I don’t really care for haggling, but I’m willing to do it if it’s worth my time. I think that I hold my own against other amateurs, but I’ve never bought a new car. I wouldn’t really want to go up against a professional.
Won’t haggle?!
I like it but I’m not too good at it. I hate when people try to haggle with me in my shop though.
If I’m paying in cash I’ll always look for something off because at the very least they can spare you the transaction fee.
I enjoy haggling to a degree. I don’t really do it at retail stores, and I’ve purchased most of my electronics online anyway, but for cars it can be fun.
What I do for cars is once I’ve decided on the car, I go through cars.com and costco’s program and let the dealers email or call me. I also do a bit of research to find out what people are paying for the car. If there is a car specific message board, you can get the price range to a pretty accurate number.
I won’t walk into the dealership until the price range is where I want it. I also tell them that I want the price of the vehicle including tags, taxes, etc. Can’t get me to that range, then it was nice talking with you. Once we have the price range, we go in and I let my wife take over. She likes to haggle for the sake of haggling and can spend hours doing it. She will then get a few hundred off the price.
Paying sticker price is for suckers. Those who see themselves as being noble or above it all by paying full price deserve to be sucker-punched by the retailers who are charging outrageous mark-ups on nearly everything. Almost anything is open to negotiation. It’s one thing if you’re too timid to try it, quite another to just roll over and take it up the butt.
I prefer to dicker.
Back in the days of yore, when I worked as a recruiter, every training course I ever took recommended telling people to deflect this question. It isn’t up to you to price yourself, as you can only really either price yourself out of the job, or signal that you are willing to take less than they are willing to offer. It isn’t like the company is going to suddenly increase its budgeted amount for the position by 10% because you have asked for higher than they were planning to pay.
Make them make the first offer. I always told people to say, and I have doen it myself “I’m willing to work for a salary commensurate with my skills and experience, and the responsibilities of the position.” Let them put a number down. If you don’t think it is enough, you might have upward bargaining possibilities, but once you say a number, you have put a ceiling on your earnings.
Hijack
I am a little curious about this. Doesn’t that allow the employer to frame the salary range? Are you really at a disadvantage if you open at, say, $82K and they would have opened at $76K? I don’t think you’ve priced yourself out of the job, especially since employers know that you can be talked down (probably more easily than they can be talked up).
I might agree you don’t want to bring it up until an offer of employment (without a salary figure) has been made. The rationale being that after each side has invested the time and have come to the conclusion that it is a good fit, the more likely a negotiation over salary won’t go off the rails.
How do you answer the question “What is your current compensation?”, though? I couldn’t come up with a good bullshit for that one in time.
How about, “Enough about me. Let’s talk about YOU!”
Seriously, depending on what kind of job we’re talking about, I think you can politely refuse to answer that. "I’m not quite ready to discuss the financial aspects of the position. I’d like to know more about the requirements, expectations, etc. Can you tell me a little more about blah-blah?’
I know this doesn’t work well on the lower-rung positions (i.e., under $50K), but I think there’s more wiggle room as you move up.
It is what the incumbent is making, plus 10%.
I just don’t see any benefit of it. I am not sure HR people actually expect you to answer it either.
Again, as someone has said, the higher up the totem pole you are, the more leeway there is. But for the type of people I was dealing with (salaries in the $50-$100k range) I don’t see the benefit for them answering the question.
I disagree with this. I have worked for companies and I’ve done payroll and bonuses and this happens all the time IF you have a person who wants you bad enough.
I’ve seen managers say to the controller or GM, “Look this guy is great and I want him. Make room for him.” And if the manager that wants to hire him is firm enough they get it. I had one lady in H/R want the sales person so much, but he insisted on a PRIVATE assistant. (Usually it was one asst per three sales people). He got it. So in effect we wound up paying him $10K MORE than any other salesperson but we also had to hire a $32K/year asst (that doesn’t include benefits) for him. Was it worth it. No, not in the least, but the H/R manager pitched a big enough fuss about how great he was.
I’ve seen salaries with $20,000/year differences just because some people negotiate better.
On the flip side, I’ve had some job interviews where they refuse to even talk to you unless you name a price first off. Not a range but a price. I just pick something, but don’t take it too seriously. As a matter of fact I’ve been so frustrated at H/R people like that, that I’ll lowball them and go through the interview steps and waste their time.
I hate haggling.
When I bought my last car (in August) I called the local dealers one by one and asked them to beat the quote from the previous one each time. The trick is that once the guy calls you back with the offer, you thank them, but make sure you talk to somebody else when you call back again.
Huh? You’re getting quotes from different salespeople at the same dealership?