Prestman Auto

Prestman Auto should be avoided at all costs. I have purchased two vehicles from them and almost a third and through these experiences I have found that while they look squeaky clean on the outside, they are selling truly crappy salvage title cars that are worse than poorly repaired, they are potentially dangerous. I bought my first car from them in 2013 (see my Yelp review). The gist of that is that the car, a 2011 Audi S4, looked great, but on closer inspection had a terrible paint job (drips and runs, no clear coat in places, and bare spots), a cracked rim, problems with the MMI, aftermarket and poorly-fitted sun roof, and a hole in the muffler. I tried to get them to address these issues after the sale and they would not. They actually wouldn’t even do the things they promised they would do before the sale – including giving it a proper detail. Fast forward to 2016 and I decided to give them another chance. I had found two cars that I was interested in on their lot and figured if I bought two at the same time that they would give me a better deal. I was looking at a 2015 Audi S4 and was about to buy it when, after a test drive and in just the right sunlight, I saw a run in the paint! Upon closer inspection I also noticed that the front bumper had not been repaired on the underside and was not attached properly, leaving it misaligned (and because of the damage from the wreck) it could not be aligned. I told the salesman (they are all seem like nice people, but are dishonest as the day is long) that it had a run in the paint. He came out and looked at it and I told him I was a buyer if they would fix the fender and the paint. He checked with Tracy the sales manager (same guy that sold me my 2011 Audi) and Tracy said he would fix it AFTER I bought it! What that told me is that they weren’t going to fix it if I didn’t buy it and would hope that the next guy wouldn’t notice (like when I bought my 2011 S4 from them). Obviously, that put a bad taste in my mouth about that vehicle. I went home and did some research on it and found that it had a very interesting past, which I won’t get into here, but it was enough bad mojo on this thing that I was out. However, I ended up buying a 2015 Lexus IS250F from them a couple of days later. Great looking car. As they were doing the paper work, I ran my hands across the paint (after having found overspray and drips on the two Audis, and sure enough; overspray all over the hood). I immediately went in and told them I was “out” on this car too if they wouldn’t fix it. They reluctantly agreed to do it and I picked up the car a couple of days later. All was good, until… Wife gets in an accident. Body shop calls and says you should see the crappy work they did on the repair down here. Welded stuff and didn’t paint it. Temporary fixes all over the engine box. Broken headlight that should have been replaced during the original restore (not damaged in my wife’s accident). So, I’m disappointed, but the shop ended up fixing everything with the insurance payment and I decided to let it go. Then… A couple of months later we get the dreaded ABS indicator on the dash. Take it into the dealer to find out that the brake actuator should have been replaced after the accident that totaled the vehicle. The dealer report read, “Scanned vehicle and found multiple codes from the brake actuator causing several different attributes of the vehicle to fail, such as the power steering, combination meter, blind spot monitor and several others.” They also showed us that the under dash on the driver’s side was repaired with duct tape rather than being replaced! Instead of doing the right thing or the safe thing, they left the damaged part on the vehicle, putting the future owners lives at risk and putting us in a position to pay a nearly $3700 bill to get the part replaced and the car fully functional and safe again. These guys are scammy. What’s the chance that three cars out of three over the course of three and a half years would all have crappy paint jobs and shoddy repairs? Odds are that the preponderance of their vehicles are not fixed properly but most buyers never figure that out. Stay away from these guys! I know their clean lot and nice looking cars and friendly sales people with their cold bottled water and the lower prices are very enticing, but it’s all a façade. There are reputable places to buy a used car. Prestman is not one.