Did you recently take on (or consider) a loan of 84 months or longer on a car purchase?
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That dealer let you put TWO 100lb dogs in a brand new Lexus? Really?
Always do it on a cool day or night; unpurchased vehicles are a No Drooling Zone.
We'd go to a different dealer if they didn't allow a test drive with The Boys. Of course, we buy (and demo) black interiors just for that reason and we always ask permission ahead of time.
I bet you've had much worse experiences with screaming kiddies than any sales rep's had with our canines over the past decades.
And the chance of The Boys dropping an ice cream cone is remote - they can hardly buckle-up and carry a cone at the same time, now can they?
I'd rather do that than run it through depositions, arbitration and trial. In my position, I'm worried that I could be accused of being biased against DaimlerChrysler, and that would be a bad thing (preclude me from reporting on DCC cases and testifying).
Condolences from my family and I...........geo.
I had a Crummy year last yr. I feel for ya!
Tough year indeed...! Hang in there Jim...
Regards... Vikd
Suppose you were selling Lexuses (Lexi), how would you go about selling or overcoming objections to the extended warranty since Lexus always tops the quality and reliability surveys?
I dunno, a warranty is always nice for peace of mind, but a these Lexi with a great history (properly serviced and not driven by terrorists) do some remarkable things without one .. it's a personal thing I guess ..
Terry.
Oh well, good thing I like the truck.
Darn auto climate control thingy has gone nuts, thinks I need the heat on all the time. Not a problem in the winter, but um, well, heaters and summer just don't mix. Me thinks whoever came up with auto climate control needs a serious stay in Terry's torture chamber with Barney music playing.
Wonder if I can take it out and put a regular climate control thingy in there.....hmmmmm.
*walks away grumbling, darn truck thinks I'm stupid...I may be blonde but I know the heater doesn't belong on in the summer*
Terry :-)
Like the Lexus issue, how do you convince someone to pop for an ESC when they just ran up 180K on their last Honda and gave it their kid for college, and the only thing they did was a timing belt and tune ups?
I had a 35-40% warranty penetration on the other marques and the used side, but I was only 7% on Honda....I imagine Lexus would be just as tough.
Terry ;-)
Talk about the most honest F&I guy I ever did business with. Wow. He didn't even rattle when I called him 4 hours before I was to take delivery of the car, and ask him if he'd be able to let me sell my trade to my dad, with the dealership handling the paperwork. He had the air of, "cool bro, no problem, will your dad need a loan?" I said maybe, he's going to see what rate his credit union will give him. Turns out that Mr. Laid Back F&I beat the credit union rate by two whole points. We were astonished. We got to the dealer, and he had all the paperwork for both cars fired up and ready to go.
Now THAT is a dealer I'll be taking my business to in the future!
Am I the only one who took that as a euphamism for his dogs going No. 2 in the back of the brand new Lexus? I have been chuckling for 5 minutes thinking about the dogs dropping thier payloads while driving with a car salesman in the car.
But The Boys got a chuckle out of it..."Why, that would mean we're not even car er...housebroken!"
But not our Boys!
After more than 40 years delving into the wonderful world of canines, I know that every dog owner will tell you that THEIR particular breed is the smartest, is best with kids, gets housebroken the quickest, can remember the most commands, is the most protective, yada yada yada.
Of course - that's a bunch of nonsense....because everyone knows that MY breed is the only good one! -
http://www.akc.org/breeds/recbreeds/giantsch.cfm
Especially when they go on car demo drives, he said, trying to swerve back on topic...
We should have a "Funny Stuff Dogs Do in or to Cars" topic. Lot more interesting than doc fees.
Duncan
Ok, anyone else feel the sarcasm here??
***Hey hey hey now, don't be telling her that, she will be in another ABC vehicle in 15 minutes ...***
Nah, have my heart set on a new house, will drive the Explorer for a while.
Its gonna cost me big $$$ to fix the darn climate control thingy, dealer wants $83 just to *look* at it.
Oh well, its minor and the truck only has 44k on it.....hmmm, I've put 3000 miles on it in 3 weeks, cool, at least it will take a while to become a high mileage vehicle.
Now don't get me started on hubby's Chevy.....starting to think that truck is possessed or something. Gonna have to drop $2k into it here real soon.....something about the flywheel making it go herky jerky.....I dunno. At least its paid for.
Seriously I do like my Explorer and plan on driving it for a while.....show me another V8 that can get 21 mpg, doesn't happen often.
I am getting around 17k for the car and I owe 7k.
How does it work. How do I know they will pay off the loan?
Thank you in advance for your time.
: )
Mackabee
This is kind of a long one, but please bare with me and let me know what I should do:
I bought a 2003 Ford Ranger today. I got the price off their website. It's a XLT with auto. MSRP is 19,200. Their internet price is 14,508. They also have a "coupon" that you can print off the web and it's good for $750 off the internet price. So, the final price is $13,758.
I know that Ford has a $3000 rebate on this car. So, when you add $3000 to $13,758, you get $16,758 (the actual selling price). The invoice on the car is $17,758. I thought "Wow, $1000 below invoice, this is great!" I should have known that if something is too good to be true, it usually is.
After picking out the car, I thought it was funny how the salesguy never mentioned a word about the price of the car. He just took my internet price printout and the coupon. I thought "This is really no haggle!".
When the time comes to sit down with the Finance guy, the numbers don't seem to add up (this is where I screwed up). The finance guy says that Ford will throw in an additional $1000 rebate if we accept a rate of 7.49% on the financing (way above market). He said it would be cheaper to get an additonal $1000 off and use the higher rate (which is correct).
So, I just thought "Great, more money!" This is where I became retarded. I asked what the actual selling price of the car was and he said it was $17,758.
When I asked how he got to that figure, he said it was my internet price of $13,758, +$3000 from Ford, and +$1000 in additional from Ford for the higher rate. That does add up to $17,758, so I said okay like an idiot.
On my way home, I was going through the numbers in my head and something didn't make sense. I was getting an additional $1000 rebate but my final price was still the original internet price of $13,758!
What the !@#$%!
I turned the car around and drove it back to the dealer. I told my salesguy that there was a problem with the numbers and we both went to the finance guy's office.
At the end of the conversation, they end up telling me that the internet price of $13,758 assumes $4000 in rebates ($3000 from Ford and another $1000 for the higher rate). They said that I didn't read the website carefully.
I didn't believe them. They have computers in the showroom, so I was going to bring up the website. Before I get to the computer, my salesguy runs in front of it and tells me that it doesn't have web access!
I said I want to talk to the internet guy. I get him on the phone and he confirms that the price assumes $4000 in rebates.
Sorry for the long story.
The short of it is that I got a Ranger at $17,758, which is invoice. I guess they make money by charging me the 7.49%. Instead of getting a great deal, I got an okay deal.
This is my problem now. I just got home and bring up the website to double check the fine print about $4000 in rebates. When I click on the Rebates and Incentives link on their site, there is nothing about an additional $1000. It just lists all Ford incentives for their various models. The one for the Ranger is $3000. There is nothing about a $1000 rebate in exchange for the higher rate!
Do I have a right to demand an extra $1000 when they did sell the car at invoice?
Are there any Ford guys here that would know if there is such a thing as an additional $1000 rebate to buyers who accept higher rates from Ford Motor Credit?
I know that getting a car at invoice is a decent deal, but I am angry because:
1. They lead me to believe that I would be getting a better deal than the one I got. The finance guy said "an additional $1000", not "your internet price assumes $4000".
2. They accused me of not reading the website carefully. When I get home, there's nothing on the site that says what they said at the dealer.
I really want to call the Internet guy on Monday and demand an explanation. Maybe it's not reasonable to expect another $1000 back, but they could have just said that they made a mistake on their website. Instead, they tell me that I can't read correctly. That's wrong.
Thanks to anyone that actually stuck it out and read on the whole thing. I'm pretty fired up right now. I'm sure I could have made it more concise if I wasn't so mad.
Let me know what you think.
Thank you,
Peter
Peter
I bought a CPO Lexus RX-300 with 46K miles about three weeks ago. I have just noticed that the odometer is showing less mileage than actual. For example, I know, by measuring it with my other car, that the distance to the entrance of our complex from our house is 1.1 miles. This car shows the distance as 0.7 miles. I have confirmed this by at least three other different observations(where I got the mileage from highway signs) between several other points. The discrepancy gets worse with longer distances(it is about 3 miles for an actual of 86 miles). I have checked the tires and the specs are OK (225/70 -16).
Now, what I am supposed to do? We love the car and have put new tires on it and do not want to part with it. On the other hand, I do not want any hassle come selling time. I will inform the selling dealer and take the car back for his inspection on Monday. Meanwhile, I would love to hear what people think about this.
I am posting this on two threads, hope that is OK with Edmunds protocol.
Thanks
It's not worth getting all worked up about now... easy for me to say...
Nothing illegal, so nothing you can do, really. Why "demand an explanation"? You've 'splained it pretty well... they're shysters.
Hope you'll still enjoy the truck!
-Mathias
: )
Mackabee
jcat as long as they're 18 or older, they are hired to wash cars and move them around the lot.
You can probably do something to improve the financial aspects of the buy for yourself, though. Refinance the loan through your own bank or credit union. If you do that quickly enough you should qualify for new car rates and also cost the dealer his hunky commission on your upsold loan.
Thanks for your replies.
I'm a little embarassed! Thinking about how fired up I was last night, I can't help but laugh at myself.
Buying a car is a financial decision and it should be handled in a rational manner. There was no reason to be emotional about it. Ha ha!
I thought about the numbers again this morning and THERE WAS NO SLEAZINESS INVOLVED, just some poor presentation from the sales and finance team.
Here's the deal:
Mackabee is correct. My purchase price of 13,758 is $4000 below the invoice price of $17,758. $3000 of that is from Ford and the other $1000 is for accepting the higher finance rate.
So, Landru, I wasn't tricked into buying the truck at invoice. I was "tricked" into buying the truck at $1000 below invoice!
I'll be the first one to admit, it's a great deal (although I didn't bother checking TMV).
I'll also admit that this dealer has pretty good inventory and they have pretty aggressive pricing. If I were the salesguy, this is how I would have sold the car on the website or to a prospective customer:
I will sell the car to you at invoice, minus the $3000 Ford rebate if you pay cash or finance the car at market rates.
OR
I can sell the car to you at $1000 below invoice, minus the $3000 Ford rebate if you finance the car at an above market rate of 7.49%.
From the customer's perspective, it's a no brainer. You don't need a financial calculator to know that you should take the extra $1000 and payoff/refinance the loan early.
Instead, this is what they did:
On the web, they publish a completely random price of $14,508. Then they say "But if you print out our coupon, you get an additional $750 off the internet price." What's with the coupon? Just publish the final price. Don't make me subtract one random number from another random number to get to the final price.
They don't say a word about above market financing on the web.
When you get to the dealer with the web printout, the salesguy doesn't mention a word about the actual price of the vehicle or the higher rate.
When I ask about the price, he says it'll be discussed in finance. I didn't realize finance guys were allowed to negeotiate car prices. I just figured that would be the job of the SALESperson.
When I question the accuracy of the prices, they then say I didn't read the fine print on the web. But wait, there is no fine print on the web! What should we do now???
Landru, you have to admit that a good salesperson should be able to sell snow to an eskimo in Alaska. A good salesperson should be able to make a customer feel good about a bad deal.
What these jokers did was to piss me off about a great deal! This one should have been a slam dunk for them. The numbers themselves are great. I would have definitely recommended them to anyone looking for a Ford. I would have definitely said good things on the customer survey too.
Now, all I can say is that they have a good variety of cars at good prices, but I would not feel comfortable buying from them again because they are completely incapable of presenting the facts of the deal.
Anyway, thanks everyone for listening to my story. Whether you agree or disagree with me on how I feel about these particular knuckleheads, your providing me with feedback was very helpful and I really appreciate it.
Enjoy the rest of the weekend,
Peter
where's my calender ..?
Terry.
"...they are completely incapable of presenting the facts of the deal."
Gosh, kinda thought that's what they do for a living every day...whatever.
My only question concerns the refi to get a lower interest loan now - is there any provision in the paperwork you signed that you have to kick back the $1000 "incentive" if you dump their loan, say, within a year?
Terry.
Thanks for any answer to this question.
The Sandman :-)
In other words, you'd qualify for all the cool new programs.
When I went to purchase my Sentra back in May, one dealership couldn't understand why I wouldn't finance the deal after he ran my credit, so I figured it must be pretty good. Funny, a Toyota dealer also really wanted me to finance a Corolla I was serious about.
The Sandman :-)
If you hand said that he never had a mortage (or had one that was privately held) and had no plastic then there might be a question as whether he has a active credit history, but that posibility is remote...
The only way he could "pump up" his score from where it is would be to consistenly borrow AlOT and consistenly pay it off EARLY -- but there is little reason to attempt to push his likely 750+ FICO into the 800 range.
You can visit the Fair Issac site for details...