★★☆☆☆

I’m starting by taking one star off simply because White River Toyota has now sent me FIVE emails asking me to review my experience. If they want my review that badly, here it is.

The fifth email even reminded me that they had contacted me a week earlier and informed me that the survey would only remain active through September 21, 2026. Five emails requesting feedback is excessive. And no, “every dealership does it” is not an excuse, because they don’t. Even if they did, White River Toyota could set a better example. Asking once is reasonable. Asking twice is more than enough. If a customer still hasn’t responded after that, perhaps the message is clear: they either don’t want to spend their valuable time writing a review, or they didn’t have an experience they particularly want to write about.

Unfortunately, in our case, it was the latter.

Our first major problem involved the deposit. During our negotiations, we were shown a specific vehicle and VIN and were asked for a deposit in a way that led us to believe we were securing THAT particular vehicle. We paid the deposit based on that understanding.

The receipt we subsequently received, however, only stated that the money was being used to begin the process of securing a vehicle. It did not identify the specific VIN we had discussed. A few days later, the vehicle we believed we had secured was gone.

We felt deceived.

We have the email conversations showing the context in which the deposit was requested and the specific vehicle being discussed. When we raised the issue, our salesperson, Brian, never personally responded to us. Instead, his manager replied and explained that the inventory manager had been on vacation. That may very well have been true, but it did not change how the transaction had been presented to us or how we felt about it. Yes, the deposit was 100% refundable, but that isn’t really the point. We would never have submitted it had we understood that it wasn’t actually securing the specific vehicle we were discussing.

That costs another star.

Then came our trade-in.

We were quoted $15,000 twice for our vehicle after providing the VIN and multiple photographs, subject to the vehicle being in generally decent condition without any major undisclosed problems. Because I wanted to avoid arriving on delivery day only to suddenly receive a substantially lower offer, I actually drove the vehicle to the dealership approximately a WEEK EARLY specifically so they could see it in person.

After seeing it, they offered us only $12,700.

That’s $2,300 less than the $15,000 we had been quoted, a reduction of approximately 15.3%.

The explanation given to us was a rip in the leather on the driver’s seat that was visible when opening the door.

We went home, discussed it, and ultimately decided to proceed because by then our new vehicle was already being shipped. We had spent months negotiating and shopping among dealerships, and once everything had reached that stage, starting over somewhere else would have meant spending even more time. Yes, we technically still could have walked away and received our deposit back, but time has value too.

Before completing the purchase, I emailed and asked if they could please try to do better on the trade. Brian reluctantly went back and asked, then returned with $13,000. Better, but still $2,000, or 13.3%, below the $15,000 we had originally been quoted.

What made this even more frustrating happened AFTER all the paperwork had been signed. While I was transferring our belongings between vehicles, Brian suddenly noticed that one of the rear headrests/backrests was missing.

I genuinely had no idea it was missing.

But that raised an obvious question for me: If the vehicle had actually been thoroughly inspected when I drove it there a week earlier specifically for an in-person appraisal, how did nobody notice an entire piece of the rear seating was missing?

That made me question how carefully the vehicle had actually been inspected before reducing our trade value by more than $2,000. From my perspective, it felt as though the visible tear in the driver’s seat had simply provided a convenient justification for substantially lowering the original offer.

I’ve been trading vehicles for approximately 25 years, and I also found some of the explanation about their eventual resale of our 2018 vehicle with approximately 97,000 miles difficult to accept. I obviously cannot say what ultimately happened to the vehicle after we signed it over, nor is that any longer my business, but the entire trade-in process left us feeling uncomfortable.

That’s the third star gone.

I do want to be fair, because there were genuinely good parts of the experience.

Brian himself was extremely personable, funny, friendly, and welcoming. In terms of personality, he was probably the warmest person we encountered at the dealership. That made the other issues particularly unfortunate because, on a personal level, we genuinely liked him.

There was one additional thing Brian did that bothered me, however. While giving me the technology tour inside our NEW vehicle, he simply peeled the factory protective film off one of the screens, specifically the screen containing the climate controls, without asking me first.

My jaw practically dropped.

I’m someone who takes extremely good care of my vehicles, and I actually like leaving those protective films on for as long as possible. The vehicle already belonged to us. I would have appreciated being asked before anything was removed from it. By the time I realized what he was doing, the film was already off and in his pocket. It may sound like a tiny detail to someone else, but to me it was a very big no-no. Once a customer owns the vehicle, please ASK before removing anything from it.

The absolute highlight of our dealership experience was Lucas in financing.

Lucas was fantastic. He was extremely knowledgeable, sharp, friendly, personable, and completely on point. He knew exactly what he needed to explain, exactly where everything needed to be signed, and made the paperwork incredibly efficient. My portion probably took less than five minutes, my wife’s took another five minutes or less, and we were finished.

That was easily the smoothest and most impressive part of the entire transaction. If you deal with White River Toyota, I can highly recommend Lucas.

Another unexpected highlight was one of the custodians who was tidying the dealership while we were there. She was wonderful: funny, friendly, personable, and a fellow parent of three daughters. We really enjoyed talking with her. Sometimes the people you least expect end up making the biggest positive impression.

Unfortunately, most of the other employees we encountered felt very cold. There was very little eye contact or acknowledgment, and the overall atmosphere didn’t make us feel particularly welcome. People generally seemed focused on whatever they were doing rather than interacting with customers. Brian was very much the opposite in that respect and deserves credit for being warm and welcoming.

So, ultimately, this is a two-star review.

One star lost for FIVE emails repeatedly asking me to provide a review.

One star lost because of the way the deposit and specific vehicle were presented to us, which left us feeling deceived when that vehicle subsequently disappeared.

And one star lost because a $15,000 trade-in quote became $12,700 after an in-person appraisal, eventually increased to $13,000 only after I asked them to try again, despite my having specifically brought the vehicle in a week early to prevent exactly that kind of surprise.

There were good people involved, particularly Lucas, and Brian was genuinely personable and enjoyable to talk with. But friendliness cannot erase business practices and negotiation tactics that left my family and me feeling uncomfortable.

White River Toyota asked me five times for my feedback.

If they wanted it that badly, here’s my review.