Looking for quality dealers in NE

We bought at the tail end of the 2003 model year after much calling around the NE area. I live in Souhtern NH and work in Worcester, MA. So we called aound those areas and extended our search to Maine, where I had gone to school and to VT for the sake of including the remainder of Northern NE. It would have been easiest for me to buy at Peter's Honda in Nashua, but they were not overly enthusiatic on discounting....great communication via their website though. Honda of Keene also had great communication via their website...just did not have the product. For us the absolute best deal would have been through Harry's Honda in Presque Isle, ME at about 600 over invoice...but the its either a 10 hour drive or a 1 hour flight from Boston...just did not have the time to deal with that when we bought...very nice people though on the phone. We ended up buying at Town and Country Honda in Berlin, VT, again going through the internet and got the best deal within reach at the time. Small dealership, no BS, and they even swapped it in for us. If you would like PM me via this board and I can share more details. I also have a friend that got a very good deal on a 2004 EXL RES after shopping around at the Boston area dealers and finally buying up in Concord at Grappone Honda (I may need to confirm that exactly, but she worked over 3 dealers that would be in your / our market area) With any luck she will see this post anyway and post...

In regards to "when is it reasonable" to request a refund of your deposit... that would be anytime in most cases. The only instances when I can think of the refund being an issue is if you hade the dealer swap in vehicle for you (added cost to them), if you factory ordered a vehicle that they would not have an easy time selling (not really an issue with the Pilot as there are few choices in true factory options), or if you had them accessorize a vehicle on hand to the hilt and decided to cancel before taking delivery. the first and third choice realy only pertain to vehicles that have already arrived, and the second is not really an issue.

I would see if the dealer can locate anyhting for you. The dealer in VT we used found the vehicle in about 15 minutes, secured in the same amount of time with a deposit in house via a credit card over teh phone, and did not flinch about putting lower trim and fog lights on about a week prior to the time that we could finally pick it up. I am not sure how things work in MA, but in NH, without compelling reasons, the dealership has to refund a deposit in a timely manner. we got our deposit back from Peter's Honda in Nashua in about 5 days (credit card is ALWAYS the way to go), once we found the VT dealer, and Peter's simply could not produce an EX-L in SBP at that time (odd thing that they could not find the same vehicle we bought given the fact that our vehicle came from a dealer in Sounthern VT and we ended buying it in northern VT, only to retunr to southern NH). Well that and they were crying foul to discount the vehicle at all. Good luck on your hunt.... loved our dealer and had good vibes from Honda of Keene.

I thought that you had initially had liked Silko in earlier post...unfortunately the whims of a particular dealership can be fickle and merely add to a negative perception as a whole by the public. Unfortunately, the obvious collective desires of this board focus on obtaining and enjoying an extremely popular (for good reason) vehicle. As we all have found out (for the most part) showing desire at the dealership equals a direct ratio of greed in return from the dealer.

It is merely despicable for the dealership to take such a long time to refund your deposit. Again, unless you placed a deposit in the context of the possible scenarios that I had listed in a previous post, you should expect a quick refund. I am assuming that this was probably not the case and that you are merely being screwed by the dealer.

We did not bother with dealing with Silko initially for a price inquiry as I was growing frustrated with most MA dealers as they were holding MSRP when we were looking, and probably still are. It is obviously difficult to travel a great distance in most circumstances to purchase a vehicle, but a friend and fellow follower of the board had great luck in even getting ballpark trade numbers (sight unseen) from at least one MA dealer and ended up purchasing at Autofair in NH after she was able to play one against the other. I have heard that Commonwealth Motors in Lawrence is pretty good. We looked there first and the saleperson gave us the old MSRP talk....never bothered to go back, but it sounds like some people have done OK there with competing offers in hand.

I liked our dealer, but it was a haul even for us to get there from southern NH (dealer in Berlin, VT). The absolute best deal we could find in New England was in Presque Isle, ME (too far, but only about 600or so over invoice).

I guess that I would try to use the e-mail system to the full extent and try to get as many offers as you can from those dealers that you would consider travelling to. The trade does make things a little bit odd in terms of online or telephone negotiations as they could always low ball you on price in attempt to make it up on the trade.

One thing that you may hear is that "if you buy here, you get better service". We service at the local dealer that would not negotiate and so far I have not been forced to wait outside while the car is being worked on. The service department is only too happy to make money from ANY customer. You may see some little things that count, but they simply cannot play games on straightfoward warranty issues.

I wish you the best of luck in your hunt. If you do not pla to ever deal with Silko again, be the thorn in their side as far as contacting the salesperson, sales manager, dealer manager, dealer principal frequently until you get satisfaction.

Sorry for the novel... I used to work in new car sales (temporary job to kill some time in between schools) and we were a pretty honest shop....tended to hate those that gave us a bad name.

Good luck!