2023 Tahoe Buying Advice - Ordering vs Looking For?

[WilliamMunny]

I have been in the market for a 2023 Tahoe LT for about 6 months now. As I won't pay more than MSRP (most dealers want $2k - $8k over) and I am not in a rush it's been a lot of looking. I finally found two dealers within 100 miles of me that are selling at MSRP but neither had an LT in stock or comming.

After speaking with one of the dealers I placed an "order" with them for a 2023 Tahoe Silver (Luxury Package, 20" wheels, cross bars, Max Trailers (if they can get it) $69,330MSRP). No money down and I can walk any time, but the dealer explained this is not a traditional "order" where GM would build the Tahoe but when given the chance by GM the dealer would find a car that I want and take it in their stock to sell to me. I guess once a month or so dealers can pick a couple of newly built vehicles from a GM list to bring to their lot. I was told it takes about 12 weeks for this process, depending on what is offered and who has put their request in before me.

Has anyone done an order like this? Is there any other advice? I don't mind waiting but the value of my trade is going down and rates are going up.

I have looked anywhere within 250 miles of me and either the car/color is not available or if it is they what way over MSRP.

Thanks.

 

[todayusay]

sounds a little sketchy...so 3 months and you might get one?

wouldn't burn that bridge but looking for units "in stock or in transit" is a gamble for sure...but if you contact a few you may get a call back weeks later of one that has come available...would also try and find a dealer you could place a "real order" with...hopefully without a non refundable deposit...wouldn't think an LT order would take too long to be picked up by a decent sized dealer

 

[andresm89]

I was in more or less the same boat as you with an order in with no movement in months. My advice is to keep looking at the in transit inventory and call dealers in your area when new vehicles pop up. (maybe expand your search radius?)

I kept looking daily and managed to find one available a few hours from me at MSRP.

 

[WilliamMunny]

What is the best way to search the in-transit inventory, just chevy.com?

 

[Pertzbro]

or cars.com alot of them will have a picture or wording saying it's In-Transit.

 

[andresm89]

I was mainly using this: https://www.chevrolet.com/locate-inventory/tahoe

 

[WilliamMunny]

Found a Tahoe that I was looking for, only 2 hours away asking MSRP. But then talked to sales and they put a "ceramic coating" on the car for only $1995, they do it on all their cars. I hate shopping for cars.

 

[StephenPT]

I mentioned this in another thread, but GM should stop with this "custom order" process and either not allow it, or come up with something new. You're not really "ordering" a car. You're putting in a "request" to the dealer of your choice that says "Here's what I want - when you get allocation for this, can you put my order against that allocation."

There is nothing that prevents a GM dealership from having 1,000 "orders" for Tahoes/Suburbans and they will only receive ~50 allocations for the model year (allocation size depends entirely on the size of the dealer).

I believe Ford is setup where they send their allocations ahead of time to their dealers, they fill them with customer orders and once they are out of allocations they can't accept more orders. Honda and Toyota don't allow you to order a car - you put your name on a list with the dealership and you get your place in line. They then call you when they find something that matches or is close to what you want. GM's process is more like Honda/Toyota, but they allow you to "order" your rig with this fallacy that your order will materialize into a rig in your hands within a matter of time. Don't get me wrong - for a lot of people their orders do materialize and they get exactly what they ordered. You have to do your homework ahead of time and find out A) How many allocations does the dealer get per year B) How many people are ahead of you in line. C) Is the dealer going to be good at communicating with you if your order can be placed, but needs to be slightly tweaked to get it accepted.

Knowing what I know now, I never should have placed an "order." I should have setup a Cars.com account - set my criteria to what I'm looking for, wait for the right one to pop up, make a call and hope that it's not pre-sold.

 

[Crabby]

It's the new dealer thing, adding ceramic coating, window tint or wrapping part of the front. If you order make sure in your deal that when
it comes in they don't add anything unless you want it.

 

[bunky319]

Knowing what I know now, I never should have placed an "order." I should have setup a Cars.com account - set my criteria to what I'm looking for, wait for the right one to pop up, make a call and hope that it's not pre-sold.

I hear what you are saying. But I think it depends on your "must haves" in a vehicle. For example, I believe you also are waiting on a diesel and those are very scarce on the inventory site. They have been scarce for a long time. So maybe you would have found one, maybe not. But the likelihood that it is A) available and B) being sold for MSRP or less might be a low probability. I wanted to find a dealer who will honor Supplier pricing, which cuts down the number of available dealers even more.

Then what other options do you need? For example, I must have a bench seat in the 2nd row. Those are very rare on inventory units and even more rare on something like a Denali. So in my situation, I think I would have been waiting even longer to get what I want to show up in inventory.

Now if you want something more common like the 5.3 (or even the 6.2) you probably have lots of options taking the "search the inventory" approach.

Personally I still like the ordering process, but I wouldn't waste time with a smaller dealer. I've had an SLT (diesel) order in at a smaller dealer since 8/16 and it still hasn't been picked up. I put an order in for a base Denali (diesel) at a larger dealer on 9/16 and it was just accepted today.

But I do agree the ordering process is confusing and frustrating. I guess you have to pick which approach works for you.