Ninja_Matt
Authorized Vendor
Thank you!
For future prospective buyers, how many % below invoice would you say is a good deal?
Short Answer: I would say 2-3% below invoice, or about 5-6% off MSRP before incentives is a solid deal for someone off the street not trying to waste a ton of time negotiating with a million dealers. This assumes a dealer fee reasonable for your market (some markets are $200, some are $899).
Long Answer: This may vary slightly on a few factors such as dealer fees, region, purchase type and specific model/trim, but generally speaking Invoice tends to be about 2.5-3% under MSRP, with some base models being closer to 2%.
After invoice you have holdback which should equal 1% of pre-destination MSRP and then CO-OP money which is essentially advertising and marketing reimbursement credits to Mazda dealers which varies based on different tiers that dealers can have (for example, at least back when the new dealer designs came out to replace the old green and orange design, dealers would get paid back more money per car for making the investment to modernize). Let's call that 2.5%. There is also typically some other behind the scenes cash that the dealer makes at volume and again based on the tier of that dealership. All said and done, not counting the money they make back on dealer fees, typically 10-11% off is where dealers truly start losing money, assuming they are a high volume dealer maximizing on their manufacturer bonuses.
Now to be clear, this is net profit to the ownership, sales reps and sales manager rarely get paid on net profit, they have a gross profit based on a cost before holdback, Co-Op and the behind the scenes money which is why it is so hard to get a deal this low because the people you are working with are literally taking money out of their paycheck to sell them that deep because their loss on their pay line stars closer to 4-5% area. This is why we work with ownership for bulk deals and those decision makers can see the real net profit lines.
Just some advice when comparing deals and negotiating. Never include rebates as a discount. Those are non-cost adjustments from the dealer, the manufacturer pays for them, if they manufacturer gave them a $40,000 rebate, you wouldn't be getting a 95% off deal from the dealer. Your real sale price here, based on your numbers is $41,750 which represents a 5.6% discount.Bought a car about two weeks ago in the PNW region. Cash deal no financing.
2025 CX-5 2.5 Turbo Signature
MSRP: $44,245 (Soul Red Paint, Cargo Cover, Wheel Locks, Roof Rail & Cross Bar PKG)
Sale Price: ~$39k (inclusive of $2k customer cash + $750 mazda loyalty)
OTD Price: ~$39k + TTL
That’s 11.5% off MSRP. Not the best deal I’ve ever negotiated, but the wife insisted on red and there was very low inventory in my area with that color. Most cars on lots came in either white, black, or gray.
Considering you paid cash and the dealer isn't getting any money back from the bank, this is a great deal. You also got a nice amount of rebates with it, which does affect how good of a deal of course holistically (a $40k rebate at MSRP from the dealer still beats a 10% off dealer discount with no rebates), but my method is to gauge the dealer participation aspect, plus Mazda rebates tend to be pretty consistent. You rarely see a big outlier in huge rebates.
-Matt