October 2021 by Andre M.
I was searching for a specific trim on a Mitsubishi Outlander. I called in and spoke with Neil, apparently a Manager over there. He told me that the vehicle cost was $36.5K. I told him I was looking for a leasing at about $400/month. He said I needed to put $6k down. I told him that I would think about and stop by on the next day. Before I went there, I went online at mitsubishicars.com (manufacturer) and I found the same vehicle at $37.1k with less than $5k down and $347/month. A sales person called AJ left a message reminding me to stop by. And I did. AJ showed me the vehicle, which was exactly what I was looking for. We sat down to decide between leasing or purchasing. He told me that I needed to put $6k down and the monthly fee would be on the low $400s. I told him that this does not match what the manufacturer offers online. I showed him the link to a car $500 more expensive than the one we were talking about, with less than $5k down and $347/month. He claimed that those prices didn't include dealer's fee, title transfer (?), tag (I have my own), and sales tax. Even assuming that the online deal didn't included all that, we added up all the fees that he claimed to be missing from the manufacturer's offer and turned out that his numbers were still way above the new projected price.I told him that a lease on those terms were not acceptable. Since I wanted the car, I asked for a cash price for financing, instead of leasing. After dancing around the subject for a while, he finally told me that the vehicle was actually $40.5k, not $36.5k. He said that currently there is only 5 units in the whole country with the configuration I wanted, thus they would be charging me a markup of $4k. Let me be clear about this. I see no problem when a dealer overcharges for a vehicle that is in high demand, this is business. However, I think it is despicable and dishonest when someone offers you a price to get you driving 1hr to the dealer just to realize that the dealer was lying about the price. He said that the car was flying out of the shelf, was very easy to overcharge $4k. I told him that I could pay $4k, $5k, or $10k if that was what I was offered by phone and agreed upon. I told him that it was completely dishonest on their part to bait me in, and I would not buy the car.He asked me to compromise, maybe meet him at the middle (meaning agreeing to overpay $2k), and I told him I would feel bad paying even $1 more when I was lied to. I also told him that I WANTED to buy the car, but I didn't NEED to buy the car. I suggested him to keep the and oversell it to their next scam victim. I don't need to stay anonymous, all here is true. My name is Andre Martins.