Comment by MrFoof | Hacker News Reader

Comment by MrFoof | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

American here. I've done this crazy thing when I want an exact vehicle: I order it.

Yes, you wait. You may be waiting quite a while for a dealer to give you one of their allocations. But you get exactly what you want. If you go around to dealerships and make it clear you're serious, you'll even pay no more than you would otherwise. Negotiate price no differently. This market is a bit of a nuisance, but even now the vet salespeople will still play ball, because someone that serious is actually an easy sale. They'll still sell what's on the lot or floor plan, but now they just sold ANOTHER car. Know several people recently who've done just this.

-----

Not limited to luxury vehicles either. Had someone at somewhere I was doing consulting for ask me about how he'd go about it for a Subaru Legacy, in the base trim, with ALMOST NO OPTIONS. He wanted exactly what he wanted, and nothing more. Told him just to go do it.

He did. He waited about 4.5 months (because it had to be built per the build schedule, then shipped on a boat!), but he got exactly what he wanted, for the price he asked for. To him it was completely worth not having it, "right now". He told me that after seeing how relatively little work was involved, he'd never buy a car off the lot again.

-----

Average sale price of a new car in the US is $48K. People regularly pay $60-130K (or far more!) for luxury cars. Sorry, I can't compromise on something with a 5-digit (or 6-digit) price tag.

Just be careful you don't order from a dealer. Order directly from the mfg.

I once ordered from a dealer, left a deposit, waited 3 months (with no car at the time so busses and friends), they claimed it came in on a Sunday. I said I'd be in Monday morning since my bank is closed on Sunday. They sold it to someone else, told me I could order again and wait another 3 months if I wanted.

Since the deposit wasn't tied to a VIN or something there was nothing I could do.

The dealership model needs to die.

American culture is all about the price being the price. With dealerships, you're haggling just to get the price down to the normal goddamn price, just because of middlemen.

I am happy to pay The Price if it means no bullshit and an assurance I'm not getting screwed. Make your car decisions based on the merits of the vehicle.

> American culture is all about the price being the price.

Variable sales tax rates depending on locale / product / usage / other arcane rules; variable tipping rates based on type of service rendered, customs, etc.; services charges, delivery fees, resort fees, convenience (of printing your own ticket) fees, so on and so forth...

No, I think Americans are quite used to not just paying list price.

Tipping was the first thing I thought of when reading the parent post. I'd call it another cultural outlier. Most American retail stores and activities do not involve tipping. The one big exception is eating at non-fast-food restaurants.

Meanwhile though, literally everything done by people living in young urban "gentrified" areas seems to involve tipping.

You can always take back your deposit.

But I can't take back my 3 months of waiting

When I lived in the US ten years ago some of the luxury dealers (definitely BMW, I seem to recall Porsche too) had these programs where you’d buy a US-spec’d but take delivery of it in Europe. So you’d get exactly what you want, fly to Germany, drive it around there for a week, and then they’d ship it over. There was some reason why that ended up being cheaper than driving the equivalent car straight off the lot in the US though the reason escapes me now. When you factored in flights and other costs it netted out about the same, except you got to spend a week or so in Europe too.

Sadly it always remained aspirational as I never could quite bring myself to justify spending that much on a car I’d barely use.

It's not a new car when it's brought through customs, so you save a bunch on duties.

Do you know what name or search keywords to use to learn more about these offers?

'European Delivery' should get you started, that's what BMW uses.

You're gonna want that TrueCoat though...

When I was buying my car in Australia my dealer was pretty up-front:

* buy off the lot, and get a discount

* they could buy from another dealer for me out of state but then there’s transport costs etc so it’s less cost effective

* factory order

And they didn’t care if I wanted to factory order and they were stuck with the cars on their lot, they’d facilitate it.

European here. When I want a new (to me) car, I go on mobile.de, find the one I want and go buy it.

Unless it's a Rolls Royce, a brand new model or facing significant supply shortages, there's almost no point in ordering a new car from the factory. Cheaper and faster to buy a lightly used one, generally it's trivial to find fully optioned examples.

I'm not saying you HAVE to order a car. My point is if you want something very specific, you have to put in the effort.

Especially because when dealers order 300+ cars in one go (for the next few months) to stick on their floor plan, they aren't getting weird with options. They stick to what they know sells, with options the average buyer wants (or won't balk over), and hits their revenue and margin targets. To most people cars are an appliance. There's only a few configurations they're going to order. Moreover, it's rare for them to order a stripped out model -- they're not popular with buyers, and less gross margin.

You can search national inventories, find the exact car sitting somewhere and go get it. Hell, most local dealerships who DON'T have the car themselves will be more than happy to trade something they have to the dealer (of the same brand) that possesses what you want so they get the sale. Make some phone calls, and one will play ball and do most of the work for you.

Point was sometimes there isn't a free lunch, especially if a person is going to be particularly choosy about the specifics of what they want and be salty over anything else.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com