Worst Experience I Could Have Imagined - andrewchwalik
What an absolutely frustrating experience. If I had to do it all over again, I would avoid this dealer. Read this entire review to make sure you know what's going on if you decide to get a car from Liberty Lincoln Mercury in Vermilion, OH.
I went to Liberty Lincoln Mercury in Vermilion, OH to check out a used Nissan Juke. Prior to the visit, I did my fair share of research to narrow down the type of car I was looking for. After a week of online studying and a few test drives around the Columbus area, where I live, I decided I wanted to get a Nissan Juke. Sadly, there were none in my area so I had to look around the entire state of Ohio and that's when I came across the 2013 Juke S at Liberty Lincoln Mercury in Vermilion.
This was my first time buying a car so I wanted to make sure I had all the details set before making a 2 hour drive to Vermilion. My father and I had a few conversations with Tevin, a sales representative, about the preliminary details found online and set up an appointment to check out the car. When we asked about taking a few hundred dollars off the price to get it in our range and for the long drive, he said, "Yeah, I can probably do that for you Mr. Chwalik." This never ended up coming to fruition. Of course, it wasn't written in stone but he should have never even mentioned "probably being able to make it happen" in the first place. This is most likely just a sleazy tactic to get interested buyers into confirming an appointment.
THAT'S JUST STRIKE NUMBER ONE BUT SOMETHING I GUESS YOU EXPECT WHEN DEALING WITH CAR DEALERSHIPS.
My father and I scheduled an appointment to check out the Juke with an intention to purchase it if everything checked out. They had the details online, but unfortunately, everything didn’t line up exactly.
There was only one key that went with the car - that was not mentioned anywhere. Most cars normally come with two from what I understand. The worst part was that getting a new key would cost around $200!
Another thing that was not mentioned or depicted in any of the images was that the driver side floor mat was missing. All the rest were still in the car, just not that driver side mat. Not a huge issue, I just wish they had told me that from the beginning. That would cost another $100 to get more mats.
The worst aspect was something under the hood. This was not listed anywhere online or mentioned by the employee we met with to go over the paperwork prior to checking out the car. There was a plastic covering that protected the engine and it was cracked down the middle. There was an image on their website of all the components under the hood, but they did not show a crack whatsoever. When we asked the sales employee, all he did was say that it wasn’t a big deal.
With all of these issues not being communicated online or during our multiple discussions, my father and I simply asked that they deduct the total cost of the car by $300 to cover the purchase of a new key and a new floor mat.
The owner of the dealership came in and was not even slightly willing to budge on the price, even after all of these issues that we had discovered. He acted as though they were not a large deal.
Here’s the point: If those issues would have been communicated upfront, we wouldn’t have been taken off guard and surprised to find out these problems. It felt like we were being cheated because they were trying to sweep the details under the rug. Not a great experience when buying my first car.
SADLY IT ONLY GETS WORSE FROM HERE.
The owner did finally agree to deduct $200 to get a new key produced, but that was all he offered. Really, I liked the car and the other issues were something that wouldn’t affect the driving (I hope) so I took the offer. Plus, I just wanted to get this terrible interaction over with. Hopefully, I never need to buy another used car. If I do, I’d NEVER go back to Liberty Lincoln Mercury in Vermilion, OH.
Once I agreed to purchase the Nissan Juke, we had to wait an hour just to meet with the finance person. That wasn’t a huge problem, it just added to the frustration. As a dealership, it might mean you need to invest in your company a bit and hire another employee. We finally got all the paperwork done and I think I was more excited to get away from the car dealer than I was to be driving my new used car.
LITTLE DID I KNOW, THIS WAS NOWHERE NEAR THE END OF MY TERRIBLE EXPERIENCE.
A few days later, I received a call from someone at the dealership that I had NOT worked with during my encounter. This person was telling me that I needed to pay $250 more because they forgot to include an expense in the original contract. ARE YOU KIDDING? Could this entire experience be any more sketchy? After attempting to understand the situation, the explanation was that there was a “mix up” on the dealership end and they forgot to include a $250 charge for the loan fee. Just to be clear, the dealership messed up the paperwork and was now expecting me to pay an extra $250 after the contract was already signed.
After a heated conversation and an unapologetic finance employee telling me the paperwork wouldn’t move forward unless the fee was paid, I reluctantly had to shell out $250. There went the $200 deduction to get that extra key replaced. The worst part was that the employee did not apologize for the screw up even though it was their fault! I still can’t believe how rude he was. The only nice part was that he did call me back an hour later to apologize for the call and offered me a $25 gas card. Nice gesture, but it didn’t make the experience any better.
There you have it. This was the extent of my horrific experience with the Liberty Lincoln Mercury in Vermilion, OH. Getting your first car is supposed to be an exciting time, unfortunately, it was ruined by a terribly managed dealership. If you haven’t gathered, I would NEVER recommend this dealership to anyone. I would stay away at all costs. Seriously. You’ll have a much more pleasant experience at almost any other dealership.
Best of luck buying your next car and I hope your experience is 1000 times better than mine.
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