Review of Walker's Renton Subaru, Renton WA

[Rockford]

Interested in a new or used car from Walker's Renton Subaru? Read about my experience buying a Subaru from Walker's in Renton, near Seattle, in the greater Puget Sound area. Subaru, kite surfing, SUV, granola lesbians, dogs! Walker! Renton!

Everything that keeps you from going to car dealerships will happen here, but I'll see if I can keep it to the most pertinent details. In hindsight I see all of the places where I should have stood up and walked out, but I really needed a car that weekend.

I mistakenly stopped at the new cars department looking for used cars. The salesman that met us at the door made me explain why I didn't want to lease a new car before finally telling me where I could find the used cars, down the street.

I got to the used car department and test drove the car I was interested in. It has some interior wear that I didn't like, and it was going to take a pretty good deal to put me over the fence. The sales manager quoted me a price, verbally, which sounded pretty good, and was confident we could get some of the interior issues included. After we had gone back and forth on some details, he put a piece of paper in front of me with a number at least $2,000 higher than what he had first said, which I was to sign to verify it as my offer.

I pointed and said, "that's going to change, right?" He looked a little strange and went to their Web site to look up the price he had managed to quote from memory a few minutes earlier. He also got me to agree to pay a flat additional amount to fix one interior issue, but the others wouldn't be included. He presented this offer to his manager (or the plant by the water cooler, I don't know) and it was accepted.

Now, he puts a credit application in front of me. I say, "What is this? I'm preapproved through my credit union. You just send them an invoice." He mumbles something about yeah, no problem, we just need this to transmit the information to something something mumble. I say again, explicitly, that I am preapproved and the credit union has everything they need. I don't like this and I don't know why I'm doing it. I ask, "You're not running my credit again, right?" "Right, right, we just need to [mumble mumble whatever]."

Well, somehow he comes back with a percentage rate, and it's not the one the credit union quoted. He has lied to my face in order to try to trick me into using their finance program.

I get over to the finance office (in yet a third location; the service department is a fourth), and the finance person has documents drawn up for the higher-percentage loan through their lender. I say, "What is this? I can't sign this until it has the right lender and interest rate on it." She sighs, snottily says "fine," crosses out the bank's name with a flourish and writes in my credit union's name next to it. Nice.

Anyway, while I'm doing paperwork they say they need to just give the car a final once-over to make sure everything is in order. I agree to wait until the next day to pick it up, so they can detail it, etc. But, when I'm done with the paperwork they say OK, it's ready. Huh? OK. Turns out they had just needed to replace the headlight bulbs.

They had replaced the bulbs, but a clip on one housing was broken, so the bulb on that side is held loosely in place with two strips of Scotch tape. This is not mentioned by the dealership, but my friend discovers it the next day when he's looking to see what bulbs the car takes because he wants to sell me an HID kit.

I drive straight back down there, see the guy that did it. He knows why I'm there and starts playing it off -- "it still works, what's the problem?" The problem is that I just spent many thousands of dollars and the sticker on the car says, "Reconditioned to the highest standards." These are not them.

I found my initial salesman (not the manager; this guy actually seemed pretty decent), he took a look, said he'd be right back. Came back and said we're going to fix this for you, no charge, I'll send the paperwork over to the service department, just call and make an appointment. They'll do the interior work and detail the car, too.

I call the service department a few days later and they don't have much idea what I'm talking about, but we make an appointment, I drop off the car and get a loaner. They have to order a new headlight housing and get the interior guy in which will take a day or two. Fine, take whatever time you need, I just want it done right. I've also asked them to look at the brakes because there's steering wheel vibration and a slight grinding sound in the rear upon braking, not noticed in the short test drive.

Well, the brake rotors have pad material on them and I can pay a hundred and whatever dollars to have them turned if I want. And the car was detailed at some point but I can pay another two hundred and some dollars to do again. There are, actually, visible swirls of unbuffed wax on the car, I realize later. All of these things more evidence of their "highest standards."

(I paid for a proper detail elsewhere and they made the car look amazing, in addition to getting stains out of the carpet that the dealership hadn't.)

I bought the car with 62,000 miles on it and found out the 60k service hadn't been done. That one cost about $1,200. My shop said they were getting funny readings off the tailpipe emissions and suspected it had a non-factory tune at some point. Well, it had been running fairly crappily when I took it in, and when I came out with a stage one Cobb map, the car ran great but the clutch slipped, bad. So, I suspect -- and this part is total conjecture, I admit -- that either the original owner or the dealership detuned the car to hide the clutch slippage.

I could go on, but I'm spent. I just wanted to get another warning about these people onto the internet. I wish I'd heeded the ones I'd read.

[eggroller]

Man, I am sorry to hear your sad story! When I was shopping around they really didn't give me a good vibe. They reeked of the typical used car dealership one would find up on Aurora. Shady and hard to hold down.

I found an Outback that I liked but they dicked around with my time and wouldn't budge on the the price. My salesman couldn't get past what I knew already about the car and I was set on my price (quite a bit lower than their price because of issues that needed to be addressed). He then walked into their office and another guy came out. My salesman handed me off!

This new guy took me for another test drive and tried to convince me that he knew more than I about cars (when he clearly didn't). He played hardball and stuck to their price and promised they would fix the car. Apparently this guy was the 'closer'. He makes the deal work by promising all sorts of stuff but when I looked at the paperwork the promised items were nowhere to be found. So, I did what should have done hours ago, I walked. They ran after me. I told them I am not there for their used car salesman games. I requested them to give me the photocopy of my license and insurance. They argued that they needed to keep it on file. I managed to convince them with some idle threats and took off.

Lucky me. I now am telling every person who is shopping for a car to avoid them even if they have their dream car on the lot. There are other places to buy from!

[scooterwilli]

I had simular problems with them, but I learned alot about buying a car. I wont be going back and strongly urge folks to use another dealership.

[jtbiz]

I bought a used car from them and it actually went fairly well but that's because I might have had the one decent sales person there.

However, I would not get them a very high rating overall. I have some issues with their service department after servicing my older Outback. Not only that, but they did a detail on my 07 Outback I had just purchased that anyone could have done better. No stains removed from the interior and the paint still feels somewhat rough meaning buffing/cleaning wax was probably not used and certainly not a clay bar. Their detail service flat out SUCKS.

Overall my vibes for this entire dealership, from new to used to service are not great. Auburn Subaru is much, much better.

[SgtSchultz]

That's a shame because that dealership is the same one who runs 1stsubaruparts.com and their service department kicks major a$$.

[jtbiz]

Originally Posted by SgtSchultz

That's a shame because that dealership is the same one who runs 1stsubaruparts.com and their service department kicks major a$$.

That's a website run by their parts department. Their parts department isn't bad. I will say though, that they ordered me an incorrect part for my Outback and I wasted a lot of time and had to yell at someone before they went back and actually looked a little closer and found the right part.

But just because their parts department runs that website, it doesn't mean their service department doesn't suck.

[Seabass]

Good to know. I've only bought an oil filter there. I was a little annoyed at the separate location of their parts dept, but they seemed nice.

[aftCG]

I've bought two cars at Walker and I seriously can't believe I even went there for the second car. I went in because when I stopped in and saw the OBXT they said they'd make me a good deal since I was a return customer.

I should have walked out and in the end I got a bad deal. I can only blame myself for not doing so of course.

In the long run I'm happy with the car but I wouldn't let anyone I know shop at Walker. If I ever buy another Subaru it will be from the place in Auburn or (distant second) Carter in Ballard.