Lakeland Toyota — Local services in Lakeland

This automotive review for the Doherty automotive group. I am 73 years old and have purchased many new and used cars in my lifetime and my experience with Lakeland Chrysler was the worst experience in my life. This was the second and last time I will purchase or recommend this company to anyone. My first purchase was a 2023 jeep wagoneer L. After a little more than a year I needed to downsize due some damage to my home from the hurricane that passed through our area. I was in good shape as for equity as I owed only $24,000 and only 14,000 miles. At this point I looked into selling and getting something less expensive. I was made a legitimate offer by a different dealer cash on the spot. Decided to contact Lakeland as they had sold me the wagoneer and had done all the servicing. Was asked not to do anything until I saw them that they would pay as much if not more. I made the appointment and arrived on a Saturday morning. After being there for most of the day I was told that I was getting the same amount for my car because of the tax savings. Not so, if I was getting the same for my car as the other dealer it would be a plus for me. Getting the same amount with the tax savings added only allows the dealership to get my trade for less money. I asked to see the car report for the vehicle I was looking to purchase as it was not listed in the inventory. Was told they would get it for me. After hours of being there we finally agreed on the car along with a we owe list. Now in the finance office I am informed that they will cancel my extended warranty and would receive a refund in about 5 weeks. Now we get to the money owed back to me from the wagoneer. The business office had closed and I would have to return on Monday morning and they go to the business office and get my money. I live 1 hour away and by the time I got home I had several concerns about the car I had just purchased. I had forgotten to get the car report. At this point I reached out to the dealership and asked if I could make a change. I was informed that after I signed that the car was my problem. I returned to the dealership on Monday and was basically ignored most of the day. Monday morning I was not alone as the showroom was full of unhappy customers. Finally one of the things on the we owe list was taken care of. As for the money owed to me I was informed that I would have to wait for the contract to be funded and could take several days. I am not happy to spend a day waiting for nothing 😕. On Wednesday I received a call with Chrysler Capitol to welcome to the company so I asked when my contract would be funded. I was put on hold and when she returned I was informed that the contract was funded on Monday the same day I had sit being ignored. I contacted the dealership and was by the finance manager that it would take another 48 hours. I informed him what Chrysler Capitol had told me and about 15 minutes later I got a message saying I could come get my check. I am starting to wonder what kind of place am I doing business with. I decided to do a post. After about a week I was contacted by the dealership and asked to come in they would try to make things right. I made an appointment. When I get to the dealership I am told they will take care of my we owe list only if I remove my post. I removed the post and they did as promised. Here we go again. About 2 weeks ago I received a letter from my lender on the wagoneer. Along with a refund check for overpayment was a letter informing me that my warranty refund would come from the dealership. Two weeks ago I contacted the dealership to check on the status of my refund. After 2 weeks of talking to several people and numerous calls I finally was put in touch with the person that handles warranty cancelations. I was informed just yesterday that my warranty had never been canceled. Now I need to sign a cancelation from and wait for another unspecified time for the dealership mistake. Make sure that you know and have everything promised before you sign because this automotive group policies and...

I am posting this review here as Mid Florida has a "deal" with OkCarz and this dealership on being able to trade in a car from OkCarz to Lakeland Toyota if you make payments for a year that are not missed.

This review is about my experience with Mid Florida the owner of both okcarz and Lakeland Toyota.

I got a car here 8/28/2025 and left at around 8pm and by 11am on 8/29/2025 the vehicle was in the shop. The vehicle is supposed to have a warranty but their warranty does not cover anything on this vehicle that is wrong. Basically they sold me a vehicle that will never be able to be driven. They performed some type of hijink to get it to drive off their lot and to my house. I was sold the vehicle by Daniel and Stepanie. The first payment is due 9/11/2025. They are unwilling to help with anything. I would never buy a car here. The owner is Mid Florida Financing and they refuse to assist either. So now my credit will be taking a hit because they sold an unusable vehicle. Beware if you try to buy a 2018 white Ford escape from them.

Update: luckily they hadn't finished financing the vehicle so I opted to give it back to them. FYI that is a scam dealership use to let you leave and come back to finish paperwork and ask for more down. To be clear their warranty does not cover the sensor / brain EEU of the vehicle and only after telling them to take their car back no matter what (before finding out no hit to my credit would happen) they said they'd make an exception and cover it. With zero guarantee of if they warranty the part the Pep Boys would install.

Update from 9/18/2025: the message the owner posted a week ago is false. They are more than aware of who is making these reviews because I've had 3 calls asking me to remove them.

They have thrown away my personal items and claim they were never in the vehicle and can also not locate my house keys.

They tried to charge me $450 for a tow from pepboys where they had the vehicle taken due to their warranty back to their Lakeland location. I disputed and out of $1,100 down payment I am getting back a portion of it only.

They lied and said the checks would be at the Dale Mabry location a week ago. They lied when they said my sister was added to the account yo be able to speak to them while I'm working.

Now they have lost their own refund checks and Amber refused to allow my sister to find out where they have sent them. Matthew and Scott from Dale mabry have been saying check again tomorrow again and again. News flash to me but they don't mail the checks they send them by courier or something like that and they claim the person is late or not showing up.

What a hot mess. Also they have a partnership with Lakeland Toyota and at this point don't trust their buy here pay here dealerships or their "real" dealerships.

Update from 9/18/2025 part 2: they tried to only give $560 back last week we negotiated and were told we would get back $980. Today after giving my sister my SSN so she could talk to Amber she was told it was back to $560. However now we will get one check 9/19/2025 and the remaining 9/25/2025. This company is...

I made an appointment at 12:00 for a synthetic oil change. When I arrived, I told the technician about the coupon I had for a $49.99 (that I ended up paying $62 for, but we will circle back to that later lol) and handed the keys over to him at 12:15pm. Being this is a dealership, I expected the maximum service time to be an hour and a half. 1:00 comes, 1:30 comes, then I'm even kind enough to wait until 2:30. I walk to the service desk and ask, "hey where's my car?". I got a response saying that they are JUST about to pull my car to the back to get started on it. While I fully acknowledge that life happens and things go behind schedule, I find it ridiculous that this misunderstanding could've been fixed with simple communication and it didn't happen. I go back to the waiting area and wait for my car. At 3:15 I'm met by two men saying that I have to purchase 4 brand new tires right now because ONE of my tires isn't meeting their safety standards. They show me a quote for $790.92 (the mechanic made sure that I knew that it was for the tires ONLY and no alignment) and expect me to now spend more time and money at this dealership than I need to. I tell them that I don't have time to do that being this is my only day off and I work every other day. Let's not also that I've already been here for 3.5 hours at this point, and the idea of a rental car was offered. The face that they think that I'd rework my work schedule to have another service done by this place is blasphemy! Oh! And to put the cherry on top is that I had an appointment, at another business, to replace the tire that they mentioned at 3:30. I just couldn't make it to that appointment due to the lack of communication about my service time of an oil change☺️😝. I was met with attitude with who I'm assuming is the mechanic because I refuse to spend any more money and additional time at this dealership and they leave. At 3:45 I'm told my car is done (I later find out it's still not done lol) and I go up to pay for my service. It's coming up to be $72 and I remind him of the coupon. It brings the total down to $60.14. The coupon I had was advertised for the synthetic oil change to be $49.99 (excluding taxes). When I get the receipt, I was charged for a labor fee. If you're going to advertise for a $49.99 oil change, make sure you say EXCLUDING LABOR FEES. I pay for my service and am told that the hood of my car is still up. So I wait around the corner from the service desk (where the accessory parts are sold) until 4:00. I am given my keys and I go to leave. I get to the stop sign, look at my sticker and see that they have given me the wrong one. My car is currently at 114,800 miles and they gave me a sticker for 109,799. I went inside, got the correct sticker and left. What should have taken an hour, took 4. Include my travel time back to my home, in lake wales, that is a 6 hour day for an oil change. So if you'd like to spend 4 hours at a dealership to be bullied about purchasing 4 brand new tires while waiting for an oil change, make sure you come to Lakeland Toyota. Thanks guys...