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Comment by lnwlebjel | Hacker News Reader

Interesting. I rank buy a car from a new car salesman as the worst consumer experience of my life. So much so that I've since bought used cars and in the future hope to buy a Tesla in large part to avoid that experience. I understand that it could greatly benefit the salesperson in understanding the social psychology of the consumer ... but never again will I subject myself to that process.

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I'd rather go get a cavity filled, then buy a new car. Do it as infrequently as possible (hoping to get another 10 years out of my 11 year old Toyota).

Every time I visit a new car dealer I feel a need to take a shower, just to get the stink off of me.

BTW, apart from fixed price online sales, there are fixed priced dealerships. They advertise price on the website and don't negotiate. You just show up and get car at this price. Very smooth.

You can do this at any dealership.

You'd like to think that, but no, there are plenty of dealers that will TELL you they're happy to negotiate everything by email/phone and then you just show up and get the car, but once you're there they want to change the deal and will still make you sit in a little office with someone that tries to add-on warranties, paint protection, prepaid services, etc.

You mentioned you liked dealers that don't negotiate. So I mentioned you can buy without negotiating at any dealership. The advertised price is pretty fair at 90% of dealerships.

Beyond that, their advertised specials are spectacular deals usually. Who spends money and attention advertising specials that don't even compete with the competition?

The problem is that you feel like a chump if you don’t negotiate. No one wants to feel like they didn’t get a deal especially on a used car. But the last time I bought one it was from a dealership that didn’t negotiate, a fact I discovered when I started negotiating. And then to see if it was true I started pushing pretty hard and they stood firm and the end result was great, I left very happy with my purchase.

Yes, you can, but during normal times at most dealerships (current market being atypical) it means that you left few hundred dollars at the table.

Unless you have a trade in as this is one area where they can still get you.

Do those fixed price dealers count their various add-ons (rust proofing, extended warranty...) in the fixed price or not. These add-ons are how most dealers make money (that and warranty work)

For trade-in compare price they offer to Carmax (including taxes and fees adjustment), if less, just sell to Carmax.

Whatever is on the sale sheet is included. You can order extra stuff, they will install it for you, but obviously it’s not included in the advertised price.

Sure, but "smart dealers" won't tell your trade in is worth, instead they give you final payment after your trade in, and they often won't tell you how long the loan term is for.

Uhhh....they don't add on unnecessary charges? Like a paint coating you didn't ask for?

I had one try to add $3k for invisible (UV) paint the police could use to prosecute the thieves if my car were dismantled. All the extra fees turned a $4500 car, listed at $8500 at that dealership, into $19500. The "fixed price" just meant they were completely and utterly unwilling to negotiate on that sort of insanity, so some dealership down the road got my business instead. $5k later, the same car has had no issues for 50k miles.

Honest question, when the customer knows you're trying to fleece them and is willing to pay a small premium to finish the deal and get on with their lives, why would a dealer double down on something so outrageous?

Because making a $15,000 profit 5% of the time and nothing 95% of the time is better than making a $500 profit every time.

Basically if scamming your customers works a nontrivial fraction of the time and the margin when you're not scamming is small, scamming is the incentivized behavior.

The whole idea is that there is a car and non-negotiable advertised price, you pay the price + taxes + registration + processing fee, which are all known in advance and get the car. That’s it. If you are talented negotiator and have time, you’ll get better price elsewhere, but I value my time and well-being more.

Obviously there could be bad dealership which would try to screw you, read some reviews and don’t go to such place.

> I'd rather go get a cavity filled

WITHOUT anesthesia

I once dated a girl whose dad's idea of a fun Saturday was to spend the day at a car dealership to see how low a price he could negotiate for a car. He'd always walk away, regardless of how low they went. I thought that was hilarious.

This needs to be a reality TV show with hidden cameras!

Jesus, that just feels cruel to me.

The car salesman practices this every day.

The buyer might practice this 4--20 times in a lifetime. At the high end, that's only a month's experience for the salesperson.

Consider it a form of practice which might save many thousands of dollars in time.

What a Chad dad :)

Something is deeply wrong with her father!!!

Probably my least favorite consumer experience leans toward purchasing cars. Ironically I also LOVE cars. Hate buying them though

Don't ask them, tell them.

Do your research, narrow it down to a small set of models and trim levels, know what the best deals available are, and set your numbers a bit lower. Ring several dealers and say "I'm looking for X.Y.Z at price $NNN, what can you do for me?". Some will not even respond, and do NOT get pulled into the "we can only talk when you are here" - cross those off the list. I found one that would come very close to what I needed, and did the whole deal via email, only actually physically meeting him when I actually went to trade-in and get the new vehicle.

And guess who got the next sale a year later when my wife's lease ran out? And who will get the next one?

On top of that, my experience at that dealer overall has been FAR better than many others. It's worth the long search and semi-log drive to find the right one.

I've only ever bought used cars, from individuals. Paying extra for the overhead of a dealership and some salesperson's bonus seems absurd to me. You're pretty much guaranteed to get taken advantage of by a professional.

Local classifieds, private sellers, take the car to a trusted mechanic for an inspection.

Op here, selling 3000 cars.

I've never bought a car at a dealership, and neither has anyone in my family in 25 years. But then again, I know cars inside and out (even from before my car sales career) so I feel pretty safe not accidentally buying a scammers car from Craigslist.

As opposed to buying a(n always more expensive) scammer's car on purpose at a used car dealership?, the choice seems easy.

Very few franchise dealerships would ever sell a car with problems knowingly. It does happen, because people trade in cars with intermittent problems without telling the dealership.

Compared to Craigslist where there is no shortage of people selling cars directly with current problems, intermittent problems, hidden problems, and massive paperwork issues that can stop you from registering the vehicle all together until resolved.

That’s why you always ask to take the car to a well known 3.party that don’t benefit on the sale, and check the car for you for any hidden problems.

So you still can buy from Craigslist without the risk.

This only leaves the potential for massive paperwork and back due fee issues. Surprisingly common on craiglist. A spare current registration sticker gets slapped on that belongs to another vehicle of theirs, and you buy the car not knowing it has 3 years back due fees totally $1000, probably approaching $2k if it's a pickup truck (atleast in California).

I don't think I could've asked for a better endorsement for my point.

That's my policy. The only two cars I've purchased that I deeply regretted were one new one and one from a used car lot.

I've never had any issue from a private sale.

How does that work? You write a stranger a 30,000 check?

I don't see how this is preferable if you are purchasing nice/new or high end vehicles.

Personally I've never paid more than $7000 for a car.. but yeah, a cheque, or a transfer. You transfer the ownership at the govt office, and it's done.

Dropping 30k on a car seems a little nuts to me, but I understand different people have different values.

Just remember that what Tesla saves you in the purchase experience will come back to bite you in the service experience. You need to go into the delivery process as sanely as possible and be willing to walk away from it if you see any issues that you want fixed. The problem is that by that time you will have been waiting a month or more for your car and will then be back at square one and on Tesla's shit list to boot.

> in the future hope to buy a Tesla in large part to avoid that experience

And see Tesla knows this, which is why the margin on their cars is higher than most.

You may have disliked that sales experience with a dealer or used car salesperson, but it quite likely got you a slightly better deal than had you tried to negotiate yourself.

The margin might simply be from cutting out the middleman while keeping the middleman price. So, the buyer is not necessarily better or worse off. But not having to go through a pushy salesman is a big win. It’s why I love Carmax (and would probably like Carvana).

Tesla was supposed to pass some of those cost savings onto the end customer not to pocket it all like this but I'm aware that it's a corporation that's looking to maximize profits to their shareholders and extract as much value as possible from their clientele.

They are likely selling all cars they can produce. Why would they sell them at cheaper price point?

Tesla, like every other publicly traded company, sells their product at a price they feel they can get away with, in order to maximize profits. Any cost savings in the process only affects the floor price, which they're probably not selling at.

In the current market, most figurative Tesla dealers would be charging $7k+ over MSRP, which is what you can currently make immediately flipping any newly-purchased Tesla, even the base Model 3s. I'm sure there are some who would stick to MSRP out of "professionalism", but it wouldn't be the majority.

This obviously won't last, but just something to consider.

If you buy a Toyota following the Tesla model, where you call and say "I'd like to buy the car you have, for the price you have listed", you will also have a generally good experience.

My Toyota experience was okay, but I still needed to sit at a dealership for almost two hours to deal with the paperwork, wait for financing, etc. Tesla allowed me to take care of all of that from the comfort of home.

Buying a Ford was the worst experience I've had with a new car, but that could have been entirely on the dealership.

Yes, they are there all day, until closing time, or longer. Usually, the longer you stay, the more likely you are to buy their car, or give them more money. They control the situation and the incentives are in their favor. This is one reason we loathe car shopping.

I wish that was the case. The dealership experience seems designed to maximize the pressure and extract as much value from customers as possible.

My first Toyota dealer experience was offering to buy a car at advertised price, and them refusing/countering with a lease. We just walked out.

Based on that, I waited until Toyota offered pretty good unadvertised discounts and called up a bunch of dealers with an offer/car in mind. I got the car my wife and I wanted for $1k more than my offer, which was I think $9k less than MSRP, and the experience was way better. We only had to sit through the finance departments upsells.

The third sale was paying MSRP at a Lexus dealer and we still were there for almost 5 hours.

> I got the car my wife and I wanted for $1k more than my offer, which was I think $9k less than MSRP

I think these numbers are better represented in percents rather than absolutes. $9k less than msrp on a Corolla seems unobtainium.

Oh yeah, it was on a plug-in prius. MSRP was I think 37K and we paid 28k. It was something like $6k in manufacturer credits because sales had stalled after Toyota ran out of carpool stickers. The dealer only knocked off $3k, and I'm sure they still made money on the sale.

Toyota was just my random example. Point being, if you offer to pay the asking price, it's pretty painless at most places just like at Tesla.

My last 2 vehicle purchases (2014 and 2021) were through internet sales managers. I told them what I wanted, when I was intending to buy, that I had sent the same e-mail to every $MAKE dealership from San Diego to San Francisco, and that whoever had the best offer was getting my money. It was a painless experience both times.

My friend tried to do this with a Subaru and got nowhere. But it was in 2018 I think.

Nothing to lose with the strategy, but it is societal economic situation and demand of car dependent.

That's a good point. We lucked out on our timing in 2021, we were looking ahead of the chip shortage, etc.

Agree. I've heard of this going very well, and other times you get zero bites. I think the courtesy/approach of the email also determines if this works or not.

If you start off combative I think its much less likely to go well.

I just let my fiancée know recently that this is how I intend to purchase our next vehicle. Strictly through email until the day I go to pick it up in person. If they say 'You have to come in' to talk price I am going to hang up immediately and call the next dealer on my list.

If you do enough sales of virtually any product buying a car gets easy. It's just a game. When the salesperson says "I'll need to talk to my manager," you just say "No problem. I'm not in a hurry." And when they try to add stuff to the contract at the end, just say "No."

> my opinions on why car sales is the best sales experience

Pretty sure the parent means "best" as in the best way to get experience doing sales for the salesperson.

That's why they said:

> I understand that it could greatly benefit the salesperson

Used car salespeople are even worse! Are you buying from individuals or from a dealership?

What do you mean? Buying a used car from a dealership is about 5x worse than buying a new car. Of course they're buying from an individual.

> Buying a used car from a dealership is ... worse than buying a new car.

Yes, that's what I said.

> Of course they're buying from an individual.

That was not clear.

Entirely this. The main reason why I've only purchased one new car in my life is because dealing with car dealers (new or used) is about as fun and rewarding as pulling out my fingernails.

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