Shift: Savvy Used Car Buying

Go with carvana. It’s way less hectic (although they have their own faults) and easier to purchase. There was a Corolla hatchback I saw that looked nice and the price was right. I went onto their chat because I saw an insanely high ($1500) shipping fee to get it delivered to me (where carvana has 80% of their cars with free delivery to me and I live in a very small city 2 hours away from a big city) so I asked the chat rep if I could pick up the car somewhere to avoid the shipping cost and they said they would advise against it. I asked why and they didn’t say anything and left the chat. I ended up buying a brand new Corolla sedan as it was a few bucks a month more than I could find used as used car prices are nuts and I was able to get the Corolla under msrp and extra incentives to lower the price even further, however after doing research for about 3 months, carvana is by far the best online car buying experience. I had 2 cars and returned them for various reasons and didn’t have any issue with returning them. Avoid shift. Their fees are higher and zero customer service.

I found out about shift because they advertise on auto trader. The X5M they had listed seemed to be a great value. I called about it and was forwarded to some call center where the shift employees were useless. All they could tell me about the car was "it's not ready for a test drive". I asked if I could go to this warehouse and look at the car so I could see if was even worth waiting for. I could not. I asked why it wasn't ready, and it was like they had a script and would just reply "it's not ready". I did not need financing through shift and when I told them that I think they threw me on a do not call list. They kept pushing their high interest financing and said it'd make it easier. When I went to my credit union and asked about shift they told me they only financed one car with shift and it was the most painstaking process they've dealt with. When shift emailed me about the car I was interested someone already put a non refundable deposit down for it within 10 mins of me receiving the email. That is illegal in California however they get around it by calling it a service fee or some BS. Buyer Beware!

First time car buyer, shift made it super easy. Not responsive at first to phone calls, they said they were very busy. Once I expressed interest and booked a test drive they were with me every step. Clay was nice enough to give me the exact wording that the bank would need to finance my car, which helped me make sure I had everything I needed. I choose to go to their location in Commerce, CA, instead of having the test drive brought to me. Since I purchased after the first test drive, they gave me $300 off. I don't remember the test drive guys name, (maybe James? Jay?) but he was the big motorcycle dude. He made the purchase process simple, and was fun to talk to. Overall, I'm giving this a 5 star because it's a new process for buying a car, that some people will be hesitant about, but trust me, they're honest and helpful people. -chris, purchased 2009 Mini Cooper.