james5377 said:The invoice price for my Protege5 with all the options are $15355 (carsdirect.com) which includes $2500 factory rebates. If I were to put in my $500 college rebate, the price I paid for mine ($14625) is still lower than whats its supposed to be . (thumb)
Just a suggestion here.... go to www.mazdausa.com and search the inventory of the dealers around your area. (peep) Check out their cars and find those that have the options/colors that interest you the most. I did an excel worksheet of all the dealers's inventory that has cars that have ABS option. After that, I narrowed it down to several dealers that have the options that I want. And I just inquire each dealers individually and wait for them to court my business aggressively. (guns) I finally go for one that tried relentlessly and politel enough even thought I did not return his calls (lol2) (receive way too many phone calls from dealers (bang) ). The final price he quoted me was good enough to get me sign the paper .
If you can pay the car with cash, you can DEFINIETLY get a good deal!! (silly)
I was debating about whether to get Mazda3, but I know I will not get a good deal since its new to the market. Besides, the first year model is probably gonna have some problems in one way or the other. Also, since Protege5 is only available in 2002 and 2003, that actually somewhat leave the car pretty desirable in a couple of years time.
Hey, I even had a hard time looking for a used Protege5 !!
September 2002. I forgot, it also has alarm and cassette player, which is never used.Rah Sham Bo said:Damn...When did you get it?
Andy said:Heres some more detail:
Sticker price 19,040
I paid 17,426 plus:
Service and handling: 595
Tax: 1131
Tag: 200
Total: $19,354
But, I was able to get 0% financing for 4 years.
All of these figures I'm hearing is doing nothing but driving down the resale value of these cars. Oh well! (dance)
That would be for paperwork (profit). I haggled with the dealership for over 4 hours on the price, and they wouldn't come down any more in price. I think it had something to do with them getting a check from Mazda. They said they sold it to me at their cost, and even showed me the invoice. I also noticed on the pink slip they fudged the numbers on the taxes, which kept the cost of the car at invoice.ub4me said:0% financing is worth more than $1500, so your final price would be $17.8K. I don't think it was a bad deal since you bought it last year.
Anyway, what is "Service and handling: 595"? I don't understand it
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james5377 said:The $500 college rebate is valid for people who are about to graduate or graduated from college within two years of graduation date. The exact information is available on the www.mazdausa.com. Most car manufacturers such as Toyota and Ford has such college rebates plan.
Most of the dealers usually ask you for your graduation date coz people are more enticed to buy the cars if there is $500 discount on the car. My $5000 discount from MSRP includes the factory rebates of $2500 and college rebates of $500/
Like my dad always says.... its pay to go to college.
As for dealers, I have at least 8 dealers within 75 miles radius from my place.