ALM Mall of Georgia — Attraction in Buford

I’ve never written a 1-star review & have patiently given ALM Mall of Georgia ample time to ATTEMPT to resolve this. On Dec.9th, I drove my family from Charlotte, NC to Buford, Georgia, home of ALM. That’s a +200 mile/3.5 hour trip TO Georgia & a +200 mile/3.5 hour trip FROM Georgia. You can do the math…a +400 mile/7 hour extravaganza for a lemon vehicle. On Dec.17th, 1 week and 1 day from purchase, I frantically maneuvered the purchased vehicle to the nearest Jeep dealership service center to be diagnosed. Prior to our ALM arrival, I discussed trading-in our vehicle for one of their Jeeps. Not only was the vehicle we traded-in older than the Jeep we purchased, our traded-in vehicle was in better mechanical shape and was 6 years older with +30,000 more miles.

Within the first 2 days of purchase, we noticed multiple oil stains in our driveway and garage. And within the 1st week, the vehicle began making horrendous noises when idled & in drive. I don’t know how ALM managed to have the vehicle run properly just long enough for the test drive and for us to return the vehicle home. On day 6, I was on the highway with my family and the “Engine Temperature Hot,” warning indicator appeared, prompting that only 9% of oil life remained. The vehicle would not allow me to accelerate beyond 53mph as cars were racing passed us on a major interstate. We managed to arrive home safely, but this was a traumatic experience.

I’ve notified the salesman, Mo, multiple times with photos and details, who has yet to successfully assist us. His generic email responses were, “I’ll send this to management and the service department and will get back to you.” ALM sells their vehicles as-is and offers 6 month/7,500 mile warranty. When I inquired about repairs, Mo stated that we could return to their dealership for them to evaluate our vehicle. I reminded Mo that we live +200 miles/3.5 hours away and cannot afford to spend an entire day just to have the car evaluated, which doesn’t account for time needed for labor. I also inquired with Mo, due to the long commute, if we could visit a local mechanic/dealership to receive a diagnostic report and submit it for pre-authorization prior to repairs so it could be reimbursed by ALM; still no answer. It sounded like we needed to plan a vacation just to have the lemon vehicle brought up to satisfactory safety standards. I literally took the vehicle 1 mile down the street from my home and the “Engine Temperature Hot,” warning indicator light flashed again as I was taking it to the closest dealership earlier today. You would have to be a fool to attempt to drive this ALM lemon vehicle from North Carolina to Georgia without risking your life and the lives of others.

AVOID ALM MALL OF GEORGIA WHILE YOU CAN!!! Here’s a preview of what to expect. You’ll be greeted by a Sales Representative, introduced to Sales Manager, Tony, who didn’t reply to my text messages this weekend. Then, you’ll be seated in the closing room with Finance Manager, Sebrina, who had the icy attitude of, “I’m just here so i don’t get fined,” and this cycle proceeds all the while General Manager, Billy, sits back behind the glass wall and glances over his glasses, periodically, watching the dealership’s production rise daily as more lemon vehicles are sold. This will habitually continue as ALM is open 7 days per week.

Above all, everything that glitters is NOT gold. ALM does a great job of dressing up their lemon vehicles so they’re sold. Distraction techniques of custom interior leather seats with accent stitching or off-road tires/rims + lift kits can hypnotize you into making a purchase you WILL regret. God forbid you trade-in your well-running vehicle for 1 of their lemons. ALM’s home page website, states, “…Visit us today to see our wide selection of high quality, low mileage Pre-owned vehicles.” How can they state quality unless their definition is synonymous with mediocre?! ALM should stand for Atlanta Lemon Motors.

P.S. - I was unable to upload videos and still waiting to see if ALM will reimburse me...

Had to replace engine and they knew about it, but didn’t tell me I kept getting the same code until I took it to Cadillac and they told me the car needed a new engine.

Problem after Problem. 5 month follow up at the bottom.

Let me start by saying that my sales rep “Isaac” was amazing & worked within what I was looking for.

With that being said the rest of my experience SUCKED.

The day I picked up my Cadillac the check engine light came on within 5hrs after leaving the dealership. I took it back & sat in the waiting area for over 8hrs just to get it back with them telling me that it was repaired but within one week the check engine light came back on and that’s when I noticed the glove box would not open so I notified the dealership again. This time they told me they had ordered the part so I scheduled the repair date and drop the car off where they then gave me a loaner and was told that it will only take a couple of days to repair this time. I called in a couple of days and I was told that they were still waiting on the part which was supposed to be ordered before I brought the car back to them. Now approximately two weeks has passed and I’m upset about not having a car that I purchased and the day before I picked it up something told me to check my Onstar app and when I did, I noticed that my car was no longer at the dealership. It was at an employees home overnight. When I woke up the next morning, I couldn’t wait till 9 AM to contact Tom the GM of the dealership when I called and I asked to speak with Tom he answered the phone instantly told me my car should be ready the next day and that’s when I asked him. Why was my car sitting at one of his employees homes at that moment he was baffled on the phone and told me he will call me back in 5 minutes but three hours later I had to call back up there for him to tell me a bullsh!t story that sometimes they let their employees drive a car home and I was pissed because this was a paid for a car while they have hundreds of non-sold cars up there, but let me say when he told me the lie that he told me I never believed it anyway so I assume he thought I was gullible. I did not expect for him to tell me that an employee drove my car without permission because that would make his business look bad. So I’m still trying to figure out why the dealership employee drove my personal car that I paid for home and park it in their driveway overnight & I wonder well else my car has been during this time. Tom also informed me when he called that my car was to be washed & cleaned up before I arrived because the employee drove it in the rain so he didn’t have time to wash it due to the rain but it was dirty with a plastic from the replacement part sitting on the floor when I picked it up.

I did screenshot the location of where my car was parked by the way, so use your own discretion with purchasing from this place in my opinion, I will never purchase from ALM Mall of Georgia again.

6 Month Follow up: 5/14/2025 Come to find out that this place has been scamming me pretending to repair the “Check Engine” light situation, it is still coming on so I took it to the Cadillac dealership & they a long with a second opinion Shop says the the engine needs to be replaced. Both agreed that ALM should have never sold anyone this car & believes the ALM known about this issue. If I could take the one star away, I definitely would this place sucks and is a pure scam.

Update 6/5/2025 While getting a new engine installed was just told that the rear end is bad as well with a bunch of metal shavings and needs to...

I would not do business with these people ever again.

Make sure to have literally EVERYTHING the sales guy tells you in writing!

Orginially I left a 5 star review because the sales guy, Elijah kept asking for it and I wanted him to get the additional commision for the review. So I gave 5 stars.

Sales process was fast and easy. All of the problems started after the purchase.

1 Delivery - I purchased out of state and it took them 2 weeks to deliver the car. There's absolutely 0 updates from them, so I had to call every day to find out when I'll get my car. Everytime I'd call, they'd tell me that I should be getting in a couple of days because it's leaving the lot like right now. They did this for 2 weeks!

2 DMV filing - I received the temporary tags and was supposed to recieve my plates within 30 days of the purchase. On day 39 after the purchase I call the office to get an update on the status of the plates. Turns out they didn't file, and I am now waiting on a new set of temporaty tags. I know will have to follow up with them about this multiple times because noone ever knows anything and nobody is calling you back!

3 Busted front camera lens (will upload a pic later) - They claim to inspect their vehicles and deliver them in like new condition. That's according to my sales guy Elijah. Well after driving the car for a little I realized that the front camera lens is busted. When parking it looks like there's a small piece of hair on it so I never gave it much thought. As it got colder I realized that it's broken because you can not see anything from it because I guess it fogs out and freezes from the cold. Took it to the dealership (they wanted to change the entire system) and decided to have the lens swapped at a local shop and not bother the dealership.

4 Crack in the dashboard (video attached) - I can see how they could have missed that one from their "INSPECTION". Theres a crack in the dash, it's hard to catch from the drivers side, I was driving it for almost a month till my wife pointed it out from the passengers side (she has her own car, so 90% of the time I'm there alone). It blends in with the middle console so it's hard to catch from the drivers side, but it stands out from the passengers side. Elijah basically insunuated that I did this myself and the dealership wont fix it and the manager is unavailable.

5 tires - Accodrding to my sales guy, the tires were new. The tires I have are 100% not new, they're not worn out, but defiantly not new.

6 UPDATES - I know I've already mentioned this a few times, but the communication with these people is almost non existant. I literally have to call and text multiple times about everything. If I didn't call about the plates, they probably would have never filed the paperwork with the DMV so I can get my plates. I know I'll have to call multiple times about my new temprary tags. Will be calling to try to speak with the manager about the crack in the dash. But I'm sure I'll never get a call back. It's almost impossible to get an update from these people, how will you get a call back from the manager?!?!

Will be posting this review on every single platform and filling with the GA department of revenue, GA consumer protection division, BBB, and FTC. I would like them to fix the dash, but I am like 99% sure its not happening and I will never get a call back from the manager. So I'm filling just because that's not the way to do business and that's not how you treat...