A Lesson in Car Shopping

Those of you who have been through buying a used car (oops, pre-owned) will relate to this.  Those of you preparing to do this for the first time, take notes.  Or just print a copy for your records ;)

 Saturday, after two months of researching and planning, my fiancée and I went out looking for a newer truck for him.  We wanted a truck so we don’t have to keep borrowing someone else’s vehicle every time we need to make a trip to Home Depot.  We have a lot of home projects coming up, and this is an issue.  Since it will primarily be Mike’s vehicle, I left it up to him to get together the facts on the different trucks and to find a few he wanted to look at, while I would handle the actual financial end of the transaction.

He found a truck online at a local dealership, Wholesale Outlet, which he wanted to look at.  A 2004 Tacoma for around $11,000. 

Never assume the vehicle you see in the Auto Shopper or online is actually available.  It is actually a common practice for dealerships to “bait” customers with their sweetest deals, but when you arrive the vehicle has already been sold or is not available.  Instead, consider these ads representative of the TYPE of vehicles available at a dealership, but not the actual vehicles available.

We got to the dealership at 9 AM.  It was raining, so there wasn’t anyone else on the lot.  We were greeted by a salesman named Ralph Proffitt (yep, that is his real name…comforting, huh?)

If you really want to get a good deal, go car shopping when it is raining or snowing.  The lot is empty, and dealers will be more likely to want to make you happy. They don't want to be walking around in the rain showing you multiple cars.  And since few people buy cars in bad weather that have fewer chances to sell something.

We asked about the truck, and discovered it was actually on a different lot (surprise) but he said he can locate it and we could go look at it.  Fine.  I expected as much.  I specifically ask him “Do you have any trucks on this lot between $10,000-$13,000 we can look at in the meantime?”  He says sure and takes us over to a selection of four vehicles that he claims are in our price range.  While we wait for Ralph to track down the mystery truck, Mike sees a truck he likes on the lot.  Ralph comes back and tells us the truck we originally wanted to see has been spotted.   Then he says “Well, you probably don’t know what that means…”

If you are a salesman and you are going to use jargon that you suspect the customer won’t know, DON’T use the jargon.  And if you DO use the jargon, don’t imply the customer is stupid with a statement like Ralph made.

Having sold vacuum cleaners for ten years, I understand perfectly well what spotting means, and I inform him as much.  So someone else was already negotiating for that truck…how very convenient.  Regardless, Mike found the truck on the lot he liked…and it had lower mileage to boot.  So all was still well.  We took it for a test drive.  While on the test drive, Ralph keeps trying to pull a credit app with his questions. 

Salesmen aren’t just engaging in small talk.  They are asking “qualifier questions” to see if you can even afford what you are looking at.  Qualifier questions include “Where do you work?”  How long have you owned your home?”  “You folks have any kids?” (Every dependent you have impacts your debt ratio.  Generally finance companies subtract $100 income per month per child).   A good salesman can guess your credit rating and how much you are willing to finance by asking qualifier questions.   So to prevent this, ask lots of questions about the vehicles and dodge personal questions or give vague answers.

We get back from the test drive, and I ask for a price.  He starts to ask me to fill out a credit app so he can give me the best price. 

“My credit is fine.  And my credit shouldn’t impact the price of the truck, only my interest rate,” I say. 

He asks me what kind of a monthly payment I was looking for.

“I’m not worried about the monthly payment.  I want to know the total price.  You make me happy with the price I already know it’s in my range.”

Salesmen will ALWAYS try to sell you on the monthly payment.  Never buy based on the monthly payment.  Payments can be negotiated depending on how many months you want to extend.  Decide a total price you are willing to pay.  You can use online calculators to guesstimate monthly payments at different percentage rates.  Depending on how new the car is, some dealerships will offer finance terms as long as 96 months in order to get the monthly payment down to a specified target.  Do you really want to pay for the same vehicle for 8 years?

Well, Ralph goes in to “talk to his manager” and get us a price. After being on the lot for two hours, he comes back with a price of $18,900. 

Now, the last time I checked, $18900 was NOT between $10,000-$13,000.

Now, it’s one thing if he had come back with a price of $14,000 or $14,500 after I told him my range was between $10,000-$13,000.  That’s basically how it works.  Salesman starts off high, you start off low.  You meet in the middle and both sides think they won.  But to come back with a price almost $6,000 over my range was just insulting.  He starts rambling on about getting the monthly payments down.  Mike just looks at me and walks away. He knows what is coming.

“You wasted two hours of our time after I SPECIFICALLY told you I was looking for something under $13,000 and specifically ASKED you if you have any vehicles under $13,000?  Then you play a bait and switch and let us test drive something with a price of almost $19,000?  You’re a liar and a fraud and we’re leaving.”

We storm out.  Apparently the manager decides to follow after us.  He starts off apologizes for Ralph, acting as if he had no idea why Ralph would do that.  He goes to Mike first, who points at me and says “You got to deal with HER.”  So he comes back over to my side of the car and starts off “Look hun that truck can’t be sold for $13,000, but I’ve got some others…”

Unless you are my grandfather or a senior citizen asking me to grab something off the shelf in the supermarket, do not call me “hun.”  It’s patronizing.  It’s insulting.  And when dealing with the likes of me, liable to get you hurt.  There are three uses of "hun."  There is "hun" as in when your significant other or a loved one uses it as a term of endearment.  There is "hun" as in when a senior citizen uses it as a term of endearment or a friendly nickname when they don't know the name of a younger person.  And there is hun as in trying to demonstrate some sort of authority over a female.

“One, I am NOT your hun, so knock it off.  Two, your dealer wasted two hours of my life showing me a car he knew damn well was outside what we wanted to pay.  Three, you people have zero credibility with me right now, so unless you are in fact prepared to sell that specific vehicle for under $13,000, we have nothing to talk about.”

He stood there dumbfounded as Mike and I drove off.  Mike was trying hard not to laugh.

On the way home, we went past Frank’s Auto Sales.  We decided what the hell let’s stop in and see what they have on the lot.  A young salesman, Frank (the Third we soon learn) comes out and introduces himself.  I warn him in advance I’m already in a foul mood and why.  I figure it’s only fair to give him a warning.  He just laughs a little and says “Yeah, we get that a lot.  Tell me what you want and I’ll see if I can make you happy.” 

We tell him what we are looking for, and he takes us over to a section of the lot where he says the vehicles are in our range.  Mike didn’t really like any of them, and we were about to leave when Mike sees this Ford Explorer Sports Trac and asks about it.  Frank quickly points out that it is not in the price range and that he can’t sell it at that price (apparently in order to make sure he isn’t misconstrued later). 

You know that look that your kids make when you tell them they can’t have whatever it is on the store shelf they want?  That face that simultaneously expresses understanding while also making you absolutely miserable?  That’s the face Mike makes.  I’m glad he doesn’t play poker.  He’d lose a lot. 

Now in reality, I had no problem spending more than $13,000 on the right vehicle.  I had figured out our budget could handle more than that.  But generally when you are going out to negotiate you want to start at your lowest offer and force the salesman to come down in price quicker.  Salespeople are generally trained to offer discounts in proportion to the difference between your starting price and the list price.  So if a vehicle is $18,999 and you tell them you are looking for something around $17,000, they might only offer you $500 off.  Tell them you are looking to spend around $16,000, maybe the price comes down by $1,000.

So I ask Frank how much the truck is, and he says it’s listed around $18,900.  Mike shrugs and we prepare to leave, but then Frank asks if I’m willing to consider it if he can get the price down.  Again, he stresses he can’t do $13,000, but maybe we could meet in the middle somewhere.

Doing the math in my head, I get a good idea of where the middle would be, and guess the payments would be around $250 a month without running for a hundred years.  So we decide to take it for a test drive. 

It’s a sweet little truck with only 40,000 miles on it.  We get back to the dealership, and Frank gets me a price of $15,700.  After negotiating a few details regarding the down payment and warranty, Mike gets to drive his truck home.

Now what makes this whole thing funny is, when we get home there is a message on my answering machine from Ralph.  It rambles on for about a minute and a half.  It says he feels real bad and that he didn’t mean to lie to us.  He didn’t know how much the truck was, and he really thought it was in our range.  And (here is the kicker) when he went to church Sunday he was going to pray to God to forgive him for upsetting me.  He repeated that part a couple of times.

Unless you know that the customer is the same religion as you, don’t play the religion card.  In fact, even if the customer IS the same religion, don’t play the religion card.  It just ticks off the customer and probably damns you to hell for dragging your god into your mess.  Besides, when dealing with a pagan like myself, it just makes you look pathetic and gets you publicly embarrassed on Gather when I write an article about it.

The moral of the story is:

Know what you are willing to spend before you go to the car lot, then shave a few thousand dollars off of that and tell the salesman that is what you want to spend.  It gives you more room to negotiate and you will get a better deal quicker with less hassles. 

Remember, your credit should have zero impact on the price of the vehicle.  It will only impact your percentage rate.

Always negotiate based on total price.  Never negotiate based on a monthly payment unless you want to finance for ten years.

Never agree to fill out a credit application under you have finalized a price.  If you have shaking credit or bad credit, dealers will generally charge you more if they think they can get away with it, as they will assume you aren't that savvy.

Salesmen use terms like "hun" (and the male equivelent of "son") to establish authority over you during a conversation.  Nip it in the bud immediately.

 Keep control of the small talk by focusing on the vehicles themselves, not you and your spouse.

The moment God (or any variant thereof) comes into play, walk away.  Generally con artists try to hid behind "religion" to create a false sense of honesty.