Hacker News Reader

Comment by sleepdreamy | Hacker News Reader

This is literally the process of purchasing a vehicle in 2022. I needed a car (My old one had broken down after 9 years of service)

Advertised price was 24,500. I walked out totaling 30,000 after all the bullshit and that was with a 4000 downpayment. I left an honest review on Google Reviews about how misleading and unhappy I was with that dealer in particulars process but I loved the car so I just sucked it up.

When we bought my wifes car I had a much better experience. Some dealerships are just sleazy, and if you need the car you need the car.

View on HN

But you still bought the car!!!

That's the entire point of these crappy business practices. At the end of the day, you paid. Thus they continue doing the same thing.

If you really wanted this to change, don't reward the bad business practices.

(Side note: This is a common topic on reddit /askcarsales. Honest dealers are basically forced to do some of these things. The shady dealers advertise lower prices, but lots of fees. So uninformed consumers show up at good dealer and say "Look ShadyDealer has this exact car for $5,000 less! GoodDealer tries to explain, consumer gets mad, etc. etc.)

> That's the entire point of these crappy business practices

Exactly. They're trying to find the maximum you'll pay. It's like when you click on "Enterprise" plan on a SAAS company - time for a sales rep to Google your company, see the nice share price and give you a "custom" quote.

For what it's worth, there are more reasons.

Enterprise sales can be a long process because of the procurement process at the company. You can be looking at a 9 month to 3 year sales cycle, where a sales person is going to be involved the entire time answering questions, having security assessments completed, responding to quotes from other companies, etc.

You're going to have more conversations about special implementation requirements, integration with an obscure system, special support, training and compliance needs, etc.

For a long time I've believed that every company really needs 2 "enterprise" plans.

1. Standard Enterprise

- Yes we have SAML

- Yes you can have massive discounts on overages

- Yes you can get a copy of our SOC2 Type II if you sign an NDA.

Price: $X / [month,year]

2. Custom Enterprise

- We'll complete your custom security assessment document

- Discuss special options for training and support

Price: Contact Sales

If you need the car, you need the car. I sure did

Usually, I would say buy a used car then... but right now, used cars are ridiculously priced too! The used car dealerships are making money hand over fist too, and some people are out there paying ridiculous prices for old cars, probably because of the wait times on new cars. And you know the dealers are lowballing the fuck out of people who don't know any better, and asking stupid prices.

It also doesn't help that every manufacturer has basically stopped selling their low-end small cars. No more Honda Fit. No more Ford Fiesta or Focus.

The thing is, I don't think that most people buying cars right now even 'need' them. So people like you who do need one are also getting screwed by that.

Let no generosity go unpunished, and let no greed go unrewarded!

When I negotiated to buy my most recent car online back in 2016, the term to use was 'final out the door cost'.

I reached out to maybe 7 or 8 dealers, had a couple that refused to provide a total itemized cost, and then got back 5 quotes that varied quite a bit (like $7500 on a $30k car).

Did one round of negotiation which ended up lowering the lowest price another thousand bucks or so and went with that dealership.

When I bought a car in 2015, I called around asking for the out-the-door price. I told the dealer that offered the best price that I was on the way. When I got to the dealership, I realized I was at the wrong one. I called the dealer to tell him I accidently went to the wrong one, the sales manager was standing there next to me and said we can beat their price, and I told the guy on the phone, they went back and forth a couple of times by $100 each instance. I ended up staying where I was and buying the exact same (common) car there.

When I bought a truck in 2019, there was only one in my state that had the features that I wanted (I did not tell the dealer this). I tracked down the fleet/internet sales manager's email and emailed him asking what the Out-the-door price without incentives was on that VIN, then when it came time to do paperwork, I told them to apply incentive codes XXXXXX and YYYYYY. They tried to add on a dealer package for $1500 (I laughed when they explained it to me: nitrogen-filled tires, VIN etching on the windows, tint on the rear windows, and security lug nuts, I said we're breathing 70% nitrogen right now, and you can buy a VIN etching set online for $10), so I kept saying "no" until they asked if I could do $150 which was their cost, and I said yes to finish the deal.

I told the salesperson that I understand they have to make a profit, and I have no issue with that, that they probably made $1500 to $2000 after the manufacturer volume incentive, and he said they only made $800 off of me.

Things are drastically different now. Bought a 1 year old car for cash last year after an accident totaled my old car. Dealerships have no/low inventory. We had cars sold when we were on the way to the dealership to test drive them. Any negotiation was laughed at.

Absolutely brutal.

You're lucky if the dealership actually has the car. Indeed, you're lucky if it's even been built yet. I was able to get the car I wanted for a not unreasonable price but I did have to wait 6 weeks.

Yep. Wholesale prices for desirable used cars are now often more than the new MSRP and they sell instantly. Especially for things such as the RAM TRX trucks, RAV4 Hybrids and any EV.

the golden rule for having leverage in negotiations is the ability to walk away and not close the deal.

You can apply the pressure by thanking them for their time but their number is too high compared to the competition and I guarantee the car salesman is going to be calling you back with a better deal.

Any sale is better than no sale, they make money selling cars by volume and will take less profit to close a sale, you don’t know their profit margin so let them eat into it to close the sale at a later time by walking away! If you don’t have time, they will play on these fears to make you think you must sign the paper that very second or you are missing that deal of a lifetime.

Also, you can flex carvana prices and be like, I can buy a car through carvana on my phone cheaper than you guys, then simply tell them you are walking away cause of that and see them magically go talk to their manager and get a better price for you right then or later on the phone, I pulled this off a couple times before. You can figure out their profit margin and markup and see if you can get them to lower the price and still make money. Win-win

I just bought a new car as well. It turned out that the "in transit" car had obviously not been built yet. Paperwork charges were a bit high and there were some mostly BS "factory installed options." But MSRP was MSRP and I was actually able to get the charge for the options added to my (already pretty good IMO considering) trade-in price. The main pain was that I had to wait 6 weeks when I had some issues with my current car. But then I went in with the attitude that I was probably paying sticker and would be happy to just get the car I wanted so things went pretty smoothly from that perspective.

Having worked at a car dealership some number of years ago I was surprised and amused by the way that this business has been soaked in (what would only recently come to be referred to as) dark patterns for so long that they have acquired an almost folkloric categorization scheme, with pithy, locally conventional names identifying almost every well-worn dark pattern sales track. The one they'd use internally to sum over your experience above is "sticker is quicker."

I think my favorite out of all of these was "grapes;" the term used by Ford salesmen to refer to fiercely brand loyal pickup truck buyers. juicy and easily squeezed.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com