Tips for those looking to buy a car! A must read!

[mattyboyl]

I have learned a few effective ways of getting an awesome deal without the headaches of wheeling and dealing. Dealers want to make the most profit possible, while you the consumer want the best deal possible. That's a dilemma we are fecaed when looking for cars. So here is an effective method that make both parties happy. You, the customer get a great deal and the dealer gets a profit. Most of the time, unfortunately, the customer has the illusion that he/she has gotten a good deal and the dealership comes out on top making a monstrous profit. Let's take the greed out the the business and make it fair for both parties.

If you have AAA, you can call them and get the dealer invoice and pay $500 over invoice guaranteed at their participating dealers. They will mail you a certificate to guarantee you that deal. Just another perk of being a AAA customer. Think I'm lying? Give them a call, you'll be glad you did.

If you don't have AAA, you can go to invoicedealers.com and/or search the net for other sites that will give you invoices. The more the merrier to shove in the face of the crooks, I mean dealers. You can get the invoice of any car you want to purchase. How can you argue with invoice price. I mean, you understand that the dealer must make a profit in order to stay in business, so you offer them a nice few hundred dollars over invoice for their troubles. Of course dealers will say that number is wrong and that their internal printout is correct. Come on, how naive are we? Anyone can type numbers on a computer and have them printed out to make it look official. I don't know how they can pull that crap and keep a straight face. Dealers have tried to push a $23000 -$25,000 invoice prices, making me laugh all the way to the next dealership. If you have any other tips, post here. This thread should be informative and educational.

Just a few other tips:
If you have good credit, you hould be able to get the best interest rate possible. Sometimes you can get 0%. Then there are others that will offer 1.9% if you can pay in 36 mos. and 2.9% for 60 months. If they run a report and you don't agree, check it yourself online for free. There may be errors that are keeping your credit score down.

Another thing dealers try is the whole monthly payment figure thing. They list the monthly payments and nothing else. This doesn't tell you a blessed thing. It doesn't give you the breakdown of how much the car cost, what the financing rate will be, or taxes & tags. I had a dealer say that the interest doesn't matter since it's compound. Was this guy serious? When I did the figures, he was trying to implement a 19% finacing charge! No, I didn't forget the decimal. He was serious, 19%! The monthly figures looked good, but when calculated, it showed to be mostly interest!

[Weedo]

Why pay $500 OVER invoice when you can buy the same car for $600 UNDER invoice?.?.?

My Solara was purchased $600 under invoice. Our '03 Sequoia was purchased for $900 under invoice. Dealers can pull out Holdback, TDA, and other profits that most consumers know nothing about.

[mattyboyl]

I find that hard to swallow Weedo. Just for curiosty purposes, how much did you purchase your Solara for? If dealerships did that, how could they possibly stay in business. They'd be losing money. I am no business major, but that just doesn't fit into any business practices I am aware of. Scenario: Why sell you a car for 900 under invoice, not make a profit or comission when I can sell this same car for hundreds to thousands over invoice all day long? Just doesn't make sense.

[Weedo]

I find that hard to swallow Weedo. Just for curiosty purposes, how much did you purchase your Solara for? If dealerships did that, how could they possibly stay in business. They'd be losing money. I am no business major, but that just doesn't fit into any business practices I am aware of. Scenario: Why sell you a car for 900 under invoice, not make a profit or comission when I can sell this same car for hundreds to thousands over invoice all day long? Just doesn't make sense.

Call them: Tempe Toyota, ask for Sherman (head of the Fleet/Internet department. Ask him how much under invoice I paid for the Sequoia. Yes, brand new '03, early in '03. Oh, I also did 36 month financing at 0% through Toyota. (480) 598-0000. I'm sure he can explain it much better than I could. Feel free to ask him about the Solara as well, that was $600 below invoice (with NO incentives). Oh, and this surely helps, they were #1 for Toyota nation wide last year. I'm sure a dealership that sells in volumes can blow them out with more incentives from Toyota.

I also priced out a 2004 Camry SE. Sticker was $24,7xx. They had $1,000 cash back on Camrys at the time. The total sale price was going to be $20,3xx. Again, below invoice, and in this case, plus $1,000 below that. It was such a good deal, my Dad bought one. I just couldn't see myself in a 4-door Camry even though it was "a better deal" than the Solara which did not have the $1,000 back.

I have no reason to lie, I don't care what anyone pays for their cars. Just trying to help out as you did...

[VirtualSlayer]

so for a 2004 Solara SLE, stock, prolly with nothing, how much do u think it should go for?

invoice price from www.kbb.com says the car is worth 23,900ish.

And whut do u think people normally say to the sales ppl when they are buying, supposing u want 2 get under invoice

[slingshot]

I think you can get it for invoice or slightly above like others here have done.

[Jon11582]

I find that hard to swallow Weedo. Just for curiosty purposes, how much did you purchase your Solara for? If dealerships did that, how could they possibly stay in business. They'd be losing money. I am no business major, but that just doesn't fit into any business practices I am aware of. Scenario: Why sell you a car for 900 under invoice, not make a profit or comission when I can sell this same car for hundreds to thousands over invoice all day long? Just doesn't make sense.

Yes, its possible for them to sell it under invoice and still turn a nice profit. Its all in the holdback. Read up on it here.

[VirtualSlayer]

Its kinda stupid, my toyota dealer said THEY were da no.1 dealer of the year, so i think they are all lieing.

[Prophet]

All good advice...Personally, I like to keep car buying simple.

Give the dealer your bottom line price, walk when they give you something different and get your price when they stop you from walking away. If they don't stop you, you'll get your price somewhere else, or at the same dealer a week later when they call you back.

Bottom line with car dealers is that if they think they can take advantage of you, they'll try to. You have to set them straight immediately and show em' you're not one of those people. And it's so easy to let a dealer know you mean business....you don't even have to speak. Just get up and walk away when you don't get the price you want.

If you do this, you'll get your price with little to no hassle.

Why? Because every decent car salesperson and dealership knows that for every paltry profit they get from someone like you, there's another person to take advantage of about to walk through the door. They'd rather just give you the price you want and get you out of there so they can concentrate on fleecing the next guy.

[pantyninja]

The invoice price can be whatever they want it to be. Don't think for a second 600 below invoice means they are losing money on the deal.
For instance there is at least 7000 in profit on a Corvette. You can go to Kerbeck Corvette and find 2004 Corvettes for 7000 off. They just want to get rid of them for cost because the 2005 is on the way. I worked at a dealer. What they show you isn't accurate. Your invoicedealer.com price is what they call a fair price to pay for the vehicle. They make money on the option packages as well. The 900 for a sunroof option gets the dealer some money as well. Thats why its so hard to find the base models and everyone has the cars stuffed with all the goodies. The base cars are for advertising purposes not for selling. People who order their cars the way they want them are the extreme minority.

Don't forget about dealer holdback either- usually 3% of the vehicle price paid by the manufacturer to compensate the dealer for the interest paid for inventory while it sits on the lot. If the car moves quickly the dealer pockets the difference between the interest paid for the timeframe it sits and the 3%. The faster you move the cars, the more money you make without even going into the car. Pure profit. Some manufacturers with extremely quick turnaround time(Audi for one) does not offer their dealers holdback whatsoever. Slow turnaround time(Ford for example has some models with 180 days worth of product in Inventory T-Bird) would get killed without holdback. They would be paying interest to the bank for their inventory while the cars just sit.

You can get a good deal sure, but believe me below invoice in no way means below cost. Invoice is an arbitrary figure. Volume dealers do get a break from Toyota as well so you may have some more leverage there. Hope this was informative