My Review Of Kristal Auto Mall:
I drove 2.5 hours to look at a Mitsubishi Endeavor that I was very interested in. The SUV had great reviews, and was in pretty good shape and reasonably priced. When I arrived the salesman (Rinaldo or Alfonzo, or something like that) took me out back to look at it. There were a few obvious things wrong including the sunroof cover being off track and interfering with the sunroof opening and closing, and an object stuck in the rear heater blower that made a loud sound. The salesman told me to come back in a day or two and they would have it fixed. I called him the next day, and to his credit he appeared to have called into the shop on his day off to check on the progress. I also asked about inspection, which he talked his way around but never answered. I told him that the carfax showed a failed emissions inspection, and that I would like the car inspected to buy it. He told me you would try to get that done. He told me to come in the next day, so I drove another 2 hours (that's about 7 hours not in 2 days) to look at it. So, I came excited and ready to buy it, when to my surprise it was apparent that nothing had been done. Nothing at all was fixed, and the car was not inspected. I looked closer at the sunroof cover and discovered that it was simply off track. This could have probably been fixed in 2 minutes, but they obviously didn't care. The car also had a broken 12 volt cover.The salesman told me repeatedly on both days that "it's a used car," which meant that they weren't willing to do anything to fix it. We took the car for a drive. It drove well, but was out of gas. We stopped for gas and I noticed that the gas cap was broke. He did not offer to get a new one, but said that I could just buy a new one at the dealer or somewhere. During the test drive he had me stop so that he could get pizza. While he did offer to get me some, and while I would be okay with that under some circumstances, it seemed unprofessional given his general lack of interest. When we got back I was still ready to buy it because overall it was a good SUV, and I did the research to know that it is reliable. However, they were not willing to inspect the car, run an emissions inspection, or give me any kind of proof that it would pass inspection. He told me that it failed the emissions inspection because they had put a new battery in it, and it had to reset. So, I was faced with either risking that it would get inspected in PA, or not buying the car. I decided to still buy it. However, the last straw was when we negotiated the price. I asked how much they could take off because it was not inspected, and had the several problems I talked about. The salesman talked to his manager, and then came back to say that normally they charge $995 for a dealer import fee, and $600 for a preparation fee (not sure what they did exactly), and that they would take off the $995 fee. So, in short, not only were they not willing to take off money, but they were charging me $600 more than the list price of the vehicle. This is a shady dealership. Not only was the salesman unprofessional, he just didn't care. He never asked me once anything about my life, interests, or needs. What do you expect in Brooklyn, NY. Maybe it was just a bad salesman (they should probably fire this guy), but my experience was poor. If you are willing to pay full price plus fees for a brand new car, and this dealership is much cheaper then you might be okay. After all, what can go wrong with a new car. Otherwise I would steer clear. I ended up buying a 2007 Mitsubishi Outlander from DCH Kay Honda in NJ. They were very professional, helpful, and were 100% honest. I spent several hundred hours looking at cars, and my conclusion is that you should buy from a trusted and certified dealer unless you are positive that a smaller dealer is a good one. That's a shame to say, but the truth. Best wishes.
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