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I am always wondering if I negotiate enough. I usually keep quite and let my husband talk to the salesman - then when the numbers come out I get tough. How much - on average - do you think I can get the price down? It seems not as much as years ago.
I am always wondering if I negotiate enough. I usually keep quite and let my husband talk to the salesman - then when the numbers come out I get tough. How much - on average - do you think I can get the price down? It seems not as much as years ago.
Just bought a new leftover Chevy pickup (base model, zero options).....sticker was $24585, I paid 18,335 plus tax/tag (no dealer fee). Rebates made up a big chunk of it since the invoice was only about a 2K spread. I needed the truck to replace a wrecked one so I just bought it, never even test drove it just paid for it and left.
I drive Subarus. I don't know if it is just the local dealship, but they just mark the price at $600 over dealer invoice and that's it. No negotiating. Got our last Forester for $2600 under sticker. Compared to other Subaru dealers within a 100 miles the local guy was very competitive.
Set prices like that makes for a very low stress buying experience. I plan to buy our next Subaru from the local guy.
I wouldn't even pay attention to the sticker price. I bought my Subaru Outback a year ago. Emailed 3-4 local dealers for their price ... one offered invoice price right off the bat with the color and equipment I wanted so I bought it w/o any haggling (after I gave the others a chance to beat the invoice price). It doesn't have to be painful.
I am always wondering if I negotiate enough. I usually keep quite and let my husband talk to the salesman - then when the numbers come out I get tough. How much - on average - do you think I can get the price down? It seems not as much as years ago.
I'm a weak negotiator because I know I'm not putting anything down, and also I go on monthly payment. Furthermore, by the time I'm talking to someone it's already a car I'm pretty sure that I want anyway.
It's not something that I see as stressful or requiring the art of war--but everyone's experience is different. If I was in the habit of buying older cars or if I had multiple cars at any one time, then I might be a harder negotiator.
Location: East of Seattle since 1992, 615' Elevation, Zone 8b - originally from SF Bay Area
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We bought a 2014 Escape in September, sticker was $28,XXX and I offered $23,000, got it for $22,869. They also gave me what I asked for the trade.
Before that I bought a new 2007 Ranger, sticker was $25,XXX and I offered $22,000 and got it without further discussion, and again got what I wanted for the trade. In both cases it was the same dealer. Going back over the years I have always been able to get down at least 4-5,000, but sometimes it took a couple of hours and walking out a time or two. I consider new car buying to be a fun challenge, and most of the time do it at the best time of year/month to have them motivated.
I usually know what I'll pay before I talk to the dealer, so there's not much negotiating. Sometimes they'll tell give me a reasonable price off the bat and I don't argue, Otherwise I make the firm offer. They then say how they can't sell it for that and come back with a higher price. I repeat my offer and tell them I've got to leave if they can't accept it.
Once some poor salesman kept calling us back for a week trying to get us to offer a few hundred buck more. We said no, of course. Then he'd call back the next day with a lower price. That went on for a week until he finally said they'd accept the offer. Fine. We went in to buy it and they wanted to tack on another $50 for "administrative" costs. By this time I was getting pissed. We started to walk out. "WAIT!" LOL "Okay, I won't get any commission at all, but you can have it at your price without the administrative fee."
I love the look on a salesman's face when they start playing the "back and forth" game with the sales manager and I follow them into his/her office. The salesman goes into the manager's office and talks about golf or whatever. They already know the bottom line price. It's just a game to make you think you're getting the best deal.
I remember my dad would lie and tell them he's already been to a few dealerships to get quotes and he's hoping that "you can beat their best offer"..They might have believed him and gave him their best offer, or they might have recognized his trick..Who knows, but he always felt like he was getting a good deal.
When we bought our Equinox, it had $1,500 in rebates on it. I automatically got the supplier pricing since we are credit union members so that dropped it another $1,300 or so. If we were buying a car off the local lot, I would have tried to get a better price, but they ended up doing a dealer trade with a dealer in Austin for our vehicle, so I was OK with the discount we got. This was a $33K sticker vehicle, we paid $30,400. And according to TrueCar.com I got a better than average price on it. I would have been very happy with another $750-1,000 off if they didn't have to trade for it. But we got exactly what we wanted.
Do your research, maybe check on the car forums to see what others have paid relative to sticker, and use that as a guide too.
Good luck!
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