Advice on 2007 M35

[highball]

Hi there,New to the Infiniti world. I just traded in my '99 Audi A6 sedan and am looking for a nice upgrade. I've had my eye on the M since the redesign. Looking through the listings in the area, the best price I've seen in a 2007 M35 (seems fairly stock, no NAV) with 22k miles for $28,991. Seems like a great price from the comparables on the market. It's at a chrysler dealer in the Seattle area. Maybe they don't know the market on these cars? I haven't seen it yet, and the carfax says it was a rental in its prior life, so the maintenance may be sketchy. Any thoughts? Thanks in advance.
Modified by highball at 2:20 AM 3/3/2008

[Boon]

I would stay as far away from a rental as possible. I personally treat every car with respect wheather its mine or not, but the vast majority of people beat the living $#!* out of rentals. They have the, "This isn't my car" mentality. Do as you please but I would pay a couple G's more for a car that I know somebody babied, instead of one hundreds of people ragged on. Just my opinion............... Boon

[szh]

I agree. Although, usually, the rental company at least does proper regular maintenance (as far as I know).

Separate, but related: I also have had bad luck with a lease return, so I advise against that. The lessee (lessor?) knows that the problems they create with bad maintenance will be taken off their hands in two years, so regular oil changes, regular transmission fluid flushes, and the like, are usually left by the wayside.

Since the dealers don't bother checking these, or penalizing the lessee fo failure to do these, the cars are usually in poor shape - even with just 2 years and 30k miles on the clock.

My car, after 4 years and 60k miles is in far better shape than those 2 year old lease returns for a darn good reason!!!

So, I'd recommend finding a private party sale, or one that was traded in by somebody who cared about their cars (tough to figure out though), if you do want a used car. Looking at the Infiniti service records on the car is a bare minimum requirement (but not fool-proof).

Z

[Boon]

I agree. Although, usually, the rental company at least does proper regular maintenance (as far as I know).

Z

You would be suprised. Much like a leasee, the rental companies know that in 2-3 years they will be selling these cars at auction and thus do not pay for regularly scheduled maintnence.

A good friend of mine managed a rental place, I won't say any names but it rhymes with Mudget. I wondered about how well they care for there cars and he said they do oil changes at between 5k and 7500 and that they never did any other service unless it was desperatly needed. When they did have these done it wasn't at the dealership, it was usually at a cheap shop they had a contract/price agreement with. I can't speak for all rental companies, and maybe that was just location specific, but it kinda makes sense. Cutting costs = more profit.

[szh]

Yikes!

Okay ... good reason to avoid rental car sales too then!

Z