Nissan Rogue Forum

I'm not too thrilled about what went on when I bought my new 2011 Nissan Rogue. The dealer agreed to sell me the car for $34,000 with $2500 cash down and my 2007 Dodge Nitro in trade.

I took delivery of the new Nissan on June 3, 2011.

At the time the dealer said he couldn't transfer my license plates yet because he was still waiting for something from the bank, so he gave me a dealer plate and he told me they'd have everything completed and be ready to put my old plates on the new car in a few days.

I called the dealership a couple of times in the next few weeks and was told they were still waiting for the bank. On July 18, 2011, I got a call from the finance manager who told me that the bank had only approved a loan for $30,000 and that they needed me to come up with an extra $4000 cash to finalize the financing.

I never heard of a dealer taking a trade-in, signing off all the paperwork and letting a customer drive off in his brand-new car if the financing isn't already all finalized and approved.

Plus I did sign all the usual contracts and paperwork with the original figures when I took delivery of the car.

I (reluctantly) gave the dealer an additional $1200 and agreed to pay the remaining $3700 in monthly installments of $350. I didn't feel I had much choice because I couldn't give the car back and cancel the deal since my old car had already been disposed of by the dealer and I need a car to get to work every day.

If the dealer had originally told me that I would need $6500 cash down to get financing for this car I would told him I couldn't afford it and gone elsewhere.

Is this legal? Legitimate? Is it too late to do anything about this? Or am I just screwed?

Definately not right! Put your concerns in writting, documenting as much as possible and sending copies to the following:

1. Your state's BBB. While they have no legal authority, they can make life difficult for the dealership.
2. Your state Attorney General's office. If they investigate and find wrong doing, they could take legal action against the dealership.
3. Nissan USA. Let tem know (politely) how you were treated, and ask them to look into it and give you a reply.
4. The finance company. Did they actually do what the dealership said, and if so why?

Remember to keep written records of all conversations/corespondences. Get full names, date and time of everyone you contact. And above all, keep things a civil as possible.

Even if this is not resolved to your satisfaction, the warning flags are sent out and the proper agenices will be able to keep an eye out for other alledged problems with this dealership. Who knows how many of their other customers may have gone through this? They may or may not have followed through to the proper agencies, if they have it will add to your concerns.

Sadly, I think it's safe to say all of us can relate one or more story involving a less than pleasant trip to a dealership (my partner broke a door off its hinges at one dealership).

__________________
Brilliant Silver '11 Rogue SV w/SL AWD

Thanx for your comments, Vulnavia. I sort of expected that what you said is the way to go, but I did want a "sanity check" to see if others agreed or had any other ideas.

I doubt if is a widespread problem, and frankly, I don't suspect that this dealership has done this habitually.

I believe some overzealous salesperson may have tried to push the deal through and not expected any snags, and when there were snags, before accepting responsibility and "eating" the additional $4000 they decided to try to get me to pay it. Maybe if I had refused they would have backed down. But as I said, I didn't feel I had that option because I need a car and I had no expert legal advice at the moment telling me what I had the right to do, or not do.

But I do plan to write to the BBB, the state AG, Dept of Consumer Protection, Motor Vehicles, Nissan corporate, etc.

I know that we had a car lot here in Nashville Bill Turd that did that. They were approving people for more than what they could get/afford. A girl who used to work with me bought a brand new truck and traded in her car. About 3 days later they told her the financing fell through. The problem is that they got rid of her car already. They tried to get her into a cheaper car. She felt like there was no choice there because she needed a car. Well, the news got in on it after so many complaints. So eventually they went out of business and got bought out. So you might want to see if a story can be made with the news people.

If I get nowhere with Nissan corporate or any state agencies etc, I'll probably do that...send letters to the local papers and so on and see what results come from it, if any.

Sometimes this happens when deals cannot get "bought" by the bank. $4000 seems like a bigger gamble than I have seen in the past. Usually this happens more at the end of the month when the dealers are trying to get as many cars out as they can for bonus reasons. Usually this stuff is controlled by the F&I person. You probably could have tried back out and they would have come down a little or a lot depending on the numbers. There us fine print stating that all contracts are subject to bank approval. Sometimes your trade in that is disposed of is actually hidden someplace to keep you from changing your mind. I hope this info helps you understand what may have happened. I have not seen any figures so I do not have exact answers for you.

You're probably right. The car might had been there. I would had demanded my car back. I can't believe car lots would let people drive off and then couple of days later pull a stunt like this. I would had told them to keep the car and made it right. Like give me a car with the same value of my trade in or something.

I have seen it happen so many times. When the place I worked for started pulling this stuff after a change in management I left.

I'm not sure what happened, my natural reaction is that I honestly don't think planned to do this all along, nor do I think they expected to have a problem, but that they just blew it by not waiting for a final decision by the bank before scheduling the actual delivery of the car.

And I believe that my trade-in was sold or auctioned by then; after all, it had been almost a month since I took the new car home.

So I imagine when they then found out there was a problem they realized they were going to have to eat the $4000 difference, but they decided to try to get me to come up with it before that happened.

I suppose I might have been able to tell them to stuff it, since I did have a signed financing contract etc, but I wasn't 100% sure if there was some sneaky fine print someplace that might somehow have allowed them to demand the new car back (leaving me stuck with no car at all).

I've written to Nissan Corporate, the BBB, the State DMV, Consumer Protection, the Atty General, etc...so we'll see what happens next.

Sheesh...