Complaint Review: Lenux Motor Cars - Burnaby British Columbia

This account happened to me May of 2002. During that time I had just lost the use of my primary vehicle as it had been written off in an accident. As such I was in the market for a quick replacement to get me to work/school. Being from the Island, I decided to make the trek to the Mainland hoping to find a better deal due to the greater competition. That's when I found what I thought to be a pristine '98 Integra, selling for $14,900.00 at Daewoo Burnaby.

I had never heard of this place before, but being a new car dealership I felt a little more at ease. First warning should have been the fact that being a Daewoo vendor there were only actually three Daewoos on the lot tucked in the corner, the rest of the cars being anything from a used Type-R to a Z8 in the showroom.

I approached a salesman to inquire about the Integra. He answered my questions, showing me the car and telling me the car had been "babied" by the previous owner, and that everything was in order. I left for a couple of hours for dinner to think it over and ask my friends' opinions, and came back afterwards for a quick test drive. The car seemed sound inside and out, and upon return we sat down in the office to negotiate an agreement. We eventually settled on $14,900.00 including taxes, and I drove away a then-happy customer.

The four months that followed, I had a bad string of luck with the car - it had twice been hit by another vehicle while parked, and someone had swerved into my car attempting to make a left turn in busy traffic. After that I decided it was time to trade it in for a new vehicle. I had my eyes set on an 2002 Honda Civic SiR, and the Honda dealership in Victoria (Honda City, now called Campus Honda) offered me a really good trade-in price for my Integra which I was going to put towards the new Civic. The documents were all drawn up and I was set to go in the following day to pay and pick it up...that is until Honda ran an ICBC check on my Integra's history.

It had not occured to me to do an ICBC check on the car myself... Since it was an "official" Daewoo dealership I thought that legally it would have to disclose large accidents over $2000 by-law had to be told to you by the dealer. As it happened the Integra that had supposedly been "babied" by the previous owner actually had over $30,000 worth of previous damages/ insurance claims. I was beyond shock when I heard that figure; it had been claimed approximately 7 times before I bought the car, ranging from a $10,000 collision claim within the first 6 months of the car's life to a $6,000 collision here and a $3,000 collision there.

Honda told me they could no longer accept the car as a trade-in as it would be impossible to resell. I immediately called Daewoo asking to speak to the manager; he booked an appointment on the following Monday. A few days later I took the ferry from Victoria to the Mainland and drove out to meet him. When I arrived at the dealership it turned out he had taken the day off and would be available for several days. I ended up standing there angrily recounting my case to the salesman who was apathetic. Frustratingly, I took the ferry back home and called up the manager the next day.

The manager was equally as uncooperative as the salesman. I demanded compensation, but he refused and basically offered to buy back the vehicle at its current value, basically a few thousand below what I paid for it. He even said I could trade it in for something else! He assured me that he could "locate" any kind of car I wanted with zero kilometres on it.

I considered taking legal action, but realized it would prove difficult because I had signed the purchase agreement for the car. As this was really the first time I have purchased a car myself, I didn't know what the contract stipulated... there's actually a section on there where it says something to the effect of "Has this vehicle been in an accident exceeding $2000? Yes/No?" The yes box was ticked by the salesman and everything else was pre-filled, he had simply asked me to sign on the line to take possession of the car which I naively did. Being a licensed car dealership I believed that they would actually be honest and practice good business ethics, unfortunately I was sorely mistaken.