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Well, it's been 4 days since I picked up our 2017 Q7 and while it's a change from the two S4s that I'd been driving the past 6 years, pretty happy with how everything panned out.
Timing-wise, couldn't have ended up better, though there were a few hiccups along the way.
My 2013 S4 lease was up 5/25/16 and ran into some issues with Audi Financial Services ("AFS") that even many folks at the dealership didn't know about.
FYI, if you ever plan to sell an AFS leased Audi to a 3rd party dealer, make sure it's before the last 90 days of your lease. It is not written anywhere but AFS will NOT allow a 3rd party dealer to purchase your leased car for your residual buyout amount during the last 90 days. I had an offer from CarMax for almost $1K over my residual... AFS nerf'ed the deal when they told CarMax that they could have my car for over $2K more than my residual... long story short, dealer came through and earned my loyalty matching the CarMax offer and doing right by me when they totally could have left me in the wind...
This experience plus the better lease terms with US Bank made it a no brainer to NOT lease with AFS and to go with a US Bank lease... we'll see whether that turns out to be a good decision when this lease ends in 4 years... =)
So, timeline from order to receipt of car:
2/15/16 - Placed deposit on Q7 order. Dealer was able to change existing allocation (original order created 1/21/16) to my specs. Production week of 1216.
4/11/16 - Ship (Guardian Leader) left Emden enroute to San Diego
5/14/16 - Car unloaded at San Diego port
5/19/16 - Dealer lets me know car has arrived as I'm getting ready to board a plane for a weekend trip. Doh!!
5/23/16 - Picked up car!!
Not too many tweaks/mods to do yet compared to on the B8/B8.5 platforms but so far, my personalizations include:
- PlastiDip orange sidemarkers to bright aluminum to make less hideous. Wasn't going to be an exact match to the Florett Silver paint but I figured there's enough aluminum trim (grill, door side panels, etc.) that it's close enough and better than doing a dark tint that works on darker cars.
Hope someone eventually figures out the following VCDS hacks:
- Disable DRL wink
- Enable footwell lighting / Ambient Lighting Colors (standard on Prestige trim... hardware is all there... just need to figure out how to turn it on)
Other thoughts:
- Standard audio quality is subpar on the Q7. Don't consider myself an audiophile but had much better sound on standard audio on previous S4s.
- Surprised to discover car equipped with Android Auto. Doesn't seem too useful for now but once AudiConnect free sub ends, will possibly use more for long roadtrips.
- Keep hearing wind noise from front windshield area when exceeding 50 mph. Mostly city driving so need to test at higher speeds but it seems odd for a vehicle of this caliber.
- Miss the sport seats of S4. Our Q5 has sport interior so hoping for a better seat package in next iteration of the Q7 in 4 years...
- Getting used to the lighter color. Went from pair of Quartz Gray to pair of Monsoon Gray to now having Monsoon Gray and Florett Silver. Definitely nicer than the Ice Silver from previous years though!
I dislike wind noise immensely, so I hope my experience doesn't match yours. And likewise, good luck in getting it fixed. Perhaps it is just that the car is just vault quiet in other respects so that a little bit of wind noise is more noticeable?
Thank you for reaffirming my decision to change my order to spend the extra $$ to get the Bose.
I am torn as to what financing to go with AFS or US Bank for a lease. I have read about the horror stories with US Bank, especially when turning the vehicle in at lease end around 'wear and tear'. Also I've heard similar about being able to buy out the vehicle for the residual where only you can buy it for that, not a 3rd party/Carmax. Unless you lease another vehicle with US Bank you will probably be out of pocket for something. I thought AFS would be easier to deal with. Plus if you get Audicare it does add 1% to the residual. SYMAWD or others please chime in with opinions.
I am torn as to what financing to go with AFS or US Bank for a lease. I have read about the horror stories with US Bank, especially when turning the vehicle in at lease end around 'wear and tear'. Also I've heard similar about being able to buy out the vehicle for the residual where only you can buy it for that, not a 3rd party/Carmax. Unless you lease another vehicle with US Bank you will probably be out of pocket for something. I thought AFS would be easier to deal with. Plus if you get Audicare it does add 1% to the residual. SYMAWD or others please chime in with opinions.
My guess is it's pretty much standard that only you can buy your car at the stated residual value at the end of the lease. I went through a total nightmare with Ally Bank when I wanted to trade in my leased Escalade to the Audi dealer for our 2013 Q7. They wanted over $20K more than the payoff to sell it to the dealer. I had to go through the hassle of paying it off, waiting over a month to get the ownership certificate, going to DMV to get their name off it & mine as legal owner So that the dealer could complete the trade in by buying it from me. Fortunately, this resulted in me getting way more in trade than it cost me to buy it - saved a bunch in tax.
Ally Financial is another whole tale of grief - how do you "lose" a multi-thousand dollar check that was delivered by FedEx?????
FWIW - we purchased the 2013 Q7, a 2013 TTS, and our current 2017 Q7 thru AFS and could not be happier (will be doing the A4 also when it arrives) - great customer service & when I wanted to pay off the 2013s a couple of years early, the process was painless & I had the ownership certificates within 7 days. They don't always have the absolute lowest rates but they're competitive & being treated like a human instead of a number makes a big difference who I do business with.
Ride is very smooth and no complaints here. Wife commented on how nice the ride was compared to our Q5.
How do you like the look of the 19" wheels? Do they look too small? I have one with 19" wheels being manufactured this week... Figured 19" would work until I replace with something else.
Were you able to get non run-flat tires with the car? That is what I have ordered....
On leases residuals, can't figure out what the "standard" is... From a leasing company perspective, why do they care who cuts the check? But at least US Bank is upfront that the residual price is only available to the lessee. AFS led me to believe that the residual would be good at a 3rd party dealer (which it seems to be until within the last 90 days) but screwed me with a "Fair Market Value" upcharge to the 3rd party dealer when I actually went to sell my car.
Originally Posted by adamvincent617
How do you like the look of the 19" wheels? Do they look too small? I have one with 19" wheels being manufactured this week... Figured 19" would work until I replace with something else.
Were you able to get non run-flat tires with the car? That is what I have ordered....
Well, AudiUSA only gave us two options: 19" 5 spoke and 20" 10 spoke designs. I generally prefer the look of 5 spoke wheels so decision was easy. I don't "love" the wheels but they'll suffice. It's also an SUV so having more rubber on the tires has positive benefits such as less risk of failure on bad roads (which pretty much describes all of our CA roads). That said, I do love the 20" 5 spokes on our Q5! (pictures from Motor Trend)
My car has standard tires. Runflats are a no-cost option. I had to make sure my dealer "UNSELECTED" the runflat option from my build.
Originally Posted by KB22
I've seen this colour in person and think its beautiful! Congrats.
Thanks! It's definitely growing on me. =) I originally wanted a color closer to Monsoon but the Graphite had too much of a brownish hue in certain lighting.
BTW... no comments yet on the disappearance of the amber sidemarkers?? =)
The color is awesome in person, when we 1st turned into the Audi dealer it was the only Prestige they had in stock but it was $79k with a bunch of things we didnt want or need.
I took the pic below but ultimately my wife wanted a darker color so we went with the Graph Gray.
05-27-2016, 08:55 AM
Florett Silver Q7 and Tweaks/Mods
