I have a dealer story too, this one took place shortly before the lovely Christmas of 2015.
I nearly bought an imported car from a car dealer in SA. (I won't name it but some of you can probably easily guess who I'm referring to) We had some sort of weird agreement, it was around Christmas time and they said they could register the car for me and have it to me by Christmas, even though a purchase contract had not been signed. They asked for my financial details over the phone to register the car, which I gave. However the finance company who they had been in contact with decided to close early that day, so I did not receive the car within the timeframe they promised. At this stage, I was just going to pick up the car when they reopened after christmas. Over christmas, I did some research, and found that this dealer had been caught three times selling cars with wound back odometers. After posting a Facebook status asking friends for advice, I had several people I knew personally telling me to absolutely avoid the dealer, and that one of them had bought a wound back car in the past, went through a huge hassle to get the money back, and then immediately saw the car re-listed with the incorrect mileage, which was then soon re-sold. My friend tracked down the buyer, informed him the odometer had been wound back, and when the person contacted the dealer, the dealer threatened legal action against my friend. After learning all this information, I decided I did not want to do business with this dealer. No purchase agreement had been signed, but the dealer immediately became hostile, told me I would not be getting my money back, and hung up on me. I have tried getting legal advice, but have been very busy with work, and all the advice so far has been unhelpful as "No contract was signed", so for some reason that means they can just have my money for giving me absolutely nothing in return. The most useful advice I received is to write a letter of demand for the money, and if that fails, take them to the Minor Civil Claims Court. Still haven't written the letter yet... luckily you have 3 years to do it. (Though I won't be waiting that long of course)
The dealership in question currently owes me $760.
Anyway, I now have a fantastic car on it's way from Japan thanks to Iron Chef Imports! So at least I learned my lesson.