Two Saturdays ago started out like a regular in search of my next car day, had a 10 am stop at Audi to check out pricing on an S3 and then I was headed to Genesis for a second run in the G70 I was considering. I was 95% sure I was going to order a new G70 3.3L Sport and almost cancelled my Audi visit since an S3 was more than a G70 without all the power and options. I went into Audi and sat down with the salesman and walked through pricing up an S3 which sure enough came to around $60 K plus tax and fees yadda yadda more than the G70 plus Audi finance rates are now hitting 8%! However, in the showroom which I didn't notice until after the S3 discussion was a beautiful 2019 Audi RS3. I don’t know why the salesman didn’t even let me know it was there.
I normally don't love white cars but this was a stunner. At this point I was nearing 1.5 hours and getting hungry so I asked to have the RS3 brought out of the showroom for a test drive, at which point salesperson says they haven't had it out for many test drives since they got it in recently, and told me what seemed to be a little high asking price. A quick scan of autotrader told me the price wasn't so terrible and with no more RS3 coming to Canada this year, this was maybe my last chance to own one with the inline 5.
I went to grab a burger and when I got back the RS3 was out by the door ready to go. It took me about 1.5 minutes to verify I was going to buy it but still drove it for about 20 and loved every minute of it. The sound is awesome, the power is awesome, the handling is awesome, the lack of foolish gadgets is awesome plus it has four doors and is easy to get in and out of. It was just off lease so hadn't hit the website yes and was in immaculate condition. In service date was August 2020 so less than 2 years old and has 48,000 KMs. Options include power seat pack, black optics, red brake calipers, sport exhaust (most important option), carbon fibre inlays, wireless charging and the wheels. Through some research I discovered the power seat was not a great option since it lost the diamond stitching but you can’t win them all.
When I got back we got down to brass tacks, no wiggle room in price, it has 3 years of warranty left (extra year for CPO), 2 years of Audi service left plus a winter wheel set I could inherit for $1,000 and free tire storage. They offered me exactly $198 more for my trade than BMW did (my fault for letting the cat out of the bag) and that was the deal. How could I say no?
Delivery day was today, delayed by a week after inspection showed it needed new tires and brakes. I was ok with waiting, but they should have sorted that out before setting a delivery day last week. It was after I asked about the brakes that they let me know new brakes and tires were on order. There were a couple of minor points I had to raise today, only ¼ tank of gas in the vehicle and incorrect mileage on the documents. These were quickly remedied but delayed my purchase by about 30 minutes.
From the additional purchase side of things, the $1,300 tire and rim warranty seems worth it if you’re driving an RS3 but all the rest of the add on items don’t seem like a must buy. It’s interesting how they package the add-ons, with the first level called economy which makes you think surely you need better than that! The thing is I only got ½ of the economy and passed on the $800 super coating. I figured the RS 3 was probably already super coated 2 years ago and after my first wash this evening I think my suspicions were correct or maybe it was ceramic coated because it has excellent hydrophobic action. All the rest of it is just upsell stuff which I never buy.
It’s just the right size, makes just the right sound, it’s as fast as you could want and looks beautiful.
Unfortunately, compared to the cool BMW unveiling, Audi paled a bit with no gas and paperwork not sorted out properly. It did impact the buying experience after waiting an extra week even though to their credit they did remedy it quickly. Me being me, it would have been nice for them to offer something to make up for the inconvenience.
Bottom line though … THE CAR IS AWESOME
