They would say the buyer was declined for credit and try to negotiate worse terms for the buyer after the buyer had the car. Then they would repossess if they buyer did not agree.
Bad link.
A classic bait and switch scheme. They shouldn’t have let her drive the car off the lot until the financing had been approved and finalized. She drove off in the vehicle thinking she had contracted for a certain set of terms. The dealer changed the terms of the contract after letting her take possession of the car.
That’s a no-no.
Should have given someone at the dealership 30 days in county.
Car dealerships do this crap all the time. They have you sign a deal and then they renege on the deal, claiming that they need you to sign another one because they “accidentally” sold a trimming or service that added to the price.
F’n Aye Beautiful!!! She hit the jackpot after the hell they dragged her through! This was not an aberation and a one time incident, this was SOP for the dealership, that’s why the jury hit them back HARD!
The Bastards never learn.
Did the buyer read the 10+ pages (example) of tiny type?
It’s always lovely to see dealers having to pay up for the shitty stuff they try and pull on buyers. It doesn’t always happen, but we’ve recently covered a dealer who talked a Ford Maverick buyer into paying nearly $1,000 a month for the truck, a dealership that sold a car out from under a woman who brought it in for repairs and a dealer that was sued for taking back a man’s new car just two weeks after he bought it. It’s rough out there.
My Dad’s advice when I was 12 or 13...never borrow to buy a car.
I never have. My first was a ‘31 Model A I got for free, then a ‘50 Ford w/a flathead V8, I bought for $9.
I now have 5 collector cars, a Porsche, a Silverado HD, and a Toyota 4Runner. Never a car payment. Thanks for the great advice, Dad! financing will keep you poor, guaranteed!
What the dealer did is common practice. An application signed and is submitted to the lender. Even though you may take delivery you do not have a loan agreement until it’s approved 2 or 3 days later. If that loan app is declined and this woman refused to resubmit another application she should have been repossessed.
I had snagged that car out from someone who didn't qualify without a cosigner earlier in the day. Car buying was so ugly right after COVID that I'm surprised the dealer didn't have potential buyers have gladiator fights for the chance to buy.
I can understand them letting her drive off pending finance - that's common enough. But if they were stupid enough to give her the title, they deserve what happened. They should never submit it to be titled until they have the lender on there. And then the fight would be between the lender and her, and the dealership could say 'not my problem'.
If the story is true (and it looks like the jury and the judge thought is was) the dealership had a major screw-up that they then proceeded to double down on. And their floor plan lender might want to do a physical count.
I’m a little confused here. They refer to her as being given the title. Maybe things are different in Michigan, but I’ve never financed a car and gotten the title until I paid off the loan. The lien holder holds the title until then.
Could they be referring to the registration papers?
Regardless of whether I buy or I lease, I have already run the numbers every way there are to run them. I’ve run the hypothetical payments every way there are to run those and when I walk into negotiate, I’m not surprised. I usually get what I want although I have to haggle for it, but that’s just fun for me.
I leased brand new Mazda CX 30 a few months ago I had already worked out all the details number wise and of course I read into them at the dealership with different payments that were way out of kilter on what I thought they should be, but I ended up getting exactly what I wanted after they figured out if I didn’t play the numbers I wanted I would do the deal.
What is it that makes car dealers so unethical?
The real judgement total was $824,000. The $350K was punitive damages calculated by the jury. The actual damage was a mere $38,00 for the car and related expense.
The largest portion of the judgement went to lawyer’s fees and court costs for a trial in Federal court.
I don’t think this is good enough, there should be Criminal Prosecution for Grand Theft and Extortion for everyone in the chain of command that made these decisions.