Hey guys,
New to Odyssey ownership as of this past weekend but I thought I'd share my story with you all. I've been looking for a used Honda Odyssey 05-08 for a few weeks now; we couldn't afford a massive car payment with a baby on the way so we opted for an older vehicle with higher miles with all the toys in it.
We looked hard for a vehicle that had been well taken care of mechanically and on the interior. I'd done research on Odysseys and knew that I didn't want the PAX tires, and that any van I purchased in this year range, should it be a touring, would probably have them. My husband and I decided we'd price the cars we were looking at accordingly; with Pax tires we'd like to give ourselves some room to replace the wheels and tires with regular ones, without PAX tires we'd be more willing to pay a higher price right away.
We found a lot of vehicles that were close to our desires, but not quite right ('08 no PAX but horribly kept on the inside, '07 with PAX but no exterior marks or damage and mostly clean on the inside, or an '05 with PAX and clean on the inside and outside...all three not colors we'd prefer).
I finally found one at a local dealership, an '07 Touring in the color we wanted with the features we wanted. And looking at the online ad...no mention of PAX. The internet price...not bad either.
We headed there on Saturday and spent most of the day there. Test drove the van right away. Afterward I looked at the tires myself (checked the model number) and was disappointed, saying “those look like PAX tires.” The salesman quickly told me, “no, those are regular tires, the original owner had the PAX ones removed.” I asked my husband how the tires drove and he said “they kind of feel like the drive of the PAX tires.” The salesman assured us once again that they were not PAX tires, and that we were lucky because we would not want PAX tires. “They are like $500 a tire to replace, only dealerships can do them...you don't want those.” No, indeed we didn't.
Him saying this made me happy about the vehicle, but I was still slightly suspicious. While negotiating the price of the car, I stopped him and said, “before we go any further on price, can we have someone confirm that those are or aren't PAX tires?” He said sure and disappeared to go find people to check the tires. A bunch of the salesmen and a manager went out to the van and looked at the tires.
After 30 minutes or so, they came back in and our salesman returned to us, saying “They're not PAX, they're just normal tires.” We ended up paying close to the high middle end of our budget for the van, but were happy because we didn't have to reserve a bit to pay for the PAX tire replacement. Took the Ody home and loved it to pieces.
On Sunday, I was talking to my dad about the van and he asked about the tires; he wanted to know if the tires themselves were good quality tires, since they were new. We looked it up online, but it wasn't clear that they were specifically PAX tires or not. I decided to head over to a Sears to ask them for their opinion of the tires.
At Sears, the tire salesperson came out to my van and looked at the wheels. “Those are regular tires,” he said. “But wait, let me go ask the techs to come out and look at it.” He pulled two techs from the garage and they came out. After about two seconds of looking at the tire, they said “Yep those are PAX tires. We can't touch those or do anything with them. Sorry.”
Long story....continued in part 2.
New to Odyssey ownership as of this past weekend but I thought I'd share my story with you all. I've been looking for a used Honda Odyssey 05-08 for a few weeks now; we couldn't afford a massive car payment with a baby on the way so we opted for an older vehicle with higher miles with all the toys in it.
We looked hard for a vehicle that had been well taken care of mechanically and on the interior. I'd done research on Odysseys and knew that I didn't want the PAX tires, and that any van I purchased in this year range, should it be a touring, would probably have them. My husband and I decided we'd price the cars we were looking at accordingly; with Pax tires we'd like to give ourselves some room to replace the wheels and tires with regular ones, without PAX tires we'd be more willing to pay a higher price right away.
We found a lot of vehicles that were close to our desires, but not quite right ('08 no PAX but horribly kept on the inside, '07 with PAX but no exterior marks or damage and mostly clean on the inside, or an '05 with PAX and clean on the inside and outside...all three not colors we'd prefer).
I finally found one at a local dealership, an '07 Touring in the color we wanted with the features we wanted. And looking at the online ad...no mention of PAX. The internet price...not bad either.
We headed there on Saturday and spent most of the day there. Test drove the van right away. Afterward I looked at the tires myself (checked the model number) and was disappointed, saying “those look like PAX tires.” The salesman quickly told me, “no, those are regular tires, the original owner had the PAX ones removed.” I asked my husband how the tires drove and he said “they kind of feel like the drive of the PAX tires.” The salesman assured us once again that they were not PAX tires, and that we were lucky because we would not want PAX tires. “They are like $500 a tire to replace, only dealerships can do them...you don't want those.” No, indeed we didn't.
Him saying this made me happy about the vehicle, but I was still slightly suspicious. While negotiating the price of the car, I stopped him and said, “before we go any further on price, can we have someone confirm that those are or aren't PAX tires?” He said sure and disappeared to go find people to check the tires. A bunch of the salesmen and a manager went out to the van and looked at the tires.
After 30 minutes or so, they came back in and our salesman returned to us, saying “They're not PAX, they're just normal tires.” We ended up paying close to the high middle end of our budget for the van, but were happy because we didn't have to reserve a bit to pay for the PAX tire replacement. Took the Ody home and loved it to pieces.
On Sunday, I was talking to my dad about the van and he asked about the tires; he wanted to know if the tires themselves were good quality tires, since they were new. We looked it up online, but it wasn't clear that they were specifically PAX tires or not. I decided to head over to a Sears to ask them for their opinion of the tires.
At Sears, the tire salesperson came out to my van and looked at the wheels. “Those are regular tires,” he said. “But wait, let me go ask the techs to come out and look at it.” He pulled two techs from the garage and they came out. After about two seconds of looking at the tire, they said “Yep those are PAX tires. We can't touch those or do anything with them. Sorry.”
Long story....continued in part 2.
