No test drive. Are you kidding? The dealers up here treated the car like it was made of gold. One even had a little fence around it. Stealth TT, Vette ZR-1, Viper RT/10......never test drove any of these either.
I read every road test available on a car before I even get serious about buying one. So far, as soon as I get in the car for the drive home, it's like I did test drive it already. The magazines and other literature have never been too far off. Like a previous poster said, I wouldn't buy a car like this if it had been test driven by some 'unknown'.

 

I consider myself lucky that I found a dealer who was willing to let me take a test drive, and not one where the salesman sits with you while you get to go on a 3-block test. I was aware that the car wasn't broken-in and would never beat up on a car that would later be someone else's. That test drive, 12 miles of back roads and highways, was all it took. I had been considering the TT and the Z3, and a used low mileage M Coupe. I too was wary from the press talking about the car in the low revs, but after that drive I am totally sold. My wife took one look at the car and said "do it". The only bad part, as I see it, is the waiting period. Mine, new silver/red interior, is due for Sept. or Oct. delivery. Maybe I'll be rewarded with a glass rear window.

 

I scouted around 2 months before they arrived in the US, calling for several days, until I found a dealer that would sell one to me reasonably. I bought mine Sept 25, '99, sight unseen, from a dealership in NW Georgia (I lived in Tampa at the time).

When the first ones came in, I went and looked at the ones at the local dealer, but no test drive. My first ride in one was when I picked mine up, and I've never been unhappy!

And yeah, this was the first and only car I have ever bought without test driving...

 

I drove it on a Wednesday and my heart stood still, de-doo ru-run, run, run, de-doo run, run; I got it the following Saturday, de-do run, run, run, de-do run, run! It was definitely love at first clutch-drop.

 

Yup, I got a test drive. It was sitting in the middle of the showroom floor. There were like four on the lot. One was actually outside, but they told me to pick one and I picked the one in the middle of the showroom floor. They had to move like 3 cars to get my car out. In fact a few people were looking to buy the very car that I eventually bought. I test drove it, liked it, and ended up buying the car I test drove. They wanted me to buy the exact one I test drove.

 

As I see it, in this current market there is no reason not to get a test drive. That may have been the case early on but not any longer. Any potential buyer owes it to themself to get a proper test drive one way or the other.

Also, don't pay over MSRP.

 

If you are going to spend between $30k to $40k for any phat ride. You should definitely test drive the car. Hell, I took the S2K out twice before I brought it home. VTEC...something about VTEC...definetly test drive.

 

No test drive from the dealer - but a customer of mine had one and let me take his for a drive one day last summer (by myself) Ever since that first moment of vtec in his car I knew I had to have one. It took a year and the promise of a complete basement renovation to my wife to be able to get one. Bought it on my birthday (Feb 28) - took delivery 17 days later and haven't been able to stop smiling since!!!!

 

I did get a chance for a test drive. It was only to confirm what I expected having driven other Hondas that make their stats at high RPM's. Only I wanted to make sure that the lower range was better than the Del Sol VTECH. It definetly was. The sales manager was the only person allowed at my dealership to touch the car. So the two of us took one out. He had warmed up the engine by the time he brought the car around. We took the usual route that the dealership uses. On the outbound part, I asked if I could go into an office parking lot(empty) and try the cornering. He agreed. After immitating a slolum course I progressively tightened the turns until I got the tail to hang out. On the return trip, he suggested I "light it up". He didn't have to ask twice.I used 8,000 as the shift point. He claimed he hadn't experienced the top end of the performance before. We returned to the dealership to finish the paperwork.

 

Test drove one that had about 14k miles on it. It had belonged to a Japanese kid attending UW-Milwaukee. His parents bought it for him in Sept 99 when they first hit. He graduated that following May and sold it back to the dealer because he couldn't take it with him back to Japan. The dealer sold it at auction the next day (after my test drive) for $2k over their sticker which was the same as the sticker when it was new - about $36k - but it had all the factory options. I ended up going with a spanking new one off the showroom floor.


My sales guy was also very cool and the test drive sold the car. We got into triple digits a couple of times. What a gas - and I'm still loving it!