I'm looking to buy a car tomorrow. Probably a civic/corolla/mazda3
I had planned on getting used, but figured there may be some good eoy incentives on new cars.
I've only purchased one car ever, and that was from carmax.
Any advice would be appreciated.

[Edited on December 30, 2013 at 11:44 AM. Reason : heh, my bad]

12/30/2013 11:31:20 AM

Wait a minute.... Is there another cheap import with the M3 badge? or did you just seriously say you were considering 2 economy cars and a BMW M3 in the same sentence?

I wouldn't think this is the cheapest time to buy. Most manufacturers have only been selling 14 models for a couple of months. You could get some cheap deals on 2013 models still on lots, however.

The best thing we did when I was buying is pull up all the inventory, and call around and see what place will give you the best deal. Don't be afraid to pit them against one another. Since you are buying an economy car, none of the dealerships are going to offer you any exceptionally different warranty service, whether you bought it from them or not, so I'd buy from the cheapest dealership, and use the closest to service.

With my wife's loaded CRV, she was in the car with the salesman at Burlington Honda about to buy their white CRV, when Leith Honda called her and said they would sell her the same model for 1500 cheaper.

[Edited on December 30, 2013 at 11:48 AM. Reason : .]

12/30/2013 11:42:30 AM

How'd the M3 get lumped in with civics and corollas?

You'll have more room to negotiate on last year's model when the new models are on the lot, as long as you're willing to buy last year's models.

12/30/2013 11:45:26 AM

^probably a mazda3

I'd get the mazda3 over those other 2, but I care about having a fun-to-drive car. The new m3 with the Skyactiv engines are rated for 40mpg if you can find those EOY incentives

I'd get the corolla if I wanted an A-to-B car with minimal/inexpensive maintenance. I think the new ones look pretty damn sharp

12/30/2013 11:45:54 AM

hardball. it isn't comfortable for a lot of people, but can save you a ton of money in the long run. dealerships will act like you're taking their firstborn son when you say you need a lower price tag, but 9/10 they'll keep coming down because they know at the end of the day they need to make a sale and you can walk out anytime you want. i don't mean you should be a douche, either. i'm certain some people have done more.. but my last trip to a dealership i was there for over 6 hours between test driving, negotiating, and closing the deal.

also

Quote :

"pull up all the inventory, and call around and see what place will give you the best deal. Don't be afraid to pit them against one another."

12/30/2013 11:50:51 AM

Yeah, I'm fine going with 2013.
I'm also cool with playing hardball.

12/30/2013 11:59:24 AM

http://archive.slickdeals.net/f/566262-how-to-negotiate-a-great-deal-on-a-new-car-purchase

Here's another good link

http://slickdeals.net/f/1941590-the-slickdeals-approach-to-negotiating-the-price-of-a-new-car-updated-july-22-2010

[Edited on December 30, 2013 at 12:19 PM. Reason : ]

12/30/2013 12:11:34 PM

It definitely pays to wait until the end of the month, especially the last day. Dealerships are more willingly to lose money on cars to hit sales goals that pay bigger bonuses.

This American Life did an episode at a dealership recently. Pretty interesting to see it from the dealer's perspective (may be helpful for you as a buyer...know your competition sort of thing).

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/513/129-cars

12/30/2013 8:53:29 PM

Cool. Thanks!

12/30/2013 9:28:21 PM

Remember, incentives from the manufacturer are like coupons for the dealership; they'll get that money from the manufacturer.

So if there's a manufacturer rebate, I usually go invoice - manufacture rebate +tags + tags+ title. Don't play into the doc fee. This won't get you the best deal, but I respect that the dealership is going to make some money and this usually ends up being a 3-5 minutes negotiation versus a long drawn out one. You can also go down a bit further since there's dealership holdback, but that amount varies between 'ships.

12/30/2013 9:33:07 PM

Did you mean to do tags twice?
What about just regular year end incentives?

[Edited on December 30, 2013 at 9:39 PM. Reason : ]

12/30/2013 9:37:52 PM

tags/taxes/title.

Sorry.

Are the incentives dealership or manufacturer? End of year is no doubt the best time to buy an outgoing model.

[Edited on December 31, 2013 at 5:09 AM. Reason : .]

12/31/2013 5:08:20 AM

We bought my 2012 civic at the end of the year last year and my husband used one of those websites that pulls the lowest price offers from all the local dealers. The lowest price was unfortunately a terrible baby blue color so we took that offer to the other dealers and found one in a color I liked that had just come off the truck and hadnt had the stupid racing stripe put on or any of the extras at all so I got a great price on the exact car I wanted and I got to give it a little personalization.

12/31/2013 8:33:10 AM

Quote :

"So if there's a manufacturer rebate, I usually go invoice - manufacture rebate +tags + tags+ title."

you can talk them down a lot more than that and still have a 5 minute negotiation. on my last two vehicles, I've told them I wouldn't pay for about $1,000 worth of extras that are installed at the dealership shown on the invoice, and then ask for another 5-10% or so off the invoice price of the car. They'll try to play the game of claiming they have to run some numbers by their manager, which is just a stall game. After a couple of minutes, go hover over top of their desk and ask them how's it coming. They'll tell you they're running the numbers. Say OK and continue to stand right there in earshot. They'll stop screwing around and quickly give you an answer on if they can do it or not. If they can, do it. If they can't, leave and come back another day. Salespeople know that the longer they keep you away from work and errands, the more willing you'll be to negotiate. They only sell 10-20 cars a month typically, so they have no problem spending all day stalling you out to make a higher priced sale.

Be prepared to counter all the stupid little tricks that salespeople like to pull on you. They'll tell you that they can't knock off the stupid little items like the anti-theft glass etching upgrades or some stupid center console upgrade. Just tell them the theft prevention systems are there to protect the dealership, not you, and that you're not paying for it. Other things like pinstriping, fabric protection, glovebox/console upgrades, upgraded electronics firmware, cheap flimsy bedliners, and such cost next to nothing to the dealership to install yet have huge markups on them - tell them to take them out or not charge you for them. It usually costs more to remove these piddly items if they have a busy shop, so they won't mess with them. If the shop has free time to remove these items, take note that their shop probably has a reason for why they're not that busy.

You'll also hear all sorts of things from the salesperson about how he's not making any money on the deal, or that they have other offers on the vehicle, or that you really need to make the deal today. Don't be afraid to call them out on these things.

[Edited on December 31, 2013 at 11:42 AM. Reason : did the same on a third vehicle, but I didn't know how to handle the stupid "ask the manager" game]

12/31/2013 11:41:32 AM

another tip. my wife had to work out of town the day i was in the dealership negotiating. i went through several rounds of "let me check with the boss" and "i can only go to $X on that". in truth, i really did want her input and wanted to work with her on it, but i soon realized how good of a tactic it was. it turns the tables on the sales guys, because they like to play the victim card... doing this, i was able to say "look man, i'd like to help you out on this but my hands are tied too". it forces them to have to try harder to please since they didn't have any way to directly negotiate with her.

[Edited on December 31, 2013 at 12:13 PM. Reason : ]

12/31/2013 12:12:11 PM

Quote :

"It definitely pays to wait until the end of the month, especially the last day. Dealerships are more willingly to lose money on cars to hit sales goals that pay bigger bonuses."

Sometimes, but not always. I sold cars for a while a few years ago. If we had a really good month and had already hit our monthly numbers, or vice versa, we had a really bad month and weren't anywhere near our number, the managers wouldn't budge much off of sticker price. It was kind of nice when we had already hit our numbers for the month and there were always a couple people that would walk in on the last day of the month demanding we do everything they wanted and we would tell them to piss off

Also, if the dealership isn't coming down much on the price, it could be they're playing hardball, or it could also be that they are disciplining the salesman. If we took a day off, didn't do things just the way the managers wanted, or just generally didn't brown nose the managers, they wouldn't help us out on any deals and would pretty much make us sell cars for sticker price. They were willing to lose a couple of sales to get the salesman to fall in line or quit.

12/31/2013 8:36:43 PM

I stopped by two dealerships today. Neither seemed concerned about making a sale tonight...

12/31/2013 9:48:29 PM

I expected a thread about buying a car from this guy

1/1/2014 9:42:48 AM

Quote :

"Don't play into the doc fee."

Doc Fee is pure profit for a dealership. Refuse to pay it. They will tell you its the law to charge a doc fee, do not believe them.

1/1/2014 11:55:46 AM

what was purchased?

1/1/2014 12:35:18 PM

I got a 2013 new Mazda3 sport

The day started out kind of ridiculous. I requested a bunch of quotes the previous night and ended up waking up to a dozen emails and a bunch of voicemails as well. Half the guys didn't even give me a quote and the quotes I did receive sucked. It took he first guy (Toyota Corolla) about an hour to find a car to test drive. He took a call during the test drive which caused us to miss a turn which basically doubled the time of the test drive. Their sales were actually going on through the second so they kind of fell to the bottom of the pile knowing I could always go back to them yesterday or today. Plus I was kind of pissed wasting two hours just to test drive a car. The Mazda test drive went slightly better, but the guy pretty much knew nothing about the car. I had even called ahead to let them know I was coming. He also took his sweet time with everything and kept complaining about his computer being slow. I had already received a quote through Cisco's account at Trucar.com well below his offer. I tried to negotiate a little. The dealer knocked off $200 which I scoffed at. I called Cary and was able to haggle another $200 off their price and headed over there. The price was exactly as he had stated over the phone plus another grand for fees/title/taxes I test drove it again just to be sure and the sales guy knew the car inside and out which I appreciated. The paperwork took about half an hour and I picked it up the next day. I was lucky b/c with the $2000 incentive that had going on til end of year it made my decision much easier.

[Edited on January 2, 2014 at 10:52 AM. Reason : stupid car names!]

1/2/2014 10:25:12 AM

it's just the Mazda 3, not M3. but congrats.

1/2/2014 10:48:45 AM

Quote :

"Doc Fee is pure profit for a dealership. Refuse to pay it."

I've never seen a dealer who would waive it. Instead they just discount the purchase price to cover it if they do anything at all. It's pure profit like you said, but it's also profit that they don't have to pay a commission to their salesperson for generating. Their happily fucking their customers and their employees for that profit.

[Edited on January 2, 2014 at 11:22 AM. Reason : l]

1/2/2014 11:21:37 AM