I have never owned a car. I have always gotten by with walking, biking, bussing and sometimes mooching a ride from friends and family. However, as I start my clerkship rotations in medical school this summer I will need a car. Busses don’t run at some of the insane hours I’m likely to be going to and from hospitals. So I’m going to buy a car. I have some basic knowledge of the process but I’m missing the details. I know that the sticker price is not really the price, you’re expected to bargain. But how much should I reasonably expect to bring the price down? Is it better to get a loan though whatever the dealership has set up or go to my bank? Any other important tips or tricks I should know going in? I’m sure there’s at least one Doper who’s a used car salesman. Can you give me any inside information on the process?
The big difference from the old days and now is that consumers can be better armed with information before they ever set foot in a dealership. When I bought my last car, I researched it at www.edmunds.com. I was able to read reviews and also calculate a fair market price for the car I wanted based on my zip code.
When it came time to buy. I even used edmunds to do that: they have a feature to list the car you want and dealers write you with offers, they know they are in a bidding war and there was very little BS.
I also got my car loan through e-loans.com. When I walked in the dealer, I looked at the car, said “throw in floor mats and I’ll buy it.” I had my own financing and I left. The whole thing took an hour at the most.
When I got out of college, I worked for one week as a car salesman (I never finished the training) we had classes on things like “never tell the person how much a car actually costs” and “getting the customer to come inside” it was gross really really gross.
Don’t be pressured. Don’t buy a bunch of options you don’t need. Think about how you live, what you like. The better prepared you are when you go in, the less nonsense you will get from the dealers.
It will help if you give us a little more information. Are you shopping for new or used? If you are going used, it is a completely different ballgame. Personally, I would never buy a used car from a dealer, if only because I can’t deal with used car salesmen. This may be a different situation if you are buying a “pre-owned” guaranteed car that is coming off a 3 year lease. What kind of car are you looking for and what is your budget?
I’m looking at used cars. Something in the 8-9 thousand range. I’ll have to borrow about half of that. I’m going through a dealer because I simply can’t afford to spend the time searching through used car listings. This way I can just show up and say that I’m looking for something with decent gas milage, large enough that I can chuck 6 weeks worth of junk in it to head off for my away rotations, reliable enough that it’s unlikely to die on me halfway to nowhere, preferably with a manual transmission and let them try to sell me things that match my criteria.
Find a friend or relative who has done this before and does it well. Go with them.
Or, buy a Saturn. Decent cars, no haggling.
Three words… Honda Honda Honda
they make great, low maintenence, cheap to repair and easy/fun to drive. A 1998-2002 will probably fit your budget, and get you reliable, economical transportation.
Regards (and good luck!)
FML
Something like an old Kia will cost half your budget - so you won’t have to borrow - and be sensible, safe, and nobody will want to steal it. I bought my Kia Shuma for less than $5000 when it was 3 years old, and it has served me well.
Yeah, You can buy a brand new Hyundai Accent for 10K, and it comes with a 10yr/100K warranty.
I paid $5K for mine* when it was three years old and its done very well for me. (second owner gets 5 yrs/50k warranty from date of original owner’s purchase). The hatchback holds a suprising amount of stuff.
*note: from a private party; a dealer tried to sell me on the identical model, with higher mileage, for $7500.
Do find a local independent mechanic (or at least one from a different dealership) to inspect whatever car you find. Don’t trust the word of the selling dealer on the car’s mileage and condition - they have a strong incentive to mislead, at the least. Friends of ours had put a deposit on a used car some years back, from a “reputable” dealer; they were told it had xx miles on it. An independent inspection showed that the car was probably MUCH higher mileage (50K or so) than was disclosed to them. Needless to say, they canceled that deal. Also the dealers may truly not know the car’s history.
Carfax can be a useful tool but - as I found when I sold our old car last year - it’s not all that accurate: mine had an accident reported on it that had never occurred, and its history entirely omitted an accident that had occurred (I disclosed that to the buyer, FWIW).
Excellent used car. But the Op could still get taken on the price. That’s where he seems to want help.
I was going to recommend the exact same thing. If you have a friend who has the same brand car that you are shopping for, ask him who his mechanic is and use them for the mechanical inspection, independent of the dealer. It should cost less than a hundred dollars, and will be well worth it. Personally, I really favor Toyotas, and for 8 or 9 grand you should be able to get one with fairly low mileage that will last for years without major problems.
Read “Don’t get taken every time” by Remar Sutton. Always buy used and best to buy from a private party who you know is not a “professional” (someone who does it as a side business.) If you must buy from a dealer, never finance it through him, get your financing from a bank or credit union. Just remember, if you go through a dealer they always lie, they will never ever tell you the true cost of the car to them, many salespeople don’t have any idea of that cost.
If you go therough a dealer you are going to pay a lot more than is necessary. If your ime is that valuable I would try and find a friend or relative and pay them to buy your car for you. Consumer reports can tell you the most reliable vehicles in your price range and you can find the exact vehicles you want over the internet, including dealers and private sellers. It is not that time consuming. I guarantee you I saved several thousand dollars by buying my car from a private party, not least because I paid no sales tax (may not be the case in every state.)
Yeah, that’s a really horrible idea. Instead, research cars in your price range, find one that meets your criteria, then go to a dealer and work it out.
Thanks all for the advice. I didn’t mean to make it sound like I hadn’t done any research and was just going to believe whatever they told me. I did research the types of cars I was interested in before going to a dealership that my parents have had good interactions with before. I had already decided that paying more by going to a dealership was worth it to cut down on the search time. And I left to do more research on the specific cars they had on the lot before coming back to buy a gently used ford focus. One more life learning experience checked off. I begin to feel almost like a competent adult.
Your gently used ford focus could very well have underwater when Katrina hit. There is no such thing as a reliable used car dealer. Good luck. I hope your medical judgment is better.
Unlikely as carfax said it has been continuously registered in Washington State for its entire life.