I am submitting just a brief overview at this time of what happened to me regarding this dealership due to time constraints. An update will be filed at a later time but in the interim, I am hoping that "Victoria" (author of the story I am responding to) — or anyone else who has had a similar experience, will contact me so we can compare details.
If I hadn't needed the trade-in factor that a dealer provides, I would avoid have sought a private party purchase. However, my experience at the Infinity dealer (Infinity of Fife) three years ago was so good, that I mistakenly feel back on it during my recent purchase at Acura of Lynnwood.
Both dealerships are high-end with intelligent, well-groomed sales people. But the similarities end there. The Infinity dealership was without the typical "Dealership games" that I had been familiar with in the past, and Infinity took a lot of time to explain all of the financial details with me because frankly, they had nothing to hide.
In a nutshell, I had originally targeted the dealer to look at used Acura's, at the suggestion of a friend who was helping me with my new vehicle selection, but the Acura dealership had only one option in the model I was looking for, and it had high miles.
My friend found a different vehicle on the Acura of Lynnwood website, and after further research (Carfax, Edmunds.com valuations, etc.), he ultimately recommended it because it was 1-owner with exceptionally low miles.
Fast forward to the day of the purchase (more details to be provided later) and I verbally agreed to a deal with Acura of Lynnwood after several hours of back and forth discussion. However, my daughter had an engagement that same afternoon and I didn't want to rush through the paperwork in order to make it there on time.
We agreed that I would return after the event and they would have the paperwork all ready to go.
By the time I returned to the dealership just passed 6:00pm, allowing less than an hour before closing to finalize the paperwork, they had other customers on the lot.By the time they were able to accommodate me, it was past 6:30pm.
The Finance Manager who handled my purchase was articulate, educated and extremely savvy. It was the end of the day, they were about to close, my young daughter was exhausted and admittedly, I was in a rush to get dinner for her and head home.
I signed the paperwork without much scrutiny because they seemed incredibly reputable and my experience with the Infinity dealership had positively altered my perception of the used car sales process. Later that evening when I finally had a chance to review all of the paperwork, I realized I had made a fatal error by trusting in good faith that the financials they were presenting me reflected our verbal agreement earlier that day.
It would *appear* that they "swallowed" my trade-in (I also had a cash down payment) but I want to be fair and withhold an actual accusation until I can consult a lawyer and have this confirmed. However, when I discovered — unfortunately too late — both this posting and that they have an "unsatisfactory" rating with the BBB, I wanted to get this up and posted on the chance it will save even 1 person a similar experience.
According to the BBB, in the last 36 months Acura of Lynnwood has had 10 complaints, 4 of which are related to Sales Tactics, of which 2 remain unresolved.
To make matters worse, the car (certified by their dealership) has a problem already and I have to take it in to their service department to have it fixed (unless I want to pay out of pocket). After reading Victoria's posting, I'm not too optimistic.
To be continued...
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