Overhaulin'

Do car dealerships take money off of the sticker prices of new cars?

My wife and I went to a car dealership and were looking to buy a new 2010 Ford Fusion. The salesman refused to take any money off the 23,000 sticker price besides the 1000 trade in no matter . We walked away from the dealership feeling a little upset. We were under the impression that dealerships would negotiate with you and that you should never pay the sticker price on the car. Is this incorrect?

Public Comments

1. Depends on your credit. If you have the credit score that the dealership is looking for to do business with, then yes they will usually work with you and negotiate. Sometimes the dealerships will negotiate with everyone on any deal for any car. Sometimes they will not. You obviously went to a dealership that is hard up to make a buck. Try a different dealership. Seen many 2010 Fusions, not impressed with them at all, makes me want to keep my 2005 Infiniti G35 even more. Not that I would even consider trading my G35 in for a Ford, just saying.
2. He was being a dick and just wanted a larger commission. Fords are always discounted heavily because they suck and have the worst resale value of any cars. If you really want a Ford crap then buy it from here where its discounted up to $4000: http://amexnetwork.zag.com/main.html
3. Guy was being a jerk thinking you would cave and buy it for sticker. I'm surprised he let you leave without doing something. You should not be paying MSRP for the Fusion. If you know you want a Fusion, I suggest getting a subscription to Consumer Reports and buying the Fusion Bottom Line Pricing Guide. Overall, it will cost you less than $40 and it is the closest thing to knowing what the dealer paid for the vehicle. Once you know this, get online quotes and begin negotiating. Take the bottom line, and add 3-4% for dealer profit and the dealer should be responsive to your offer.
4. YES. And if they wont LEAVE. Buying a car is easy. Not getting ripped off is hard. If you want to buy a car you want to do it in steps. NEVER EVER give the dealership your SS# untill you have a deal set in stone. And NEVER tell the dealership how much you owe on your trade. EVERTHING is negotiable EVERYTHING 1. Make the dealership go at YOUR pace, not thiers. If you feel you are going to fast, TELL not ask the sales person to go away for a minute so you can think or talk to your spouce. And gather your thoughts or wits. The dealerships job is to confuse, bully, and push you into the sale so you wont think about the cost or how much your going to end up paying. 2. Negotiate the price of the car. Before you discuss anything else, you want to talk about the price of the car you want to buy. Because if the dealership wont playball on the price, there is no reason to talk about anything else. ASK for the invoice. If they say no, leave! If they show it to you, you now know what they bought the car for. Thats what an invoice is... The price that the dealership bought the car from ford. REBATES ARE NOT DISCOUNTS. Negotiating the price of the car has NOTHING to do with rebates. If the car costs 23K and the invioce says 20K you want to get the car for as close to 20K as you can. NOW if the car has foe example a 2K rebate, you TELL the dealership you want the reabte taken off of the price you NEGOTIATED. So if you got the car negotiated down to 20K and you take off the 2K rebate, the car is now 18K so that is a COMBINED discount of $5,000. And that is VERY good 3. NEGOTIATING the value of your trade Yes, you can negotiate the value of your trade. Not only is the dealership trying to make you pay top dollar for the new car, they are trying to make you give them your old car FOR AS LITTLE AS POSSIBLE. Do research, check out KBB.com, NADA.com, EDMUNDS.com. Find out what your car is ACTUALLY worth. These sites will give you a trade in value, a private party value, and a retail value. If you can get your car traded in for between the trade in value and the private party value, then your doing ok. BE HONEST when you value your car. ONLY 2% of all vehicles in the U.S. fall into the "exellent" catagory. These sites will tell you what condition your car is in. 4. The interest rate. You dont want to give the dealership your SS# until you have gotten this far. Because there is NO REASON to. Because untill you have a price on the new car, and a price on your trade in that you are happy with, there isnt a reason to give that info out to the car dealer. NOW BEFORE YOU GO TO THE DEALER, visit your local bank and ask them what kind of rate you qualify for, and what your scores are. KNOWLEDGE IS POWER. Because if your bank tells you that you have exellent credit, then you do. And they will usually offer you the best rate you qualify for, because the bank want to keep your business, and they want you to finance through them. this allows you to have a starting point when negotiating interest rates with the car dealer. YES I SAID NEGOITATING THE RATE. If the bank offers you a 5%, then that is your starting place. It ok to tell the dealer that you have financing through your bank. NEVER tell themn what % it is. MAKE THEM WORK TO BEAT IT, because you might just get lucky and get a super low rate through them that you would never have known was there otherwise. If they beat it GREAT, if they cant, you still have a very fair rate through your bank. 5. The down payment. NEVER EVER EVER EVER EVER tell the dealer you have ANY money to put down until you have come this far. If you do, your down payment will magically disapear into one fake thing or another. You never mention any money down untill you have the price set, the trade value set, and the interest rate and loan length set. If you do everything right, here's what happens as an example: Original price of the car: $23,000 Negotiated price: $20,000 Negotiated price with rebates: $18,000 Original trade value: $1,000 Negotiated trade value: $1,750 Original interest rate: 7% Negotiated interest rate: 3.5% Money down: $2,000 -The results- Original deal: $22,000 at 7% Negotiated deal: $14,250 at 3.5% If you're smart and calm you can work wonders with buying cars.
5. if they wont negotiate Run dont walk away. and if they only offered you 1000 trade wait a couple of weeks and go back in and get a price with no trade, i once took a car in to trade in , they gave me a price, two weeks later i went back and told them i had no trade in . i walked out with the car for $2200 less than i would have paid with the trade, in other words i was going to pay them $2200 to take my old car. thats why i am in the car business today, i saw how much money they were making.HINT: never trade , sell your car and buy thiers