were the largest Subaru dealer in the country that year.
Doesn't surprise me a bit. Here's hoping they've kept doing whatever it was that they were doing. They were doing it very very right as a dealership back then.
Selling VW off to expand and only sell Subarus around here sounds like someone had real business sense. It is Colorado after all. The place oozed "smart" back when I was dealing with them before '09.
Haven't googled to see if they kept it up for eight years hence or not, but I saw snippets of numerous high reviews when liking up that article, and I still see their dealer tags running around up north here in Metro Denver, so that says something that people go south 100 miles to do business with them.
Never connected the dots on the cars that I've seen recently with their tags as being all Subarus though. Or just figured they were a multi-brand dealer.
We did always make fun of their name, though. We always called that the "Huge Burger" car. Haha. It got other meaner names as time passed, however. LOL!
The dealership who handled all the maintenance was in Denver Metro and comparatively they were a grimy little place with good service department reviews and little else going for them. I wouldn't have purchased a vehicle there on a bet. But the service bay was run well.
If that car hadn't been a POS we'd still be driving it. Right size. Wagon. TDI Diesel. Great mileage. Drove awesome for the first few years. Did a trip to South Dakota where we got 40 MPG. Karenwas a home care nurse back then and drove all over. Tons of miles. But...
Suspension and steering slowly degraded to crap over the next three years. With the major problems keeping it in the shop constantly we put zero money into dealing with those two things and the sluggish power response it exhibited on the second transmission sealed the deal.
Our rural move made us decide to look for a late model Lincoln LT as the only pickup truck Karen might like, being a city girl with her brandy new Civic and later her brandy new VW, and once she drove it, she was hooked. That search took a while.
We eventually found an '08 100 miles the other direction and that was the last year for the LT. The Ford dealer that had the LT on their lot gave us a reasonable offer on the VW for what I knew was wrong with it, as a trade in, and I'm sure they auctioned it off. I wanted nothing to do with someone coming back on me in a private sale of that POS so a trade in was always where it was going to go.
That was the dealer who wanted to know my info for running our credit and the poor sales guy blinked twice and swallowed when I said if it was her truck, he should be talking to HER. Haha. I think he learned not to assume the MALE is buying the truck that day. Haha.
Nice kid. He blinked again when SHE said, "How long will this take? We already have financing or I could just write you a check..." Then he still wanted to run both of our credit which I inwardly laughed at and let him do.
Then the propane tanks at a storage facility across the street literally exploded, and we had mild firefighting entertainment to preoccupy us while he ran the silly credit numbers.
And they couldn't beat our credit union -- again. LOL. They never learn. But he was funny when he came back and announced that both scores were over 800 so it "Doesn't matter who's name we put it in..." I glared at him half serious and half joking and said, "I thought I told you already this is her truck and her deal?"
He looked sheepish and said he would have the stuff typed up in her name. She laughed and said, "Oh HE can be on the title if he wants. It's easier that way if I croak."
I do love my wife. She knows when we are playing with a sales guy. Especially a rural northern Colorado one who's used to Bubba rolling in with bad credit and buying a car for the "little lady, so she doesn't get ripped off!" Hahaha.
That poor kid didn't know WHAT to make of us by the time we watched the bonfire get out out and signed the papers and headed home in the truck.
Even more fun, they forgot to fuel it. The detail
guys we're watching the fire too.
So a couple days later I get the standard Ford form letter from the kid saying he's going to always be there for us for any of our "needs", so I reply back that we almost ran out of gas on the way home after he said it was full. More messing with him. I knew we just went and put gas in it and didn't care.
He freaked out and replied that he'd check with his manager and get some free oil changes or something. Haha. I let him off the hook and told him it was no big deal, we'd already filled it twice and his dealership is too far from home to drive up there for $20 worth of bulk oil and a filter. Haha. Poor kid. Bet he checks every car that leaves the lot now.
He still emails from time to time asking if we need anything. He must be one of those rare ones who likes selling cars. He's still there after three years. Nice kid. I'd let him shop for our next truck for us if he's still around in another five or six years. Grin!
Car dealer storytime over. I love messing with car dealers. I go in planning on fun and mischief because I know they're usually going to waste many hours of my time. Might as well make it into free entertainment!
