My son came home from college and he needed a used car ASAP to start his new job. In upstate New York where I live, there is a shortage of used cars due to covid, so I drove to NJ which seemed to have a lot more used car dealers with large inventories to choose from. One of those places, was Auto Spot LLC in South Hackensack NJ.
When I got to Auto Spot LLC, I was pleased to see a huge selection of all types of cars, including the kind my son was looking for, that were in his price range. I asked the salesman why they had so many and he said it was because they were not a typical used car dealer, rather they were a wholesaler who buys cars "AS IS". That should have been enough to scare us off, but after months of looking for a used car, we were desperate. We looked at about five small 4WD SUVs that were in my son's price range and settled in on a black 2009 Kia Sportage with 129,000 miles listed at $4000. The salesman was somewhat sketchy and used all his tricks to try and convince us to sign. We spent up to 2 hours there, took two test rides on local roads, inspected it as much as we could, (engine, exterior, interior and as much as we could see underneath when laying on the ground). In addition, the car had clean Carfax.
Against our better judgement, we reluctantly agreed to sign and hoped for the best. One of the biggest mistakes I ever made. First it started with the price, what was $4000 turned into $5900 due to a bunch of bogus fees they failed to tell us about up front. When I said no deal, well they miraculously were able to do us the great favor of knocking off $1400 of those fees. We agreed to buy the car at $4500.
I understood that I bought the car "AS IS" and I expected to have put some upfront money on things like brakes, tires, etc. I did not suspect that a business would sell me a car that my mechanic told me the next day was actually dangerous, and we were lucky to make it home. All the damage was underneath, pretty much the entire suspension needed be replaced - estimated fix of $4200. Those were issues that could actually be fixed, however one issue that could not be fixed was the cracked frame near the left rear axle. It would just be a matter of time before that was going to go and the axle would completely disconnect from the car. This car was never going to pass NY safety inspection, even if I put in the additional money to try and fix it.
When I called Auto Spot to see if they would do the right thing and refund at least some of the money, they basically said "the car was purchased AS IS and that I should have brought my mechanic with me to look at it before buying".
It turns out, when they say "AS IS", they mean they do not even put these cars up on lift. They basically just do as much as they can to make the cars look ok and to get the cars through the test rides and off the lot. After making this mistake, I did check some other Yelp reviews and found others who had similar experiences, they bought dangerous vehicles that should never be allowed to be on the road. And this is why they have such a large inventory, because no reputable used car dealers would actually buy and sell these cars to the general public. Auto Spot is NOT a reputable dealer and as someone else wrote in their review, "it's just a matter of time before Auto Spot LLC will be facing manslaughter charges". I do not know how they sleep at night after taking the savings from young students such as my son, and then knowingly allow them to put their lives at risk.
STAY FAR AWAY FROM AUTO SPOT LLC!! read more