I am in Valencia, CA just N or LA and I ordered from Classic Mini in Ohio. It was a great experience. MY MA Julie Saxa was excellent. Always responded promptly to any questions.

Paperwork looked after via courier.

I had hoped to go to Ohio to drive the car back..but weather was too bad and had the car shipped.

It arrived Dec 23/06 just in time for Christmas!

Hope that helps!

 

Just an FYI, Julie is no longer with Classic. You'll want to talk to Mike Kost now, most likely.

 

I actually just talked with her at Classic (via email) 1-2 weeks ago, so it must have been recent... Anyway, Classic offered nice discounts on the accessories, but quoted me $1650 for shipping to L.A. (which means that even with the discounts, I'd be paying more than at South Bay MINI). I'm checking with MINI of the Hamptons right now (as they advertise $500 shipping coast-to-coast), and if they can make me an offer that at least matches South Bay MINI (i.e. +500 -accessory discount), then I'll definitely consider ordering from them, as I could probably get my MINI 2 months sooner.

In regards to ordering out-of-state, do the L.A. dealers treat you differently if you don't buy from them? My Dad was telling me he would never order out-of-state because he thinks they treat you worse, but my experience so far (I have a Subaru right now that was brought from Seattle) has been fine -- not that I know what it'd be like if I had bought it locally...

Thanks again for the great comments.

 

Sarcux,
BTW, what wheels do you have on that MINI? I ordered the matte black 18" JCW r105s, and I'm hoping they look as good as those do...

 

I had mine shipped from Ohio to CA. No paperwork problems at all and it had 7 miles on the clock.

John

 

My experience is that there's no difference in the way you're treated if you buy from the dealer or buy from another dealer and have the car serviced at the nearby dealer.

Except, in the case of loaners. Some dealers refuse to provide loaners to service customers who didn't buy from the dealer.

Not sure how MINI dealers will handle the "free" (inlcuded in the price of your MINI, according to the MINI sales brochure/booklet I picked up from a local MINI dealer) FULL SCHEDULED maintenance if you don't buy from the same dealer you take the car to for service. There is no restriction or requirement stated in the MINI brochure. It is included in the price of your car.

Anyhow, what I've learned over the years is that even those that bought from a dealer, and then took the car there for service, even those who paid MSRP plus (this when I was thinking about buying a C5 Corvette and at the time buyers were *bragging* about paying MSRP plus a huge dealer markup (and then complained about lousy service from the same dealer's service department...)) were not guaranteed good service from the selling dealer's service department.

I buy where I can make the best deal. And I get my cars serviced where I get the best service. Would be nice if they were both the same place, but I've found most of the time a good place to buy a car provides lousy service and a good place to get the car service is a horrible place to buy a car. (One place got thrown off the sales lot trying to buy a car. But the service department was very good!)

Sincerely,

RockC.

 

Her last day was Valentine's Day. Parting is such sweet sorrow, eh?

My wheels are Exel TZ-10's in gunmetal. Pretty lightweight, very inexepensive ($109). Bought them from Wheelmax.com. They're the same ones that sndwave and Ryephile has, only theirs are white, and Ryan has 18"s.

 

Thanks, Sarcux. Are the ones in your sig 18" or 17"? Checking out Wheelmax.com, I actually thought the Nex-O TS10s looked really good:
http://www.wheelmax.com/product.asp?ProdId=9966
Did you get runflats with your Exels?

Thanks (sorry to go off-topic here...).

 

17", and %^&# no on the runflats! Waste of money! I run Yoko AVS ES-100's. Perfect Dragon tyre. Cheap & sticky.