I bought a 2002 Chrysler Sebring from them and subsequently had nothing but trouble from the day I bought it. Approximately 5 hours after I bought the car, it shut down on me on a major road with my wife and 6 month old son in the car and we were almost rear ended by a big truck. Come to find out the head gasket had blown, the water pump malfunctioned and was pumping water into the engine which was mixing with the oil, this on the day I buy the car.
They don't offer any warranties, but I wasn't going to let my $2,900 go to waste without demanding they fix the car since they obviously didn't do their job up front in making sure the car worked properly. They towed the car for me and had it for a week with multiple deadline guarantees as to when the car would be ready to pick up. At 1:30pm on Friday Jose tells me "they're almost done, and I could come pick up the car around 5pm.” I get there at 5 to find out that the mechanic (who's not Jose) needs another 4 hours to finish putting everything back together, and could I come back on Saturday to pick it up.
At this point I tell them I'm just going to have my tow truck come and pick it up and tow it somewhere that I know it'll get fixed right because they're taking entirely too long even though they were fixing it out of their pocket. At this point the owner Elias Samaan, starts yelling at me from in his office that if I demand to take the vehicle or I rush them to get it done and then I take the vehicle and something else is wrong that they weren't taking any more responsibility because I rushed them to get done. I bet if I had towed it to a Tires Plus or El Doctor Auto in Longwood, I would have had to pay for it, but it'd been done in less time.
After agreeing to come back Saturday, I arrive and they're standing outside with the convertible top down and the car running. It sounded good, time for a test drive. As I pull out the belts are screaming every time I touch the accelerator. So I go down the street and pull into a parking lot and check under the hood and the belts look horrible, like they put some used belts in there and on top of that, there’s anti-freeze spewing from the reservoir over everything. When I questioned him (Jose) about it he got all defensive and again said, "that's normal", to which I said, "that's crap!" I asked if I could speak to the mechanic myself regarding whether the anti-freeze spraying everywhere was normal and if he spoke English because I’d only heard him speak Spanish. Jose lost it and called me racist and offensive. I meant no harm or to offend anyone, but Jose got so offended that he went into the office and came out with a check (dated the day before) for my $2,900 and smacked it into my hand and made me take my money back. At that point, he knew he wasn’t going to get over on me.
There are many people who may read this and say that I got my money back so I shouldn't be trashing these guy's business. Well, I'm trying to save someone from going through the hell that I went through because they may not fair the same as myself. Also, there were no warning signs or reviews out there about these guys who are out just to steal people's hard earned money.
Elias Samaan (owner) is a snake who's just out to make a quick buck. He doesn't care about the welfare of his customers. He'll tell you..."I've been in this business for 22 years and I'm out to buy a customer, not just sell a car." If he truly cared about gaining or retaining customers he'd properly inspect vehicles before trying to sell them to the public. He's not going to change his ways until he's forced to or a vehicle he sold has a massive mechanical failure and someone loses their life.
I'd recommend not walking but running the other direction AS FAST AS YOU CAN. Because you'll regret buying a car from them for the rest of your life.
I would have reported them to the BBB, but they're not an accredited business through the BBB.
Atlantic Auto Brokers
616 W. Michigan Street
407-487-1913
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