Overhaulin'

Does the dealer still have room to negotiate lower than the employee discount price on a new car?

I qualify for an employee discount on a GM product and am considering a Saab 9-3. I was quoted a price of $350/mo for a fairly loaded vehicle. Does the dealer still have room to negotiate lower when we start at the employee price, or is that the floor of possible prices. Please only answer if you're someone in the business or with direct answer that your response is accurate.

Public Comments

1. when I worked for a Ford dealership a couple of years ago the A-plan or employee discount was the very best deal one could get...there was no negotiating with that number...i believe there are circumstances (cars they can't sell) where they make exceptions, but they have to have been there a while (year or so)
2. Some factory rebates do not apply to employees - so employees don't always get the best deal. If there is a second (or more) dealership nearby pretend you are not entitled to any employee discount and see what kind of deal you can negotiate. You can also negotiate over the internet.
3. There is no better price than employee pricing. It is actually approximately 3% below the dealer's invoice price, including holdback. GM's now famous Employee Pricing event was a cause of a lot of people leaving the business, because we were only allowed to buy 1 vehicle per year at that price as opposed to "Joe off the street" could buy as many as he wanted. It also ended up costing as lot of dealers a lot of money because if paperwork was not submitted properly for each vehicle, they lost out on the small amount of "bonus" money that GM had promised to give back. Now, as far as working the payment side of things, there is nothing in employee pricing that says they can't try to make money on that side. Get a full disclosure of the finance (or lease) terms before you commit to anything and for your own peace of mind, shop around for a better deal from an outside bank or credit union.