Looking towards the Sun squinting with our new 2013 Infiniti G37 Coupe.

Summary: Shopping for a used G37 Infiniti Coupe in the Tampa area. Our experience of shopping, pricing evaluating the cars, features and finally deciding on a deal. Regular readers of ours may know that one of my vehicle’s (which has been featured in several repair blogs) was a 2007 Chevrolet Impala SS. I love the power of the 5.3 V-8. Beyond that the car has left a lot to be desired. Dash noises that I find and fix would inevitably return a few weeks later. The feeling of being tossed about when cornering even when you are the one driving and holding onto the steering wheel, but especially when you are passenger-ing! My wife would always brace for every turn. Honestly, I’ve missed the quality of a well made Japanese vehicle like the Mitsubishi Diamante we had prior to the Chevy. We purchased the 1999 Diamante with 7,000 miles on it in the year 2000, at Carmax, where I worked at that time. The Diamante is no longer produced, besides we were not really looking for a four door car this time. Something about reaching middle age makes us want a sporty, luxury coupe. Not just any coupe, we started out on a search for a good low mileage used Infiniti G37.

Thought we found the perfect car at Brandon Ford. This 2011 Infiniti G37 was a one owner new car trade in with only 15,410 miles and was literally in perfect condition. No scuffs on the wheels, no dings or chips and the interior still had that “new car” smell. At $29,995 this was a very good car, priced right and only 10 minutes from my house. However, one of the features that we decided we would not do without, especially on a $30,000 dollar used car was the ability to play our Pandora Internet radio from our phones, through the vehicle’s sound system. After all, our older Impala had an auxiliary port that allowed this. The G37 had Bluetooth for the phone, but very surprisingly did NOT have connectivity for the Internet radio from a smart phone. The ports that were (in previous models) located in the center console storage compartment were gone. After searching on-line we discovered that the 2011 G37 that does not have the NAV Pack. (Navigation Package) does not have the connectivity wired or Bluetooth for the audio. What a disappointing discovery this was. Kudos to JC at Brandon Ford though. He was very helpful and did not pressure us a bit. Brandon Ford also offered us a quick and fair trade in offer of $11,000 for the Impala SS with 61,000 miles. This was before we found out about the need for the NAV package that included the Bluetooth connectivity for the Internet radio. I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend JC at Brandon Ford when shopping for a used vehicle, but since this car didn’t have the NAV package and the audio Bluetooth connectivity, we had to continue our search.

At Lexus of Clearwater, the car above is a 2011 Infiniti G37 with NAV and it only had 17,601 miles for thirty two thousand dollars. However, there was an obvious problem with the driver’s interior trim. Apparently, Lexus of Clearwater, will only address used car issues if the customer see’s a problem. And then they may only offer to “split” the cost of repair. That’s what happened with the car above. They said they would split the $450 that it would cost to replace the door trim! It didn’t make sense for us to pay to make their car “sell-able” when they were asking a retail price that would normally be charged for a car that’s in excellent condition.

On the test drive I also noticed a hesitation when accelerating. After a quick search on-line, I found a TSB (Technical Service Bulletin) for a computer re-flash that sometimes solves the problem. Some people on the Infiniti forum said it took care of the “lag” in acceleration on their vehicle and some said it did not. If I were to proceed on acquiring this car I would have had to get the Lexus dealer to take the car to the Infiniti dealer to get the reprogramming done outlined in the TSB. I would not have purchased the car with this problem persisting. I wondered how many other issues this 17,000 mile car might have that was not addressed before the dealership put it on the front lot? Anyway, when Lexus of Clearwater emailed us the a quote for our trade and specifics on the door panel repair on their car, I was surprised that they offered us only $10,000 for our trade. This included us paying for a $200 detail job and $150 for leather repair on our car. We had the custom two tone leather installed only a couple of years ago and we were puzzled about what they thought was wrong with the leather. Needless to say we decided to shop elsewhere.

Since it was the end of the year, I decided to see if there were any “close out deals” on 2012 G37’s. I tried calling Infiniti of Tampa and turns out they weren’t open at 8:00 in the morning. After searching other Infiniti dealers nearby I found Coast Infiniti in Sarasota about an hour away from my house. So I started up an on-line chat with Wayne. Funny thing about on-line chats and NOT speaking directly with someone. It’s easy to skim past important details. I admittedly did this. Wayne responded to my inquiry. He told me all the 2012’s were gone, but he told me about a great deal on a 2013 G37 sedan with NAV and the Premium Package for $36,500. I missed the part about the “sedan”. I was shopping for a “coupe”. Long story short, we decided to spend the extra money for the 2013 COUPE. The car listed at $47,000. Much more than I originally had in mind. Wayne at Coast Infiniti did have some good end of year incentives though. He was able to get the price down to forty two out the door. That’s still a lot of money, but considering the Impala SS had listed for almost $31,000 when it was new in 2007, I suppose prices have simply gone up. We were planning on an all cash deal (besides our trade), however some of the incentive money from Infiniti required financing $7500 for at least 90 days. After ninety days we can pay that off. The only potential problem was he did not see our trade yet. Thankfully, that was not a problem. I had a trade offer from Brandon Ford and an offer from Carmax for $11,000 and that’s exactly what Coast Infiniti gave us, no questions asked. Wayne explained that he would have Dave take over for the delivery of our new car. Dave was very professional and delivered the car to us beautifully with absolutely no stress and no hassles. I would recommend the guys at Coast Infiniti to anyone. This new car may not provide as much subject matter for my auto repair blogs as the Impala SS did, but that’s OK with me.