LowBook Sales false advertising, ripoff, sells lemons, sells above high book, ultra high pressure Salt Lake City Utah

First, let me say I have a generally low resistance to high pressure sales. I am a salesperson's dream, so I typically try to completely avoid high pressure places like auto dealerships.

However, I was in Salt Lake going to a wrecking yard to purchase a replacement door for my car. Unfortunately, they were closed. On my way home, I happened by Lowbook Sales. They were open so I pulled in just to see what kind of deals they had.

Almost immediately after stepping out of my car, a salesman was upon me asking me for the keys to my car so they could, "...look it over and determine the trade in value."

After having spoken with others, I learned that the real reason they do this is to prevent you from leaving their lot while they sick progressively higher and higher pressure salespeople on you. No other dealerships I'm aware of do this.

They had me test drive a Ford Contour. It seemed like a nice car. I went in to financing where they asked me what I could afford. I told them $200 per month, and I wanted a warranty.

The contour was too expensive, so after attempting to strongarm me for a bit, I looked at a Dodge Stratus which was listed at $9,000, about $2,000 less than the Contour.

I put down $2,000 plus my trade in (which they gave me $600 for even though the book value on it was about $3,000, and I owned free and clear. I take the blame for being an idiot and agreeing to accept only $600 for it). Despite having a nearly 29% down payment and excellent credit for a first time buyer, it took much haggling to get the payments down to about $220/month.

However, they failed to tell me that they removed the warranty in order to do this. During the haggling, one of their tactics was to insult me and my choice of car (referring to my trade in as a "piece of crap"... which they of course ended up selling. If it's such a piece of crap why are you selling it to someone else? It was a great car and I'm incredibly sorry I ever traded it in.)

The owner, Jarrod, is the slimiest snake I've ever had the displeasure of coming across, and was incredibly manipulative. Me being so easily swayed didn't even realize how he was screwing with me the whole time until it was all over.

In the end, they sold me the car (I later found out they sold it to me at $1,000 above high blue book (Utah typically uses the NADA book value anyway, which is lower than Blue Book) which is where the false advertising comes in. They should be disallowed from using the name "Lowbook").

Less than a month later, we had our first really cold night of the winter. That's when I learned the cooling system was filled with almost straight water, thus causing all the coolant in my car to freeze. This resulted in a cracked block and a ruined water pump. After replacing the water pump, about a month later the idler pully broke. Found out that there was a design flaw and Chrysler had built a replacement, but ofcourse no recall. So I paid to have that replaced as well.

Some of this I can take the blame for. I should have been more resistant to their wiley salespeople, and I should have at least checked the fluids when I got it home. I could have done my research beforehand, but I really wasn't planning on buying a car.

In the 6 years or so that have past since this happened, I have dealt with many other auto dealerships. None of them are completely honest, but none anywhere near as slimy as Lowbook Sales. I also thought that as they expanded and grew (they now have a pretty large dealership in Lindon) they would be making enough money that they could improve their ways. After studying other complaints on RipOffReport.com, I see that is not the case. The owner is a snake, and he's not going to change.

Stuart
Orem, Utah
U.S.A.

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