Macan ticking noise

[johnb]

I decided to talk to the dealership about it to see what the situation is for possible trade in value. I was honest with them, and they're offering me more than I expected - only a little below the value their online calculator showed me (which didn't know anything about the issue). Maybe there's more padding in the price of the car I'm buying than I thought lol! But I think that is the route I'll end up going.

The guy surprised me with this too: I could have said nothing, and they wouldn't have inspected the car. He said they basically just run the VIN through their system, check the mileage, and quote a value based on that. I wouldn't pawn this off on someone without a warning (not even a dealership lol) but if they're ok with it, I am not about to try talking them out of it.

[Tom]

I decided to talk to the dealership about it to see what the situation is for possible trade in value. I was honest with them, and they're offering me more than I expected - only a little below the value their online calculator showed me (which didn't know anything about the issue). Maybe there's more padding in the price of the car I'm buying than I thought lol! But I think that is the route I'll end up going.

The guy surprised me with this too: I could have said nothing, and they wouldn't have inspected the car. He said they basically just run the VIN through their system, check the mileage, and quote a value based on that. I wouldn't pawn this off on someone without a warning (not even a dealership lol) but if they're ok with it, I am not about to try talking them out of it.

Oooo, I'd take that before someone wakes up. In fact, I'd worry it's a story to get you hooked on the new car only to later claim some higher-up is balking and they need to adjust further... Hopefully not, but that would be page 1 from the Dealer Hijinx handbook...

[johnb]

I decided to talk to the dealership about it to see what the situation is for possible trade in value. I was honest with them, and they're offering me more than I expected - only a little below the value their online calculator showed me (which didn't know anything about the issue). Maybe there's more padding in the price of the car I'm buying than I thought lol! But I think that is the route I'll end up going.

The guy surprised me with this too: I could have said nothing, and they wouldn't have inspected the car. He said they basically just run the VIN through their system, check the mileage, and quote a value based on that. I wouldn't pawn this off on someone without a warning (not even a dealership lol) but if they're ok with it, I am not about to try talking them out of it.

Oooo, I'd take that before someone wakes up. In fact, I'd worry it's a story to get you hooked on the new car only to later claim some higher-up is balking and they need to adjust further... Hopefully not, but that would be page 1 from the Dealer Hijinx handbook...

Well it turns out you weren't far off with this. They did indeed renege on the deal. I wouldn't say they planned the whole thing but it was pretty bad behavior imo.

When I was talking to the sales guy originally, I assumed that there was no way they would take my car in trade. Still, I thought I might as well tell them about the issue. Worst case scenario, it buys me some sympathy and maybe a token discount right?

So I told him 1. it's making a ticking noise and 2. I think it could be bore scoring. OK I could have made a stronger statement than that, but I think that's fair. Lots of these cars run for a long time with scored bores and don't make that noise so it could have been something else. But I let the cat out of the bag with the words "bore scoring" and even asked if he was familiar with that issue, which he claimed he was.

He said normally I'd have to pay $500 to have a trade in inspected (??) but to leave it with him, and he called back a while later and said "ok, I talked to the boss, and you have a choice: 1. we can inspect the car and offer a trade value based on the inspection, or 2. we can just offer you 7500 right now".

Naturally I said I'll take #2! I asked him, "can I count on that?", he says absolutely, I'll even send it to you in writing! (which he did).

We finalized everything else, set an appointment for the paperwork, and he asked me for a $1000 non-refundable deposit over the phone. At this point I have only seen the new car briefly and while it's an almost new 2025 car, and pretty safe, I just don't feel comfortable committing to something this expensive without another look. So I told him I want to come in once more to give it a once over. He wasn't happy but he accepted that. He wasn't going to be there the next day but said someone else could take the deposit.

So the next morning I go in, and he is there after all. While I'm looking at the car he says "I'll just your car a once over too". Strange, since he already declined to do that, and I'm only here at my own insistence, but whatever. They know about the issue already so I don't care. He comes back a couple of minutes later and says the new offer is $500!

At the end of the day, I can't blame them for valuing the car that low, although it was worth more than that, maybe not to them. But the fact that they weren't in the least bit apologetic bugged me a lot. The tone was very defensive. No acknowledgement of any fault on their part whatsoever. What if I had paid the deposit? What if I had signed the paperwork? Maybe they would have given me the deposit back but their tone makes me suspect that they would have blamed it on me and kept at least some of it claiming that they were out the cost of the inspection.

I took my key and left. The sales manager texted me a little later but with the same defensive tone. He told me they had warned me in advance that the offer was subject to an inspection (not true) and when I corrected him he just kept repeating himself. He made no attempt to salvage the deal which was strange because I told him I had originally expected them to not be interested in taking it as a trade in, so he should have been able to piece together that I was still prepared to buy their car. But his attitude put me off. If he had just apologized and refrained from contradicting my account of what happened he could have rescued the sale.

I ended up selling my car to Carvana for a decent bit more than the fake 7500 trade offer. I don't feel too bad for them, they inspected it and drove it (twice) and still took it. I have a number in mind of what I should have taken for it and I'll offset the bad karma some other way.

The dealership still has the car they almost sold me, I think it's coming up on 3 months now lol.

[Tom]

I decided to talk to the dealership about it to see what the situation is for possible trade in value. I was honest with them, and they're offering me more than I expected - only a little below the value their online calculator showed me (which didn't know anything about the issue). Maybe there's more padding in the price of the car I'm buying than I thought lol! But I think that is the route I'll end up going.

The guy surprised me with this too: I could have said nothing, and they wouldn't have inspected the car. He said they basically just run the VIN through their system, check the mileage, and quote a value based on that. I wouldn't pawn this off on someone without a warning (not even a dealership lol) but if they're ok with it, I am not about to try talking them out of it.

Oooo, I'd take that before someone wakes up. In fact, I'd worry it's a story to get you hooked on the new car only to later claim some higher-up is balking and they need to adjust further... Hopefully not, but that would be page 1 from the Dealer Hijinx handbook...

Well it turns out you weren't far off with this. They did indeed renege on the deal. I wouldn't say they planned the whole thing but it was pretty bad behavior imo.

When I was talking to the sales guy originally, I assumed that there was no way they would take my car in trade. Still, I thought I might as well tell them about the issue. Worst case scenario, it buys me some sympathy and maybe a token discount right?

So I told him 1. it's making a ticking noise and 2. I think it could be bore scoring. OK I could have made a stronger statement than that, but I think that's fair. Lots of these cars run for a long time with scored bores and don't make that noise so it could have been something else. But I let the cat out of the bag with the words "bore scoring" and even asked if he was familiar with that issue, which he claimed he was.

He said normally I'd have to pay $500 to have a trade in inspected (??) but to leave it with him, and he called back a while later and said "ok, I talked to the boss, and you have a choice: 1. we can inspect the car and offer a trade value based on the inspection, or 2. we can just offer you 7500 right now".

Naturally I said I'll take #2! I asked him, "can I count on that?", he says absolutely, I'll even send it to you in writing! (which he did).

We finalized everything else, set an appointment for the paperwork, and he asked me for a $1000 non-refundable deposit over the phone. At this point I have only seen the new car briefly and while it's an almost new 2025 car, and pretty safe, I just don't feel comfortable committing to something this expensive without another look. So I told him I want to come in once more to give it a once over. He wasn't happy but he accepted that. He wasn't going to be there the next day but said someone else could take the deposit.

So the next morning I go in, and he is there after all. While I'm looking at the car he says "I'll just your car a once over too". Strange, since he already declined to do that, and I'm only here at my own insistence, but whatever. They know about the issue already so I don't care. He comes back a couple of minutes later and says the new offer is $500!

At the end of the day, I can't blame them for valuing the car that low, although it was worth more than that, maybe not to them. But the fact that they weren't in the least bit apologetic bugged me a lot. The tone was very defensive. No acknowledgement of any fault on their part whatsoever. What if I had paid the deposit? What if I had signed the paperwork? Maybe they would have given me the deposit back but their tone makes me suspect that they would have blamed it on me and kept at least some of it claiming that they were out the cost of the inspection.

I took my key and left. The sales manager texted me a little later but with the same defensive tone. He told me they had warned me in advance that the offer was subject to an inspection (not true) and when I corrected him he just kept repeating himself. He made no attempt to salvage the deal which was strange because I told him I had originally expected them to not be interested in taking it as a trade in, so he should have been able to piece together that I was still prepared to buy their car. But his attitude put me off. If he had just apologized and refrained from contradicting my account of what happened he could have rescued the sale.

I ended up selling my car to Carvana for a decent bit more than the fake 7500 trade offer. I don't feel too bad for them, they inspected it and drove it (twice) and still took it. I have a number in mind of what I should have taken for it and I'll offset the bad karma some other way.

The dealership still has the car they almost sold me, I think it's coming up on 3 months now lol.

Ug, you're doing nothing to restore my faith in car salesmen. I think/hope it's 10% better than it was 20 years ago -- thanks to the internet and better informed buyers -- but the front-line salesmen may never change. Seems like their whole job is to get you into to the closer's office, and a lot of them will say whatever it takes no matter how ridiculous. Probably repeating myself, but when I was shopping for a RX7 back in the day, I was told rotary engines last a minimum of 400k miles; that a blue car was a red car; that a key job would 'buff right out' (classic); and that a Miata was a type of RX7.

I'd be the same with that dealer -- plenty of other fish dealers in the sea. Sorry about your experience, but super happy to hear Carvana paid you that with eyes wide open. (Mental note: don't buy a car from Carvana.) Maybe with their national supply of cars they have access to a good motor they can install with cheap salaried labor?