2012 Prius C2, only have valet key

I've looked through all the key-related posts I can find here, but I haven't found a good match for my specific situation. A couple of weeks ago I bought a 2012 C2 from a SoCal dealer (in "Absolutely Red", hence my handle). The car came to the dealer through an auction and had only the valet key – no key number, no fobs. Just a single naked key with no buttons that opens the doors and starts the car.

Just so we're all on the same page here, the C2 does NOT have SKS. When I refer to a fob, I just mean the buttons that lock and unlock the doors from afar.

I know that the immediate action is to get a cheap mechanical copy of the one valet key so we can get back into the car if we lock the key inside. But we'd like to get the full complement of keys. We didn't particularly like the dealer we bought from, and would much prefer to find a cheaper option anyway.

TL;DR:
Have: one valet key, no $ to spare, technical chutzpah
Want: two fob keys, or two valet keys with separate fobs

We don't need all-in-one keys that look like what's in the manual; if it's possible to do this with two valet keys and two OEM remotes that's totally okay.

From my readings I believe this situation requires a seed reset, which requires Techstream and a special cable. I'm ready to tackle the technical tasks; I have fond memories of doing a variant of the chicken dance with my beloved 2001 Prius. However, (1) all the instructions I've found involve a working master fob, and (2) I'm having trouble finding the correct non-SKS parts and the right cable.

Halp?

 

Thanks. Yeah, we figure it's a repo, but we've enjoyed coming up with other stories about its mysterious past. Such as: it was impounded after being used in an awesome Jason Bourne-style car chase. Or it was abandoned on federal property after its owner went on a peyote trip and never returned.

The dealer (Toyota of North Hollywood) was no doubt counting on us to come back and fork over another $500+ to the service department to fix the key issue – they made it pretty clear that they thought we were idiots. We'd checked for everything else, even a little missing button cover, but I guess we unconsciously assumed they would give us the real keys at the end. Buyer beware, as they say.

 

We were forced to buy under circumstances that would indeed blow your mind if you knew them. We caught some other expensive issues (starting with their absurd list price) but missed that one. Don't judge.

That said, your comment reminded me that we were relying on the Toyota Pre-Owned program to protect us from this particular type of screwing over. They gave us the checklist and I looked at every line; keys weren't marked off as an exception. I see online that the official 160-point checklist includes the words "Master key is present". I'm going to double-check the document when I get home, but I think Toyota of North Hollywood is going to get a call this evening. If they protest or drag their feet I'll escalate before they know what hit them.

In case it is useful to any future readers of this thread, I just received a (very prompt!) quote from Art Irvin of Pop-A-Lock in Riverside, CA. He says $180 per key plus $125 to program, for a total of $485 before tax. I haven't emailed him back to verify, but I believe he means making us two master keys with the built-in buttons.

 

Ah, what I meant was we had to go through the whole car-buying process under crazy circumstances, which meant we continued working with this dealer when we would have rather walked away. The details are personal in nature, but one important part of it was that our lead negotiator (my partner) had a 102-degree fever on the day we went in. We actually did quite well in the negotiation; they never knew our back was against the wall and we got a good price with no stupid crap or undefined "fees".

Meanwhile, although of course the strongest position is before you sign the contract, we are protected by the Toyota Certified Pre-Owned program. The dealer gave us a written guarantee that the car had passed every point of the officially advertised, legally binding Toyota inspection process when it demonstrably had not. Toyota has an interest in fixing the situation in order to protect the reputation of the CPO program.

Anyway, once I call the dealer, I will update this thread with the results, so that all future readers will at least know whether the CPO status actually means anything at all, and if Toyota of North Hollywood is merely obnoxious during the sales process or actually unethical.

 

Yeah, Toyota's going to be hearing about this incident one way or another. I'm going to ask them to re-certify the car at a different dealer and restart the warranty, given that this dealer clearly didn't do anything but swap the wiper blades.

Again, no one here knows the external pressures we were under. I'm perfectly aware this was a mistake, and I'm here asking for help in fixing it.

 

I guess I wasn't clear in my question. What I am looking for is tech support if I want to do it myself. I still want to understand the process even though I've since realized I can take this all the way to Toyota if needed. I like understanding what's under the hood, and it really wasn't hard to do with my 2001 Prius.

Meanwhile, I am already aware of options like "threaten the dealer" and "go to a locksmith," and in fact I've said those very things on this thread. Repeating them back to me isn't helpful.

Yes, this is a Toyota Certified Pre-Owned. Toyota dealers in the US are not allowed to call anything "certified pre-owned," or any combination of those words, that is not part of the factory program. I think you may be referring to dealer extended warranties, which are a totally different animal. A car with a dealer warranty can only be sold as "used," not "pre-owned" or "certified," under the contracts the dealers have with Toyota.

[As an aside, dealer extended warranties are almost never a good investment, and they're particularly risky with a dealer you haven't worked with before. Some dealers see extended warranties as free cash with no additional obligation. This is why CPO vehicles cost more – you're paying for the right to call Toyota and have them threaten the dealer for you if necessary. With a dealer warranty you generally have no recourse except the BBB and Yelp reviews, which are both very slightly better than nothing. We chose to pay extra for the CPO status for this reason.]

 

For the benefit of future readers, a small update. I called ToyoNoHo this afternoon and spoke with Henry in the Used Car Sales department. He left a message with the salesman who actually sold us the car (Steve Juarez, not recommended).

Steve is going to check whether they actually had the keys all along, and then either Henry or Steve is supposed to call me back. I am unimpressed with this response – they specifically said they didn't have any other keys at the end of the sale, and if they turn up now I will frankly suspect foul play.

However, Henry did promise that he would follow up with the Parts department once this useless step is complete, and that he'd make sure we got a master key. I will post further updates as the situation evolves.

And yes, I am going to tell Toyota of North America about this and demand a re-inspection, since ToyoNoHo missed even the most obvious issues the first time through. Does the CPO program actually mean anything at all, or is it all a massive scam? Stay tuned...

 

Yes, I allowed my question to get derailed into a discussion of non-technical options. I gave a pretty thorough description of my situation from a technical perspective but didn't focus on the dealer/manufacturer side of things until others brought it up, hence what you're describing as piecemeal information. I should have stuck with "please help me find the appropriate parts and procedures" rather than explaining how I got here.

That said, I think the original question was pretty clear. I explained what I already know, and named the specific parts I was trying to find and the situation for which I needed a procedure (acknowledging it could be complicated). The responses went in a different direction, apparently based on reading the title rather than the post, and they were not only not what I was looking for, but reminiscent of the over-the-top mansplaining we got from the dealer. Regardless of intention, "wow I would never let that happen to me" is condescending and unhelpful.

So, I will start over. I am pursuing replacement keys with the dealer/manufacturer offline. I know what I am doing there, and I don't need help with that part. Here on the forum I am trying to investigate the costs and difficulty of doing it myself.

I understand that not having a master key means a reset of the immobilizer is necessary, and that requires the Techstream software and a special cable. Here are the things I hope to get help with – they are the same as in the original post, but I've done a bit more research done since then.
(1) I think this is the cable I need:
Drew Tech Mongoose Pro MFC - J2534 pass thru, Drew Technologies, DT-M-MFC
This seems to be the same thing for $30:

Is that correct? Does anyone have experience using this particular cable?
(2) Once I have the appropriate equipment, what are the steps I'll need to take? There are instructions on various forums for many variants of programming SKS systems (lost all keys, programming used fob, etc.) But my car does not have SKS and I don't know if the procedure is the same.

 

Sure, I understand that the reset procedure can brick the car, and the dealer will most likely come through anyway. But even if I choose not to do it myself, I want to understand the systems in my car and the necessary tools. Besides the satisfaction of knowing what's going on, it puts me on a stronger footing for all future repair estimates.

But maybe I need to find a different forum for that. I'll still update this thread with whatever happens, for the sake of other Prius C owners. Right now we're still playing phone tag.