Long time hackr, have negotiated my last 3 leases no problem, but this past experience has been downright disrespectful. It’s a long one, so buckle up.
Back in late August I negotiated a deal for a 2025 Honda Prologue, my fiancee was looking to get into a newer car and this would let us take advantage of the EV credit. After a few months research, and comparing quotes from different dealers around Florida, I called up one down south (Dealer 1) and asked if they would match a publicly advertised lease deal from another dealer (Dealer 2) that didn’t have the color combo we wanted. 24 months, 10k miles, $340/month, 0 DAS (made sure to read the fine print + screenshot and bookmark the page, important later).
After describing the deal, linking the sales associate to the ad itself, and asking them if they would be willing to match it, sales associate “B” tells me there’s no problem matching that.
I’m guessing you can tell where this is going.
Arrive at dealership at 12:30 PM, ask to speak with B, front desk says sure thing they’ll grab them. 30 mins later B approaches us saying “happy you guys could make it” “do you want any water?” etc. Directs us to her desk, asks us “Which car were you guys looking at again?”.
Tell her the Prologue, and remind her of the deal we talked about on the phone not 24 hours ago. She says okay and that she’s going to go check on the specific one I pointed over the phone. Comes back 30 mins later to tell me that unfortunately all the ones on the lot are now pre-sold but that they we’re willing to work on the price because of the inconvenience and that they we’re even willing to have one of the porters drive it us once it arrived on the lot.
Alright, whatever. I’m annoyed but I can’t press them too hard since I didn’t put a deposit down and it seemed like they were aggressively trying to move these, maybe someone else beat me to the deal.
1 hour later, B comes back to her desk with Manager 1. M1 is polite, apologizes for inconvenience but now we can make a deal that we’re both happy with. Look down at the paper and see $615 for 24 months and around 2K down. I stop him mid pitch and say hey look this is nothing liked what I was told and completely off from matching the advertised deal from Dealer 2 I originally showed them. M1 looks like he has no idea what I’m talking about, so I open my laptop and literally navigate to the dealers page and show them the ad that’s still up.
“Let me see what I can do”
1 hour later, a new manager, M2, sits down and apologizes immediately, saying how he knows this must be frustrating. Hands me the new offer sheet: $380/month 2K down. Starts explaining how they’re excited to make up for the frustration, and I stop him mid sentence:
“I’m going to stop you right there, you honestly can’t be serious.” Tell him this is still far off from what B told me they’d be willing to do, and that it’s infuriating that I’ve been here for hours waiting, after driving 4+ hours to get there, and they’re still trying to play hardball on a deal one of the associates get ahead of themselves on.
“Okay okay let’s see what we can do make this right.” M2 leaves for another hour. At this point, I’m pretty much livid at the experience and google search the GM’s contact email, end up sending him an email with what was going on. Shortly after, M2 comes back and tells me he’s excited to tell me he can match that originally deal.
Long story short, I tell him I’m not leaving here with a new car either way, why should I do this deal with you after this experience and not literally any other Honda dealership in Florida? After a little while, They end up settling at $325/month 0 down. We end up leaving at 6 PM, finally that’s over.
The car arrives 2 weeks later, the porter drives it up to us, and he assures us the portable charger we selected as one of the charging packages is on the way and will arrive soon. Spoilers, today is Oct 15th and we still have no portable charger.
Called the dealership 6+ times over the course of 3 weeks, no answer from any of the sales associates. Call the dealership to speak with a manager, no answer once I get transferred. Messaged the GM again, doesn’t get back to me this time.
And that brings us to today. Still no info on the portable charger, and overall I’m still just in shock at how awful this dealer was to work with. At this point I want nothing to do with them and just want the charger that’s included with the lease so my fiancee doesn’t have to keep burning money at a superchager.
Is this the point where I contact Honda corporate and just fill them in on all this shenanigans? I just want this charger and to never deal with this dealer again.
TLDR: Dealer tried to bait and switch us on a deal we traveled 4+ hours for only to go around in circles for hours between 4 different employees, and now they’re refusing to reply to any questions about when I’m getting the Honda EV charger I selected as part of the lease deal.
