So Mercedes-Benz has informed me, a Smart Car owner, that they are suddenly interested in buying back my car. They seemed quite cagey and vague over the telephone as to why they would want my SmartCar back (it’s quite an old secondhand car, worth perhaps no more than $4,000 on Blue Book.) They just kept pressing, yeah, bring the car back, we want to buy it. All I can find online is some recall about how insulation mats might catch fire in the car, but even then, if that’s a manufacturing defect, it should only call for free replacement mats, not a buyback of the whole car itself.
Are they trying to buy the car to prevent some future liability?
I get mail (I never answer my phone) all the time about how Jeep dealerships need used Jeeps so they’ll give me a sweet offer if I trade mine in. Just a sales pitch. Is that what you’re talking about?
Maybe but this seemed to have more ominous undertones than that, with the insulation mat-fire issue. Just wanted to see if anyone knew about something being kept under the wraps.
We get those even for our recently-purchased Buick *(I know, right? Everyone knows the Slightly Used Boring Car market is booming).
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There’s one salesman at the dealer we bought our car from, and I can tell by his tone of voice, mostly desperation to make quota by the end of the month, that he just wants to get me on their lot. He gets credit for luring a prospect in, and hopes I’ll trade in my Perfectly Good Boring Car on a new one.
OK. Just wanted to make sure it wasn’t some hidden car defect (insulation-fire in SmartCars) because my SmartCar was in the 2007-2009 year for that fire-hazard issue.