Car Shopping Chronicles, Season 3, Part 4

Once I began test driving cars, it seemed dumb to stop just because my decision day was months away. To make accurate comparisons between my candidates, I needed to drive them within close proximity to each other. Right? Plus I just like test driving cars. I get a limited window to try different things before settling on one. Might as well dive all-in and feast when I had the chance.

Last Thursday I test drove a Volkswagen Tiguan.

I was very interested in Tiguans three years ago, until I discovered the new rules for the EV tax incentives made them on-par with the Tiguan in price. I did a lot of reading and video watching about the Tiguan, though, and knew they were solid cars with a few maddening choices inside that ruined them for a lot of drivers.

The good news is many of those flaws were fixed in the most recent line refresh a year ago. The touch sensitive controls on the steering wheel, the single biggest complaint about the Tiguan, had been replaced with traditional, clicky buttons. VW also added significant updates to the interior. I was excited to take a look.

The Tiguan shares a lot of DNA with the Audi Q5, so I felt at home right away. They are loaded with tech. Adjustable LED mood lighting throughout the car, which serves no true functional purpose but is a lot of fun. Massaging seats for both the driver and front passenger, a feature so good that car reviewers scold Audi for having a lesser version in their cars that cost $20,000 more. A much better, but still flawed, UI for the central screen, which is a Tesla-like 15 inches across now.

For some stupid reason my sales guy did not demonstrate how the massaging seats work. He just showed me the controls. I made a mental note to activate them after the test drive, but then it totally slipped my mind when we got back to the dealership. What a dumb ass I am! Oh well, I have five months to find a car, I can always go back and try them again in the spring.

All those upgrades and improvements to the car’s tech? Mixed results. The UI still seems dated, and almost like a parody of how a good system would appear. It was much more responsive than the previous system, though. With all that tech comes pages and pages of options. I’m used to that in the Tesla but VW’s seemed much less organized, at least at first glance. I’m sure it’s something that you grow comfortable with in time. Wireless Apple CarPlay and SiriusXM are double bonuses.

How did it drive? Pretty well. The thing I cared about most was did it have the occasionally scary lag in its auto-stop feature like my Q5 had? As far as I could tell it did not. I drove through several roundabouts and never lost power when coasting.

I was testing the high end, SEL R-Line Turbo model. While all Tiguans have a turbo-charged engine, the R-Line’s is a new, much more powerful one, checking in at 268 HP. I can’t say I really noticed that power, though. There was definite turbo lag. Even accounting for coming from an EV with instant burst, each time I tried to punch it there was a serious pause before the engine would catch up with the power request.

My time in the Tiguan was very much about adjusting my thinking. It wasn’t quite the Q5, but was it a reasonable facsimile at about $10K less? Sure, it didn’t have the immediate speed and power of an EV, but was it sporty enough to separate from its other gas-powered competitors? And did all the money VW has poured into the interior experience, bringing it to near luxury levels, make up for continued quirks in how you interact with the vehicle and the cranky turbo?

When I left the dealership I was impressed with the car, but not enough that it jumped the Honda Passport into the #2 spot. It felt like a genuine tie at this point.

That evening I made a new tab on my spreadsheet with columns for just the Passport TrailSport and the Tiguan. This one wasn’t for comparing specifications, it was for comparing my thoughts. I did more research, watched more videos, read more message boards.

The nagging complaint about the Tiguan that had been in the back of head from the beginning kept jumping out: this was a German car. It was over-engineered. It was expensive to service. S is also leaning towards buying rather than leasing this time. The Tiguan has a dramatically lower resell value that the Honda, or most cars for that matter. She reminded me that the two Passats she drove had multiple nagging issues that could not always be fixed fully. I am still thankful the handful of problems I had with my Q5 were covered by warranty, but even then weren’t always fixed completely. It spent a total of three weeks at the dealer in the three years I had it.

In my research Friday, I came across something that really gave me pause. The turbo in the SEL R-Line is brand new, not something that has been passed down from Audi or even used in previous Tiguans. There have been some issues with it, with some people experiencing catastrophic engine failures. Now that is true in any new/updated car, regardless of manufacturer. Read enough and you can scare yourself into not buying anything. I wondered if the right time to buy a Tiguan would be in another year or so, when the updated line had plenty of real-world miles to determine how reliable the new engine is.

As much as I tried not to let a few online horror stories sway me, I kept thinking that the various red flags about it added up to it being a risky purchase. If I was buying on looks alone, this competition would be over. However, just like with people, what matters most is what’s inside a car. I’m not ready to commit to a Volkswagen for the next 3-7 years.

I was mad at myself for forgetting to check out the massaging seats fully. I got back on track when I had the requisite meeting with the sales manager before leaving the dealership.1

I am always honest with sales people. I’ve told all three I’ve dealt with so far that my window to purchase is months out. I assumed my sales guy had shared that with his manager. To be safe, when the manager came out to greet me, I immediately restated my timeframe. He said they would love to work with me to get me into a car sooner. Which, of course they would love to! I respect that. My defense technique was to say that I was not interested in getting a new car right before winter started.

His reply?

“That Tiguan will do better than your Tesla in the snow.”

Oh my.

I laughed in his face. “I don’t know about that!” I said. “I have two motors and an extra 2000 pounds in the Tesla. It gets around great in the snow.”

This threw him. That might be my best counterpunch ever!

He again said he’d love to work with me and bid me good day. He confirmed that so many car salespeople at traditional dealers remain clueless about EVs. If you want to take a shot at what I’m driving, at least make it factual.

Also, he sounded like a good old boy from the south. That was unexpected for a Volkswagen dealership. But I guess we are in the Midwest so it’s easier to hire guys like him than stylish, cosmopolitan dudes who dress like they are on Sprockets and pronounce their V’s like W’s.

There was another aspect of my visit to the VW dealership that had a profound impact on the remainder of my car search. We’ll get to that in Part 5.

  1. Worth noting that Honda did not make me meet with the manager before I left. ↩︎