Tips on buying an MDX

Welcome to the forum

Bill,

First, welcome to the forum. Hopefully you will find it as incredibly useful and fun to hang out here as many of us have.

Many people do put down deposits at multiple dealers -- as long as they are refundable, there is no problem. You might be better served by just getting a list of all dealers within a reasonable driving distance off of the Acura.com website and start making some phone calls. As a lot of people do put down multiple deposits, sometimes waitlists end up shorter than quoted. Also, as you would expect, the more flexible you can be with color, the shorter your wait time will be.

If you haven't found a dealership to test drive it, you should do so. Also, be sure to check the dealership ratings off of the home page:
http://www.acuramdx.org/drview.php?state=MN

There weren't too many ratings for MN.

With any dealership you put a deposit down on, they should specify a price of MSRP on the order sheet. There is no reason to pay more.

Some dealerships will deliver a little faster, but they may have more options than you want, or charge over MSRP.

While you're waiting, frequent this site to determine what options you want. When you order, you will have to decide whether you want the touring, and whether or not you want the Navigation system. Beware that many people on this site love their MDXs, and may have more options than the average owner.

Other than the touring and navigation, all other options are dealer-installed. With the exception of a complicated option accessories (maybe wood steering wheel or towing package), you should be able to install all options yourself easily and save a bundle. This whole site orders all accessories from Tim at www.hondacuraworld.com. All of his prices include freee shipping, and if you compare to the prices on acura.com, you'll find you'll save a ton.

Good luck!

Buerkle Acura

[sliding in late...]

Nice to see another Minnesotan on the boards - I wonder where the rest of them are?

I've had a good experience with Buerkle Acura - the day I bought it was the first day I'd seen one live and in person (hey, it's a 160 mile drive down there..), so I ended up spending the good part of the day with the salesman, a young fellow named Jeremy. They were great, really knew the ins and outs of the car. And of course, we have to haggle about the price - at that time it was MSRP, period. We did haggle a bit on my trade-in, which I really didn't want to drive back, and they managed to up it the cost of an accessory.

Two odd things - in the period of 6 months after purchase, we got three parking tickets on the car we traded in! (No doubt it wouldn't start for the new owner - apparently Buerkle didn't do some of their homework.

And I couldn't get them to install the hitch package I bought from Tim (whom they accused of selling under wholesale!!). But all in all I've been happy with the shop there - a clean operation and generally good guys.

OK, more than you wanted ta know - good luck Bill!

Found 2002 No Wait!

I got my new 2002 MDX on Tuesday with no wait.

I have a 2-week old son and he was fussy at about 5 am, so he and I surfed the internet and let Mom get some sleep. Just for kicks I went to Yahoo cars and typed in MDX, and a local dealer had one on the lot!

I drove it that day, did the paperwork on the spot, and the sales man brought it to my house after they installed a few accessories and had it inspected for my state. It couldn't have worked out better. I dealt with Steve Dorfman at Rosenthal Acura in Maryland.

For those of you wanting an MDX but don't want to wait, check in with dealers once a week. Also check autotrader.com. It is linked into many dealers' inventories so new deliveries show up there. I'd suggest you call whenever you see new deliveries. I was offered two MDXs that way (wrong color and trim). Who knows, you might call when someone else backs out on the car they ordered.

Good luck on your search! I've only had mine a few days but my wife and I are thrilled with it.

Bill - Welcome to the board. Given your topic, you are in for a ton of responses I'm sure. I just picked up my MDX a week ago last Friday. I'm in the Atlanta area and I was being quoted 60 - 90 day waits. We did put in deposits a a couple of dealers but be careful, some dealers do not allow them to be refundable (and I can't blame them). We were quoted MSRP from every dealer in the state of Georgia and about the same wait time. HOWEVER, I found a dealer in Jacksonville Fl (6 hrs south) who on December 10th said he could get the car (Beige Touring/Navi) by Christmas. I said great and asked to place the order. When I did, he quoted MSRP + $1,000. I scolded him pretty bad for charging above MSRP and shared that I felt this wasn't right and was not interested. After a couple of days he agreed to sell the car at MSRP and it actually turned out to be a pretty good transaction. The car arrived the day after Christmas but got stuck in port until the teamsters decided to come back from their holiday!

About options. I too was trying to choose the right ones. First, the two factory only (touring and Nav). While I believe they are both worth the money, they have different value. The touring package mainly added "upscale" features to the car. My wife gave up a mercedes S420 for this MDX (we are doing the t-ball, soccer, kids friends stuff now) and we really wanted our new "truck" to feel like a luxury car. The Nav system is a whole other story. We have used this EVERYDAY since we bought the car. The features are tremendous from finding restaurants to looking up addresses based on phone numbers, this is truly a useful product. I travel a lot on business and had fallen in love with the nav systems you can get in Hertz rental cars. My wife "anti-technologist" couldn't understand why anyone would need more than a map until .... Last summer she was in a wedding in Southern California. In four days we had to be in 4 different cities we didn't know (dinners, wedding, reception, etc). I rented a car from Hertz with a nav system and it was spectacular. Not only did it lead us to or destinations via the quickest route, but it displayed remaining ETA, mileage and the like. After that trip, a Nav system because my wife's #1 decision criteria in choosing an SUV.

Dealer added options. One suggestion ORDER FROM TIM !!!. Tim can cut your costs in half in some cases and has all of the installation instructions right online (not to mention there are numerous threads on this site discussing installation). I ordered the running boards, wood dash, and gold packages to be dealer installed before I found this board. While I am happy with all of the options, I could have saved almost a thousand dollars ordering from Tim and installing myself.

Sorry for the length but as I am sure you can tell, us MDX owners are pretty passionate about our X's!

Welcome again to the site.

KBD431 ~

That's really a well-stated, informational post. It will help many out!

Like it's been mentioned so many times before, if you're willing to possibly do a little traveling and/or calling outside of your "local area", chances are you will find an MDX. Especially if you are not locked-in to one particular color.

I didn't even know the MDX existed 'til last month. That's when we went auto-shopping (while others were doing their Christmas shopping After falling in love with the MDX, the "Acura games" began (forced options and or MSRP+).

I used to be a Honda owner and travelled 150 miles to buy my cars because the dealer didn't jerk us around. I applied the same concept to Acura dealers. I went to the Acura website and started doing dealer searches. Nearly all dealers can be contacted directly via Acura's site.

I emailed them, specifically stating what I wanted (White/Touring/MSRP only) and told them that if they had it, to contact me. My phone started ringing off the hook. I did have a few contact me saying that they could have the car I wanted by the end of December but, most of them were the dealers that were forcing options and wanted me to buy on impulse. Especially since they turned down a CASH deal if they were willing to sell it at MSRP!

Thanks to this board and the gentleman that posts his allocation, it's obvious that NO dealer is going to get something that he doesn't already know he has coming.

Another dealer called me and told me he had the car I wanted, coming in in January. I went there, signed the purchase order and it is coming in this week. Less than 30 days to MDX ownership is GREAT!


There are some good dealers out there, you just have to be willing to find them.