How Long Was Your Last New Car Test Drive? Buick Now Allowing Customers To Keep Cars For 24 Hours

Dealers at the local auto mall use the same 3 mile test drive loop and that fine let's say if you're looking for a mid-sized sedan and are surveying the Camry et. al., but too many customers never drive more than that before they buy. I would highly suggest that once you decide what you want to then drive it on say your normal route from home to work to get a feel for how it works on your roads versus the roads the dealer has chosen for your test drive. Once you sign the contract, there's no going back.

Most of the local dealers of premium vehicles quietly offer 24-hour test drives already.

It never hurts to ask.

Less than 10 minutes for me. I had been researching it for months, so the test-drive was merely a formality for me. It just confirmed the good stuff I read and saw in videos, and also let me dismiss the few negatives I had heard about.

Narrowed it down to three choices and then did a 50 mile mixed use test drive in each. Only way to get a feel for comfort, quiet, and real use fuel mileage. Took a while to find and convince dealers, but in the end the winner was clear and was the one I bought. Loving it.

Wise move. Before kids #2 and #3 came along (twins) my wife did a quickie test drive in a Lexus GX and was smitten. She then insisted that I go with her to the dealer for a test drive. We test drove a Mercedes GL first and I did an accident avoidance move which the Mercedes handled easily. On to Lexus, same move and she was terrified by how unstable it suddenly felt.

Doing research on the internet, reading magazines, and doing a 10 minute drive is asinine. Sweat the details.

Fuel mileage in a new car is at best a guess - in even 50 miles - without a break-in period. However - I agree that you need to drive it in situations you are likely to encounter - not on a set course (One dealership actually had a test track and did not allow going off property).
Still - I never actually drove the exact car I eventually bought - and I should have. I drove a different color. THe one I bought ended up with bad front brake rotors and really bad shaking from higher speed stops -and while I knew what it was and was not as concerned - at least I would have had it fixed BEFORE I took delivery.

TomM: If you're interested in real-world fuel economy, visit Fuelly.com, find the vehicle you're interested in, with the engine and transmission you plan to get, and see what owners of that vehicle are *actually* getting. I did this before I got my current car, and my real-world numbers are tied for the best numbers reported.

@TomM a rule of thumb I follow re MPG is that if you can live with the city mpg estimate as the best the car will ever do, then go for it.

Fuelly.com isn't going to be completely reliable because those owners don't drive your route and the data isn't really data because it is based on what someone says they are getting, therefore it is anecdotal hearsay.

Also, how in hell does a new car have bad front brake rotors? Clearly the PDI of that vehicle was not performed correctly before it hit the lot.

That is not how you treat customers. Furthermore, the customer will always have it in the back of his mind that the car was not right when the next issue inevitably happens.

Three years ago a friend of mine was looking to do a cheap lease a mid-sized sedan.

On the VW lot was a Passat S that would do. First F up was that key fob would not automatically open the door. The salesman used the key to pry off a piece of plastic on the door handle that hides a key hole and opens the door.

My buddy starts it up and the warning light for being out of gas comes on. The salesman goes and puts a splash of gas in the tank leaving the customer standing in the lot.

The test drive begins and the car was doing an off shimmy down the road.

Back at the dealer, the salesman was talking deal and said all those issues would be taken care of.

My buddy walked, but he phoned me and filled me in. Had I been on the lot a nuclear explosion would have happened.

I went to the lot, found the offending Passat.Sure enough the fob wouldn't work. The piece of plastic had been thrown haphazardly on the floor on the driver's side. And when I drove it, the car did the shimmy.

I had some vicious words with the technician who did the PDI. The car had better be done right in PDI or I'll fire your ass.

I randomly spot check cars.

MDarringer writes “…Fuelly.com isn't going to be completely reliable because those owners don't drive your route and the data isn't really data because it is based on what someone says they are getting, therefore it is anecdotal hearsay…”

According to Fuelly.com (and I’m a member), members submit actual odometer readings and the actual fuel quantity required to fill up at every fuelling, thereby providing accurate, actual fuel economy information. This is completely different from the “anecdotal hearsay” MDarringer asserts is there.

Fuelly.com does not report a single number (e.g., 26 MPG) for a specific vehicle. It reports a range of values, and tells you how many vehicles have attain that value. It depicts this info on a graph. For example:
1 x 22.5 mpg
3 x 23 mpg
10 x 23.5 mpg
15 x 24 mpg
…and so on. With many dozens or possibly hundreds of vehicles submitting real world data for the specific vehicle of your interest, you get a good idea of the range of fuel economy numbers that people are actually getting, from best to worst.

So can you use Fuelly to accurately predict the fuel economy you’ll get on your intended purchase? Hell no (and I never claimed you could). But it will give you a very accurate idea of what a bunch of people are actually getting. Again, that’s wildly different from what MDarringer asserts is happening.

@TheSteve that is the definition anecdotal and heresay. Fuelly relies on the anecdotal information the owner provides. Look up anecdotal in the dictionary. Fuelly "hears" those reports and "says" them on their site. That is the definition of hearsay.

Your check from Fuelly is in the mail.

MDarringer: Thank you for your clarification, and for your warning to this site's readers. We shall take your point to heart.

From this date forward, we shall receive all MDarringer posts as being nothing more significant than "anecdotal and hearsay," rather than being factual in nature. After all, the AutoSpies website, like Fuelly, only "hears" what MDarringer posts, and "says" the same, and that complies to your definition of hearsay.

My last new car purchase I never drove until I put my plates on it and left the dealer. I was already familiar enough with the brand and model that it wasn't necessary.

However, the dealer I stick with will give me the keys to anything I want on the lot and let me have it as long as I want. I was thinking of an almost new Q5 TDI, and I had it for three days. Yes, I have a successful history with the dealer, but they still are a low pressure, high quality dealership. Yes, it's a VW dealer...

And they are desperate for sales so of course you can take anything home.