Buying a new Tahoe (or any car)

[Chauffeur808]

I see alot of people raving about how they got the special pricing and I hate to say it, but it is not the best pricing in my opinion and you are getting ripped off. Car dealerships hate people like me, but it's all about getting the BEST price on a vehicle. This is my car buying process, and I get waaaaay below invoice that the associate/friends pricing is not even close to saving money.

Here are my simple steps as to how I buy my cars.

1. When you go to the dealership and find the car you want and are ready to make the "deal", tell the salesman that you want to see the invoice. If they don't want to show it to you....walk away. Go to another dealership that will show you the invoice. (The invoice is what the dealership "paid" the factory for the car)

2. Once ythey show you the invoice, note the price on a piece of paper, and then ask the salesman for the rebates sheet. This sheet is a printout of all the available rebates for the CURRENT time period. DO NOT let them try to trick you and show you a rebate sheet that is NOT current.

3. Write down the rebates that you qualify for such as "consumer cash", "bonus cash", college student, USAA member, Credit Union Member and financing rebate if you finance through a certain financing company. THERE ARE MANY MORE REBAtes THAT CHANGE FROM TIME TO TIME WITH DIFFERENT NAMES. The above mentioned is not what it may be called.

4. Take the invoice price and minus all the rebates that apply to you or that you qualify for. This is the price that will get you below invoice. Write the price down.

5. Ask what the dealer holdback is for the car. They may tell you and they may not. 9 out of 10 times they will not tell you. Dealer holdback is the price the factory pays the dealership once the car is sold. If they give the holdback amount to you, you can try to minus that from the price that you figured out. ( Invoice minus rebates). Hard to do, but I did it once, and the dealer has to be really wanting/needing to make a sale.

6. When time to go to the financing person to do the paperwork, he/she will offer you all kinds of "goodies". I have been offered paint protection, rust proofing, warranty, weather mats, and all kinds of other things. Tell him/her to "throw in" the warranty and say you want a official GM warranty, not 3rd party. If he/she doesnt throw it in, tell him no deal then. You MUST do this before you sign the contract. If you sign it after the contract, you can forget about getting anything free. 10 out of 10 times I have gotten a extended warranty thrown in for FREE.

7. If you have a trade in, make sure you look at the Kelley Blue Book and figure out what your trade is worth. They will try to low ball you, but fight back and get what the car is really worth. If not, tell em no deal, or use the words I use. I will sign if you give me this much for my trade.

8. BE PREPARED to stay at the dealership for hours. My shortest time buying a new car was 4 hours. The longest was 7 hours. This is all to make you tired and grumpy so that you want to hurry up and go home with your new car but DO NOT rush. Patience is key.

9. Congratulations on your new car that you got BELOW invoice. I just saved you a few thousand more than what you would have paid. I hope this helps.

NOTE: Always go to a dealership to buy a car at the end of the month, like 3 or 4 days before the end. Dealerships need the sales to show for the month and close the month with good sales numbers. If you go at the beginning of the month, they can "play" with you all day long and have the upper hand.

GOOD LUCK! ( By the way, I bought a 2015 Tahoe with a $55,000 dollar price tag for $44,000.00....

 

[fiatdale]

All good advice. And you got your Tahoe for a great price. You still have to look at it both ways. Businesses are in business to make money, not to be a charity. Yes Im biased because I work for a large dealership and yes we do make some great deals on vehicles and services. But if we give that stuff away, we will be out of a job, just like any other business in any other industry. There's a point of being "fair" and then just being obnoxious and greedy. Its unfortunate that the auto industry has the rap it does for salesman and business conduct, but in the end, its just another business trying to make money.

 

[BMPNUGLS]

I also wouldn't necessarily say $11k off a $55k sticker price is a 'outstanding' deal either....good no doubt...but I've bought both my last two trucks brand new from my local dealer and both cases (2010 F150 SCREW 4x4 Lariat & most recently my 2015 LS Suburban 4x4 w max tow) got more than $11k off sticker out the door... Got $17k off the sticker on the F150 late in the same model year...

 

[Tiki]

All good advice. And you got your Tahoe for a great price. You still have to look at it both ways. Businesses are in business to make money, not to be a charity. Yes Im biased because I work for a large dealership and yes we do make some great deals on vehicles and services. But if we give that stuff away, we will be out of a job, just like any other business in any other industry. There's a point of being "fair" and then just being obnoxious and greedy. Its unfortunate that the auto industry has the rap it does for salesman and business conduct, but in the end, its just another business trying to make money.

I agree but the process is not fair to begin with. The cost of the product plus a reasonable margin is fair, not margins on top of margins. There are additional ways for instance that dealers are able to make money, including rebates and sales incentives paid by the manufacturer that are misleading the consumer into thinking that "paying invoice" is 0% return for a dealer. Additionally, there are tons of industries that survive on low margin and high volumes to generate their required cash flows.

I'm all for people getting paid, but I'm not all for paying someone because they want to be paid. Consumers should pay for "value added services" and from a straight 'sales' perspective I don't believe that a dealer salesmen offers me any additional value as a single consumer. Now say that a dealership had five different brands and they could show me analysis on average depreciation and maintence costs associated with individual brands, that would be a value add worth paying for.

You are correct to say that the auto industry gets a bad rap compared to other industries. I deal with suppliers/manufacturers/contractors every day and they are equally bad. In fact, it would be hard for any member on here to try and prove that his/her company doesn't have a sales/business development arm conducting the same practices. However, I would say though that in my job, 95% of the time, the sales teams are generally what I would call 'technical sales' and have specific degrees and training in product development, use, function, and application whereas the vehicle salesmen I deal with, generally, don't understand their own product as much as I do.

 

[Chauffeur808]

All good points. I kinda posted this because I have seen some guys think that the "special" pricing was a great deal. Just feeling sorry for the ones who think this. Yes, businesses need to make money, but they make it up on what I call "suckers" who do not research, and who pay MSRP plus. Dealerships also make money on repairs and make money in many different other ways. So it's not all lost. I posted here for the fellow GM SUV person looking to buy. Not the whole world...lol

As far as my price goes, im happy with it. Its the most I could get. Especially when there is NO inventory of Tahoes here, and they are in demand.

 

[Got-Boost?]

GOOD LUCK! ( By the way, I bought a 2015 Tahoe with a $55,000 dollar price tag for $44,000.00....

Do you mind posting your vehicle, options, and sales invoice?

Just curious how they discounted it that much when there aren't any current rebates or was this when they offered $2,500 off?

 

[George C]

Throw the Kelly Blue Book in the trash. Use it for starting a camp fire or use the pages to line your bird cage.
Nobody uses that, unless it's a weirdly exotic trade without proper local trade data.

If you want to clearly appraise your actual trade in value, find a friend in the use car business and have him run your vehicle comp in your local area auction data base. Trade values flex weekly, especially for pick up trucks.
That is how your dealer appraises your trade.

Buying is simple, should take a minute to complete and be non negotiable. Buyers often become overwhelmed with car **** and forget that they hold all of the cards. Dealers sense that and use it as leverage. Leverage that shouldn't exist and doesn't exist if the buyer removes the emotion.

An easy rule of thumb for buying with a trade is to use your auction wholesale trade appraisal subtracted from invoice and split the holdback. Subtract all incentives and everybody will be happy.

 

[Chauffeur808]

Got Boost.....I had a trade. I was given $$5200 above my trade cause I pushed really hard at the last minute right before signing which was my plan anyway. $2500.00 rebate (when they offered it), $750.00 USAA customer, and Credit Union Promo $2500.00 by the credit union (you had to win this contest). Not necessarily all from looking at invoice and rebates but I was more on the point of anything less than invoice is great. Pays to do homework too.

 

[Got-Boost?]

Got Boost.....I had a trade. I was given $$5200 above my trade cause I pushed really hard at the last minute right before signing which was my plan anyway. $2500.00 rebate (when they offered it), $750.00 USAA customer, and Credit Union Promo $2500.00 by the credit union (you had to win this contest). Not necessarily all from looking at invoice and rebates but I was more on the point of anything less than invoice is great. Pays to do homework too.

You can't include a trade-in when you are quoting a price like that...at least break the price down for others to see when you make a claim.

MSRP- $55k
Invoice- $49k
Rebate- X
Trade- X
Tax- X

Final price- $44k

In that case everyone that put more than 50% down would be saying..."Haggle hard guys, I only paid $25k for a new Tahoe!"



(Oh ya, I put $30k down)

 

[Chauffeur808]

Got Boost, just happy I got my Tahoe for that price. I know others who have said "okay" to a low balled price on their trade and ended up paying what they owed the bank on their trade, pus the price of a their new car. I include the trade because that is how much less I had to pay for the new Tahoe. I could have paid $5200.00 more in addition to the 44k. All about the savings. Getting more than what your trade is worth in my opinion is a big deal.