It's all good.
On May 20th I went looking for a car with my Daughter (she's getting my 92 Accord for $5 for her 16th birthday so I needed another gas sipper to commute to and from work). I already did my research and was pretty sure that it would be the FIT. The Huntsville Dealerships were having one of those big sales events at the Stadium.

I went to Jerry Damsons Dealership to see the FIT. There were 2 FIT's on the lot 1 black and 1 gray, 1 was a base model and 1 was a sport model. Other than those 2 the lot was basically empty so I pulled into the service drive and asked what was up, where were all the cars.
The service writer told me about the show at the Stadium and being the smart #@@ that I am I replied "well, if I knew where that was I might consider going there". He politely gave me directions and off we went.

To cut it shorter than it would be. Once we made it to the Honda section and looked at a few cars I asked the salesman "Sonny Chandler" why they didn't have any of the new FIT's at the show. Sonny said that other than the 2 I had seen on the lot at the Dealership they had 1 more base model that had just came in, the other 2 were sold. If I would like to test drive it he would go and get it.

I said "If it was here I would certianly like to test drive it" (remember I said I'm a smart #@@). He took off to get it, meanwhile we went looking around and VERY briefly drove a Haundai. We headed back to the Honda tent and I spotted the roof of the FIT just as Sonny got out of it. It was a red base 5sp M/T.

We grabbed the key and off we went (Sonny did not go with us, I hate when the salesperson is required to go on the test drive with you, whew). I took off for Goveners Drive (a steep winding uphill road with a sceinic loop at the top). With the A/C blasting (it was HOT out) it went up the hill hugging the road with no problem. Hit the loop at a pretty good pace and it handled great. After some more playing like stop and go at traffic lights (nice acceleration off the line) and visiting the Toyota Dealership which I'm sure they didn't appreciate (to compare with the Yaris side by side) we headed back.

As soon as I pulled in I popped the hood. People started comming over to look at it immediately. Sonny meandered over as soon as he was free. I started praising its performance and made sure others could hear me. Right up front I told him that no cruise control was the only deal killer.

We didn't do much bickering since I asked him straight up "without us brow beating each other, what's the best deal you can make on it ?". He went to ask the Dealerships owner and gave me what I considered a fair price considering the availability and how little they can mark it up. But was informed that cruise is ONLY available on the sport model. So I said same deal "how much, bottom line for the sport model ?" Again a fair price (after he checked again).

I was crunching the numbers in my head and told him we were going to get something to eat while I consisered it, and we left. I asked my Daughter what she thought and she said "I know what you're going to do so why even ask ?". She was right, I had already decided but we went to Honda of Decatur (not knowing they are the same company). After leaving there we went back to the sale.

Sonny was standing there watching someone and I walked right up next to him (without him noticing) and said "Are you just going to stand around all day ?". Startled he greeted me, and I said "ok, let's do it". Off to make the deal we went.

I was in pretty regular contact with Sonny while he tried to find MY car. I really wanted the beige interior but settled for the black since only 1 beige was in production and it was already sold. Black is so hard to keep clean. Every bit of dust or pollen shows up.

On May 27th Sonny called me and said he found a white sport M/T one in Southern Alabama that it would be there on the 29th that they had to swap for it unless I wanted the automatic that they were swapping. I promptly told him no automatics that they're having problems with them. He didn't know this but I found out about it in a yahoo forum before shopping.

ALL IN ALL 9 DAYS FROM TEST DRIVE TO DELIVERY

There was a piece of pinstripping missing which they fixed. 4 days after I took delivery the windshield developed a stress crack overnight which they replaced, took about 1 week to get a new one in.

I could add more about my experience but suffices to say Jerry Damson Honda of Huntsville made for a pleasant buying experience and Sonny Chandler did a fine no pressure sales job.

I would definately recommend them both.


http://www.damson.com/honda/

 

Congrats on finding the car you wanted (in such a relatively short amount of time, no less!), but don't believe the tripe they say over on the Yahoo forums - they're chock-full of trolls. I haven't heard one other source talk about those problems they're having with the AT, and I have a sport AT (over 2000 miles on it, 5 weeks of driving) which is doing quite well

Welcome to Fit country!

 

Look around in this forum and you'll find people are having problems with them here too i.e. pulling to the left, poor mpg. although I haven't seen any posts here as bad as the ones in the yahoo forum.

 

Great story about how you picked up your Fit

Could you send the link to the yahoo forum about the problems with the automatic ? The only problems I have seen mentioned on this forum more than once are the paint problems.

Thanks !

 

I don't like to send anyone to another forum from one I've joined but since it's more than a reasonable request since I did bring it up. Here you go.
http://autos.yahoo.com/newcars/honda...JucIEvkgK9Ws8F

I found it just by chance when I did a WebFerret search for "Honda FIT" to find out what I could before making my purchase. Hope you find it helpful.