My Experience with Stockton to Malone Honda

So, I figure now that I've been through the car buying experience, I should let people know how it went and what I thought about the dealer.

I purchased my Civic LX from Stockton to Malone Honda in Sandy, Ut. This dealer is part of the Larry H. Miller auto group. I initially contacted their internet sales department and asked if they had any offers for graduating students / first time car buyers, and told him what I was looking for. He responded with an exact dollar amount quote ($1200 below sticker). We then emailed back and forth about financing and the special 2.9% APR special that was currently being offered. So before getting to the dealer we had already settled on a price and the financing option.

When we arrived at the dealer it had just started snowing, after having rained all morning, and continued to snow the entire time we were there. We were welcomed by a greeter and the internet manager handed us (my mom and I) off to a salesman. He brought the car around (in the request Galaxy Gray Metallic) color and parked it in the service depot for us so we wouldn't have to walk outside again. The car was absolutely brand new. No gas in the tank, 3 miles on the odometer, and everything was still covered in plastic, they hadn't even had a chance to put the fuses in for the radio yet. I liked that. We took it for a test drive to make sure things were working right, it was excellent.

After returning to the dealer we parked in the service depot again and went inside. Having decided to buy it we started filling out paper work. We were offered some snacks to appease our hunger while we continued working. During this time the guys in the service shop were going through the pre-delivery inspection report on the car: cleaning it up, filling up the gas tank, removing all the plastic, etc. After we finished the paperwork and took out an insurance policy with Amica we were sent over to the financing department.

This is where the only unpleasant part occurred. The final write up of the cost included a charge for $299 wich we had never authorized nor been told about. It was for Etch (as they call it) meaning the windshields have an ID etched in them and for the $299 a third party writes an extra insurance policy for if your car gets stolen. We quickly determined this to be a waste of our money (I've already got full coverage, as required to get financing), so we told them to take it off, to which he tried to tell me there was an 85% chance my car would be stolen, BS. Then the financing guy tried to push Gap Insurance on us, claiming that the value of the car drops so much immediately after buying it that were it to get wrecked we'd have to eat the price difference from what the Insurance company would give us. However, had that been the case we would probably have bought a year old one instead; but it's not. Buying a 2006 Civic LX is only about 1200 cheaper than a new one, even with 20k+ miles on it; so they don't drop much in price. So we turned down the Gap Insurance as well. THEN he tries to push the Extended Service Plan on us for some amount and 'threatens' us about how the car is so complex that somethings is going to break and then I'll be paying for all sorts of expensive repairs, again BS. I bought a Honda because of their great reliability record and safety features; trying to tell me how expensive the repairs are going to get is basically trying to tell me that I shouldn't trust my car to be reliable, right.

So we finally turned all the extra crap down, and got the car for the price quoted by the internet manager. We left financing and went back to the salesman who brought out the owner's manual and we went through the basic stuff about the car. We setup the first service appointment for July, and got an invitation to the new owners event in May. Then we went back to the service depot and did a final inspection of the car to make sure it was int tip-top shape. Then after a couple of final handshakes I drove home.

So, moral of the story, expect pushy and outright lying (85% chance of car being stolen) finance guys that try to browbeat you into giving them more money.