For the non power buyer
Mar 18 '00
I've seen a whole bunch of great advice here, and much of it boils down to doing all your research beforehand - and most of the rest mentions in passing how important it is to have done your research beforehand before telling you how to make the best use of that knowledge.
Inevitably, they're right. If you've followed their advice successfully you won't need what you're going to read here nearly as much - especially if you know what options you want, though I'll tell you a couple of extra options he's probably going to try to sell you so you can decide before he's in your face. If you keep meaning to study consumer reports and similar periodicals, even though thinking about it gives you a headache, and you suspect there's a slight chance you're going to put it off until you MUST buy and you have an excuse for skipping the whole thing, this is definitely for you.
First, one last attempt. Head for Borders book store, pretend you're going to buy a cup of coffee and maybe a very relaxing novel, then before you can stop yourself rush over to the auto section and quickly look up the model you are interested in, or even a model you might be interested in. If you take your children to the library on a research project they put off until the last day (where do kids get these bad habits?) they'll have some of the same periodicals in the magazine section, and the librarian or catalog will help you find books.
Still here? I know how you feel. After the tension of buying was over my fiance and I went to look at magazines to see if she had gotten a good deal or not. Fortunately we had bought around the end of August, both near the end of the month and the model year. The magazines said we got a good deal. Of course the prices they listed probably didn't include end of year dealer incentives, but it still could have been much worse. We bought at the right time, at least, and the had Corolla's on the lot they needed to sell.
What finally got us out the door and to the dealer was a full page newspaper advertisement that looked to good to be true. Looks can be deceiving, but in this case it was too good to be true. If an advertisement says in one place 2.9 A.P.R financing is available, and another place 60 month financing is available, do not assume you can get a five year loan at 2.9 percent. The 2.9 is only for two years, or was in this case. Similarly, a store that sells new and used Toyota Corolla's may say they have new Corolla's at great prices, and that they have Toyota Corolla's for ten thousand dollars, but don't connect the two statements just because one is right under the other. The 10K one is used. In general, any one offer that sounds good probably can't be applied with anything else not written in the same sentence, or with the vehicle prices written elsewhere in the advertisement. The chances that they will have to resort to telling you the car you wanted is out of stock are remote, a sophisticated dealer has many better tools in his toolkit.
Even though for whatever reason you have not done as much research as we should, even a vague idea of what you want is better than nothing. For instance, knowing you want a small inexpensive car is better than trusting the dealer to choose the best car for your needs and budget, and knowing you want a Toyota Corolla is better still. If you know you want a Toyota Corolla VE you'll probably have picked up a vague idea of what it should cost from somewhere. If you don't know what VE stands for you might think you're getting a great deal because you're comparing the price you paid for a VE (value Corolla) with the price someone paid for a slightly more expensive version of the Corolla. Either way, you have at least a chance of an alarm going off in your head when he tries to sell you the Corolla for the price of a Camry.
There's a good chance he's going to try and sell you an alarm system for your car. "Just say you save five dollars a month on your insurance, and you pay five dollars more per month on your auto loan. Then you have the alarm for free, right?"
My fiance called her insurance company. Just say you save $1.50 per month on your insurance, since the car is not one of the high theft brands and has a passive alarm system built in anyway. Part of the reason he was so anxious to sell it, I think, is one of the cars he wanted to move had it installed anyway. He wanted to sell it so bad he gave us a lower rate on the loan. From what I've read here since, we could probably have got that lower rate from a bank without the alarm, but if you want to win every round, go back to paragraph one and two. Also, I'd go for the alarm on your Ferrari, or even the Lincoln you plan to drive into Manhattan.
When the first salesman was selling us the car, it sounded like the three year bumper to bumper guarantee covered everything. After the decision to buy was made and they wanted to squeeze a little more out of us, it came out that they couldn't reasonably be expected to cover oil changes and replacement of brake pads from normal wear and wiper blades, and I don't remember what else. The six year extended plan covered everything. We said no to that, and I advise you to also, I think it tends to be a high profit item for the dealer. You'll have to make your own decision, but decide beforehand how much extra you'd be willing to pay for that extra coverage (how much do you expect to spend repairing a four to six year old car, and how much do you expect to spend on brake pads, oil changes, and whatever else he tells you is included) because even if it hurts your head to think about it, might as well experience the headache in the comfort of your own home - the dealer WILL bring it up.
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Epinions.com ID:
DavidWeisman
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Member: David Weisman
Location: Carle Place, New York
Reviews written: 169
Trusted by: 70 members
About Me:
I'm mostly writing fiction right now.
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