Carorder.com delivery experience and a few newbie q's. (quite long).
12-29-1999, 06:59 PM
#1
Guest
Posts: n/a
Carorder.com delivery experience and a few newbie q's. (quite long).
Hi gang... well it finally happened today, I took delivery of my brand new silver/black 00' A4 1.8TQMS that I had ordered from carorder.com a month ago. I wanted to take a few moments to relate the experience and then I have a couple of brief questions.
I ordered this vehicle from carorder.com towards the end of November (around turkey day) because it was listed at only $700 over invoice on the carorder website. I knew that I would never get this price from the dealer so I went ahead and submitted the order. Initially I was trying to get carorder.com to work with Uzanak's dealership (McDonald Audi) but for whatever reason it wasn't working out. I was also having problems with my rep at carorder.com also (Arthur Marshall) he wasn't returning any of my emails or phone calls.
Finally I called up carorder.com and asked for Arthur's supervisor to complain about his less than stellar customer service skills. I ended up getting connected with Nancy Mata, who assured me that she would personally take care of everything (she also commented on the huge number of Audi's that carorder is selling!). She was great throughout the whole process, statusing me regularly about what was going on. Just a few short days after talking to her, I was told that they had located a silver 1.8TQMS with conveniance/winter/bose at a dealer up in Glenwood Springs, Colorado (about 150 miles away).. the only catch was I had to take delivery before the end of the year (the dealer has some incentive to get as many cars sold at the end of the year as possible, for tax purposes). I originally didn't want to take delivery of the car this soon (my lease on my Integra isn't up till February), but I figured that I would rather get the car sooner rather than having to extend my lease and wait till April or May to get one.
So I agreed to take delivery... I sold some stock options to put a sizeable chunk down on the car and didn't have to finance much. The funny thing is, Carorder.com wrote the dealer a check for almost $900 dollars and, or course, I didn't pay them (carorder) a dime. The dealer was rather flabbergasted about the whole thing (couldn't figure out how carorder was making any money on the deal). In addition to this, carorder had the car delivered on a flatbed to my office at a cost of almost $500, so all told, they lost almost $1400 doing business with me. I guess they hope that word of mouth will get them some sales where they actually MAKE money.
I checked the car out and it was completely solid. The detailing job wasn't all that great, as there was dirt on the seats and some dirt on the car itself, but these things can easily be forgiven when a car has been transported almost 150 miles on the back of a truck. I drove the car around and everything checked out, it appears to be in top shape (100 miles on the odo when I got it, but that's no big deal in my book). A friend and I took it out on I-25 and immediately started getting stares from some high school girls in a civic that apparently thought the car was Uber Cool). I am still getting used to the clutch, my Acura was much lighter with the clutch and got underway at much lower rpm's than the Audi (I used to do regular rolling starts in the Acura in 2nd gear, don't see myself doing as much of that in the A4). All in all I am very, very pleased with my decision, the 1.8T has great stock power for a small sedan and I don't even know if chipping it would be wise or necessary (at this point anyway).
A couple of other quick observations. I was rather disappointed with the Bose system... I really expected more, but the aftermarket system in my Acura blows the doors off of the Bose system (I probably still won't mess with it though, although better speakers would be a huge improvement).
The new wheels actually don't look as bad as I thought.. They were really shined up and looked much better than expected.
The new instrument lighting is actually really, really nice! I was pleasantly surprised by it, it looks very classy, although not nearly as menacing as the all-red of the previous year cars.
The new model seems to have a much notchier, improved shifter, at least compared to the 99.5 that I drove a few months ago...
Also the headlights are like freaking lunar lander lights! I really, really, don't see the need for xenons with headlights this good...
So on to a couple of quick questions. I noticed that the little cover to the VAG port behind the drivers seat has this loose, little flimsy metal peice that is basically completely free.. is this normal? It looks like it should be connected somehow, but it's not, both peices are completely seperated.
Second question, I am possibly interested in buying out the lease on my 97 Integra in order to sell it to a third party (my buyout is aobut 14K and I can probably get 16K for the car). My question is, do I have to pay sales tax on the car if I never title it? If I have to pay sales tax on it, I would be pretty even with the sale, so it wouldn't be worth the hassle... anyone who has good info oon this please drop me a line!
Thanks to all of the vets here for steering me in the right direction. I think I will be very happy with my purchase for years to come.
I ordered this vehicle from carorder.com towards the end of November (around turkey day) because it was listed at only $700 over invoice on the carorder website. I knew that I would never get this price from the dealer so I went ahead and submitted the order. Initially I was trying to get carorder.com to work with Uzanak's dealership (McDonald Audi) but for whatever reason it wasn't working out. I was also having problems with my rep at carorder.com also (Arthur Marshall) he wasn't returning any of my emails or phone calls.
Finally I called up carorder.com and asked for Arthur's supervisor to complain about his less than stellar customer service skills. I ended up getting connected with Nancy Mata, who assured me that she would personally take care of everything (she also commented on the huge number of Audi's that carorder is selling!). She was great throughout the whole process, statusing me regularly about what was going on. Just a few short days after talking to her, I was told that they had located a silver 1.8TQMS with conveniance/winter/bose at a dealer up in Glenwood Springs, Colorado (about 150 miles away).. the only catch was I had to take delivery before the end of the year (the dealer has some incentive to get as many cars sold at the end of the year as possible, for tax purposes). I originally didn't want to take delivery of the car this soon (my lease on my Integra isn't up till February), but I figured that I would rather get the car sooner rather than having to extend my lease and wait till April or May to get one.
So I agreed to take delivery... I sold some stock options to put a sizeable chunk down on the car and didn't have to finance much. The funny thing is, Carorder.com wrote the dealer a check for almost $900 dollars and, or course, I didn't pay them (carorder) a dime. The dealer was rather flabbergasted about the whole thing (couldn't figure out how carorder was making any money on the deal). In addition to this, carorder had the car delivered on a flatbed to my office at a cost of almost $500, so all told, they lost almost $1400 doing business with me. I guess they hope that word of mouth will get them some sales where they actually MAKE money.
I checked the car out and it was completely solid. The detailing job wasn't all that great, as there was dirt on the seats and some dirt on the car itself, but these things can easily be forgiven when a car has been transported almost 150 miles on the back of a truck. I drove the car around and everything checked out, it appears to be in top shape (100 miles on the odo when I got it, but that's no big deal in my book). A friend and I took it out on I-25 and immediately started getting stares from some high school girls in a civic that apparently thought the car was Uber Cool). I am still getting used to the clutch, my Acura was much lighter with the clutch and got underway at much lower rpm's than the Audi (I used to do regular rolling starts in the Acura in 2nd gear, don't see myself doing as much of that in the A4). All in all I am very, very pleased with my decision, the 1.8T has great stock power for a small sedan and I don't even know if chipping it would be wise or necessary (at this point anyway).
A couple of other quick observations. I was rather disappointed with the Bose system... I really expected more, but the aftermarket system in my Acura blows the doors off of the Bose system (I probably still won't mess with it though, although better speakers would be a huge improvement).
The new wheels actually don't look as bad as I thought.. They were really shined up and looked much better than expected.
The new instrument lighting is actually really, really nice! I was pleasantly surprised by it, it looks very classy, although not nearly as menacing as the all-red of the previous year cars.
The new model seems to have a much notchier, improved shifter, at least compared to the 99.5 that I drove a few months ago...
Also the headlights are like freaking lunar lander lights! I really, really, don't see the need for xenons with headlights this good...
So on to a couple of quick questions. I noticed that the little cover to the VAG port behind the drivers seat has this loose, little flimsy metal peice that is basically completely free.. is this normal? It looks like it should be connected somehow, but it's not, both peices are completely seperated.
Second question, I am possibly interested in buying out the lease on my 97 Integra in order to sell it to a third party (my buyout is aobut 14K and I can probably get 16K for the car). My question is, do I have to pay sales tax on the car if I never title it? If I have to pay sales tax on it, I would be pretty even with the sale, so it wouldn't be worth the hassle... anyone who has good info oon this please drop me a line!
Thanks to all of the vets here for steering me in the right direction. I think I will be very happy with my purchase for years to come.
12-30-1999, 05:19 AM
#3
Guest
Posts: n/a
Lease purchases.
My experiences with buying out a lease in Michigan, all states differ.
In order to sell a car you have to own it first, u owe sales tax in MI. When your next buyer purchases the car they owe sale tax as well. The natural reaction is "why pay full sales tax on a car you will only own for hours", its the way it is in MI. I hear in Calif there is a way to work around this, like a 48 hr grace period.
I assumed my friends lease, then purchased my A4 outright, after making 2 mths of payments in my name. Biggest hassle i have ever experienced. Audi financial is the worst group of folks i have ever dealt with - it took 2 mths for them to get around to processing their paperwork (while i made payments). Acura may be better, but it may turn into a major pain to gain a few bucks!
good luck
In order to sell a car you have to own it first, u owe sales tax in MI. When your next buyer purchases the car they owe sale tax as well. The natural reaction is "why pay full sales tax on a car you will only own for hours", its the way it is in MI. I hear in Calif there is a way to work around this, like a 48 hr grace period.
I assumed my friends lease, then purchased my A4 outright, after making 2 mths of payments in my name. Biggest hassle i have ever experienced. Audi financial is the worst group of folks i have ever dealt with - it took 2 mths for them to get around to processing their paperwork (while i made payments). Acura may be better, but it may turn into a major pain to gain a few bucks!
good luck
12-30-1999, 06:17 AM
#4
Guest
Posts: n/a
Re: My rep is Aurthur Marshall too...
I just took deliver from CarOrder last week. My first rep was unresponsive and tough to deal with. I complained and CO hooked me up with Nancy Mata. She is great . . . wish I had made the switch earlier. By the way, the car, delivery, everything went very well. Get rid of Mr. Marshall, life is too short.
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