cash for clunkers

[pcpower]

long story short,,, cash for clunkers program,, I went into a dealership last night, specifically boch toyota, largest toyota dealer in new england (or the u.s.?.?.). a relative of mine was hoping to trade in his old jeep for a new RAV-4 or something along those lines.

it was ridiculously busy, so busy in fact that I needed to wait 45 minutes to get a salesperson. first thing he said was you need to pay MSRP for the RAV-4 or they would just move on to the next customer. his justification was that we would already be getting the $3500 for the clunker so the dealer cannot give any discount on the car.

so I said yehhhhh NO WAY, but still eventually they brought us for a test drive. bottom line we wanted to pay at most invoice price on the car plus the $3500 clunker trade-in. in the dealer's opinion though they didn't feel they need to give any discount whatsoever. after haggling with the manager they took about $1,100 off MSRP.

in other words the dealer feels it has more leverage due to the clunkers program, and that it can force customers to pay MSRP. I'm pretty dissapointed at Boch Toyota for doing this, as the clunkers program is a bonus from the government to consumers. then again maybe I am wrong and the program is designed to help out dealerships first and foremost.

anyhow we're going 2 keep shopping around, and if the clunkers program doesn't get renewed this Monday, o well. :[]

 

[GoFast]

absolute crap....the money for the clunker doesnt come out of their pocket, it comes out of ours [the tax payers]. It is sad how many people fall for this crap which just enables these crooks. This kind of crap is why car sales has such a bad rap...

 

[Shadow102]

absolute crap....the money for the clunker doesnt come out of their pocket, it comes out of ours [the tax payers]. It is sad how many people fall for this crap which just enables these crooks. This kind of crap is why car sales has such a bad rap...

It comers out of future generations pockets actually.

And no that's not the biggest toyota store in the country, can't remember where its at but definatly not new england. Anyway try a different dealer. They just sound like they want to be hard asses I know our lot here is clearing out quick due to c4c, although I wouldn't expect invoice price plus c4c just because they are going to be looking for a bit of a profit

 

[Sport6]

Yeah dealers in this area are kind of dueshes.. Might have been confused by the no additional trade in on clunkers is awarded type of deal.

Then again alot of dealers practice the haggle only on the trade in pricing and with the cash for clunkers that is taken away.


Edit: Also the Cash for Clunkers ends Monday at 8pm.

 

[stageup]

rofl same as me when i went to look @ the 370z
it's white and 6spd, do you know how hard it is to get? if you dont want it we will sell it by tonight... this was over 2 weeks ago.

dude called me last night, hi we still have your car here did you want it still ?

well if you offer me fair market for my ms3 sure, if you're still offering me 13.5k no thx, it's such a hot seller, you should have no problems selling it in this economy

 

[BlueWagon]

Well, after monday all those bastard dealers will be begging for our business again instead of trying to make us pay MSRP minus clunker trade in. Those greedy pigs. It just helped them out temporarily. I feel sorry for all those people who actually did pay for MSRP. Should have done their research...

 

[dizzin9]

i sooooooo agree to everything you just said especially the part where you mentioned mazdaspeed 3 related stuff.

 

[Sport6]

i sooooooo agree to everything you just said especially the part where you mentioned mazdaspeed 3 related stuff.

(rofl)

 

[Speed3B]

All you can remember is your money is your power. If that dealer wants to be an ass call around and go to another dealer.

I tend to go pretty early in the morning when looking for a new car to beat the crowd and so I have more time to browse.

Often when they start to mention price I just come right out and low ball them. When I bought my Speed I came in and said "This is how much Im paying." and they came back with another offer and I went back to the original statement with the same numbers. When they said they couldnt do it I said ok, grabbed my stuff and was very well ready to leave. They THEN decided "Let me go talk to my manager" lol. Guess what, got it for the price I told them I was paying.

Make sure if you are doing the C4C as I have heard of some dealers giving the 3500 discount to the customers that should be getting the 4500 and pocketing the extra 1000. Remember, a lot of them have very little morals, its the business they are in.

 

[Super Unique]

They were just trying to **** as many as possible. IF they were anywhere near the largest Toyota dealer, they would get better pricing and incentives from Toyota, allowing them to sell for less at a higher volume, thus giving a better deal to consumers, which feeds and continues the cycle. Think about it.

and when you realize the truth, you won't ever step foot in that place again

 

[BillTheCat]

You may have noticed that with very few exceptions, most manufacturers & dealers suspended any & all discounts & inventives on their part when "Cash for Clunkers" kicked in. And it is precisely because they figure the clunker cash will be enough to entice you to buy- at MSRP.

They'll go back to sales & rebates after the clunker cash dries up. Until then, they're looking to land as many sucker fish as they can. I have family friends who manage 2 different car dealers here in FL, and the entire industry is basically not interested in cutting deals until the gubbermint cheese stops flowing.

For the perspective buyer, the conundrum is- do you think you'll get a better bottom-line deal after clunker cash evaporates?

 

[MikeHTally]

A co-worker of mine just traded his fifteen-year-old Nissan pickup on a new Tacoma. He got $3,500 trade for a truck worth about $800, plus some sort of year-end discount and rebate on the Tacoma, plus the $3,500 CFC discount. Lotsa folks at my work have gone for that. Another one traded an elderly Dakota for a Grand Cherokee. Bottom line was almost $14K off sticker for the GC.

 

[Kindred]

Be warned, even thought the Cash for Clunkers officially ends Monday night, I was reading on USAtoday.com that a lot of dealership are going to stop participating today so they have the time Sun. & Mon. to file all the paper work on the gov't website so they get reimbursed.

http://www.usatoday.com/money/autos/2009-08-21-cash-for-clunkers_N.htm

 

[pcpower]

update to story:

so we actually went back to that 1st dealer, because he reallly wanted 2 trade in his clunker for a RAV4. so we get there and our sales guy says he is with another customer, and come back in 30 minutes. WOW thanks again dealer, for your great customer service. also, he made a comment that the clunkers was done already, but he would check if they could make an exception.

so we took a walk next door to Boch Honda, and they were much much better. the parent company is still Boch, but the atmosphere at Honda seemed much friendlier and under control. regardless of the dozens of people trying to trade clunkers, a sales guy was available relatively quickly. and they were doing clunkers til 3 PM and then were going to check with the office, and extend until midnite depending on sales.

bottom line, he bought a 2010 Pilot for about 800 bucks over invoice. got $3500 for the clunker which if traded in regularly would have been worth $400. so not too bad of a deal overall.

the laughable thing though is that this clunker program is supposed to be about Fuel Efficiency and so forth. the clunker had 15 mpg average and the Pilot has 18 mpg average, and a 3 mpg difference in trucks/suvs is enough to have government approval. crazyness.