I purchased a 2003 Suzuki XL-7 from Mid America Auto Sales in January. I had never heard of the dealership until they started advertising on Craigslist. I wasn't actively looking for a car, but I was up to 3 vehicles and only needed 2, so I was thinking about trading in my 2 SUV's for 1 newer one. We test drove the car several times and it seemed to do fine. So we handed over the keys and titles to 2 of the best cars I have ever owned in my life and drove home in the XL-7. After about 10 days of driving the XL-7, I drove the car to work after a rainstorm. I quickly found that I could not go over 30 miles an hour on the highway without fishtailing all over the place. I called my husband from work and told him that there was something wrong with the car and I did not feel safe driving it anymore. He drove it to work the next day after it had snowed and the car ended up spinning around 180 degrees on a major 5 lane highway. He ended up coming to rest on the shoulder of the highway, but he was definately scared of the car too. After an inspection of the car, my husband found that the rear tires (which were new when we bought the car 10 days earlier) were completely bald on the insides to the point where the radials were coming through the rubber! We took the car to get new tires and the mechanic told us there was something incredibly wrong with the rear axle. Well, after a couple of days and a visit to the Suzuki dealership garage, we were told that the axle was bent, the rear axle housing was destroyed and that the Suzuki 100,000 mile drivetrain warranty was void, due to "gross abuse of the vehicle". We were advised that the only way to fix the problem would be to put an entire rear end assembly on with new brakes, shocks, trailing arms, etc... The Suzuki dealership gave us an estimate of $2,500-4,000!!! My husband contacted Rodney at Mid America Auto Sales and was given quite a run around. At first, we asked if we could get our 2 SUV's back and he said that they were gone. Then we asked if he could just take it back and trade us something the same price for it. He wanted to give us an SUV 2 years older, with twice as many miles as our XL-7, and for us to just give him $2,200 for the trouble! We told him we were not interested in any sort of a "trade" that was going to cost us more money. So we pressed him for some help in our situation and were repeatedly told that he was busy... Call me back later. Finally, my husband pinned him down and gave him all the details from the Suzuki dealership and asked him if he was going to do anything about it. We were told that he buys from auctions and they aren't checked out at all, so he had "no idea" that the car had problems. The Suzuki mechanic told me that anyone who is selling cars needs to get them up on a lift and check them out and that if that would have been done, they could have seen immediately that something major was wrong. So Rodney is either lying about not knowing about the problem or not dealing cars very intelligently by having no idea what he is selling. He refused to pay for any of the repairs or take the car back from us. He claims that he is just a small businessman, trying to make a living, and that taking any responsibility would hurt him. Well, paying for an entire rear end and new tires for a car I have owned for less than a month has put an incredible dent in my wallet! In the end, Rodney advised us to "just take it somewhere and trade it in... That's what I would do". Well, I guess that shows his scruples. Its called the Golden Rule, Rodney.
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