We all needed a new car for our three-person household. My dad warned us to be wary of this place…read moreand while I usually follow his advice, Don Robinson Mitsubishi was the only dealer who advertised on their website that credit didn't matter; only whether you had a job (more on this later!). Since my roommate had a job and none of us had stellar credit, we headed on over anyway.
We were all pleasantly surprised! Upon our entry into the shop, one of the salespeople greeted us kindly. Another salesperson came up and started helping us out. We began by looking at a used 2010 Subaru Impreza 2i Limited, which we loved...but (and here's where the above bit about the "credit didn't matter" comes in) the website was deceptive about the truth; they finance everything through a network of banks and your credit absolutely *DOES* matter; whether you have a job is inconsequential, so this is insanely deceptive and knocked a whole star off of my review.
For whatever stupid reason, the banks won't approve a car that--in their eyes--isn't worth enough (used cars tend to be worth less in general) for people with lower credit without a monstrous down-payment, so they ended up having to approve us for a new car instead (talk about backwards logic); we ended up with a 2019 Mitsubishi Mirage Limited Edition, which actually ended up being even better than the Impreza!
Lots of reviews online talk about how wonderful the Mirage is when it comes to features, safety and overall reliability, but trash on its speed, acceleration and power. I've found that the Mirage is a lot more powerful than everybody gives it credit for, despite its 3-cylinder engine. My only complaint is how crappy the speakers are (and no equaliser settings on the radio!), but I will eventually get the speakers replaced, at least.
Anyway, with all of that out of the way, the salesperson and financiers got to work setting up the loan, while Mr. Don Robinson himself came out to greet us! I was shocked; I didn't know that the owner would be in the shop. Apparently that's a common thing for people purchasing cars here, though.
It took a long time, but we eventually got our trade sorted, the paperwork signed and a payment plan hashed out. And then one of the financiers took us to finalise everything else, including an extended warranty, which he pushed. HARD. Half a star off for the hard push on the extended warranty, which is a shame, as the rest of the experience was really wonderful. We declined the extended warranty.
Finally, a sales rep "delivered" (read: gave us a tour of the features) the Mirage Limited. This was very helpful and I learned how to do many things, including fiddle with the Apple Play features on the radio. However, he said a couple of things which took off another half-star from this review: he told us to always leave traction control on unless we're stuck in snow (total BS; turning that off gives you access to the engine's full power, which I like), to always keep the A/C on when running the front window defroster (more BS; you always keep the A/C turned OFF for defrosting)...and then he audaciously asked us to give him "all-ten-stars" on the review that would come from Mitsubishi Corporate, since "anything less--even all nines--is a fail for us." Umm...no. I told my roommate to give him what they thought they deserved (I would not have given all-ten-stars to Mitsubishi Corporate any more than I would have given five stars here).
All in all, it was an extremely long but rewarding process. Everybody was friendly and the experience would absolutely have me going back again. But beware the deceptive advertising on the website, extended warranties being pushed...and sales reps asking for "all-ten-stars" for the Mitsubishi Corporate review.
