My most negative experiences with sales has been while purchasing a car. The Hyundai dealer in North Little Rock refused to speak to my wife and would only answer my questions which pissed me off to no end. When I was very young, about 20, I didn’t have anyone to cosign, but after talking to the nice Jeep dealer in McKinney, Texas he gave me a call a few days later and told me to come on down and they could do something. Once I got there, he asked if I had a cosigner, which he knew I did not, and then told me there was nothing he could do if I didn’t have one. It was a humiliating experience made much worse because I had to repair my car before I could leave the dealer.
It seems to me that one of the reasons car sales professions are so sleazy is because the entire industry is set up to be sleazy. Many states have laws forbidding an auto manufacturer from direct sales, restrict the number of dealerships in a geographic area, prevent manufacturers from ending agreements with dealerships, etc., etc. These laws help dealerships but probably drive the price up for the rest of us.
My wife and I had a pretty good experience when we bought her Toyota in 2020. We got a hell of a deal on a truck.
The last two Hondas that I bought I did the same thing. There is a dealer in my town and two others less than an hour away. When I get to the dealer I will know the exact model, trim and color that I want.
I tell the salesperson, “This is the exact car that I want. I will be paying cash. You will give me your best price today for the car and for the trade in. You will get one chance. I will not negotiate or price match. I will be going to Santa Barbara, Oxnard and Lompoc. Lowest price wins.”
When internet car sales started to take off in the mid '00s, the California Car Dealer’s Association tried to make it illegal because it was going to fuck their business tactics. I’m sure that they had some kind of ostensible bullshit reason but it didn’t go through.
There is a lot of truth in this.
There was a recent court ruling against National Association of Realtors (NAR).
With a 1.8 billion judgement, and a change to long existing fees.
My understanding Truecar once was a very useful service to the buyer.
But now TrueCar makes money from fees paid by dealerships to sell vehicles on the platform.
So another level of sleaze.
I know USAA has has parted ways with Truecar, due to these issues.
I think the level of competition/fungibility of the product has a lot to do with it as well.
If you’re looking to buy a house, there are probably a pretty limited number of houses that’ll be in your price range, have the amenities you want, and be in the condition you’re willing to take. And each one has one owner, and your realtor (should you employ one) will help you get the process rolling.
Cars on the other hand, are extremely fungible. Not only are there multiple makes and models in each category, but there are lots of dealerships selling the same makes and models. So the competition is far more fierce than it is for a house. I mean, if I want to get a Honda Accord, there are seventeen Honda dealerships within 100 miles, and there are just as many Toyota dealerships selling Camrys, Ford dealers selling Tauruses, and so forth.
So the pressure on any given salesman to get a customer is much higher than for someone selling a house.
I suspect it’s mainly the subculture. I note that car dealerships are known to be sexist towards female customers, enough so that they stand out from other businesses. And have a reputation for being highly sexist internally as well.
While that’s not the same as being “sleazy” in a business sense, I’m pretty sure there’s a strong overlap between “obnoxiously sexist” and “a jerk in general”.
Just say: “I have a severe chemical sensitivity to polydimethylsiloxane, an ingredient in sealants. If you can’t remove the sealant—or skip it entirely—at this price, I’ll have to walk away. I’m sorry, but that’s non-negotiable for me.”
If they won’t budge, thank them and turn to leave. Chances are, they’ll reconsider once they see you’re prepared to walk.
I remember Consumer Reports advising against dealer-applied undercoating because rhe installation often required drilling holes in the underside. Those holes become the source of rust.
They’re a good starting point. When I bought my last car, I started there to get an idea of what a good trade-in value for my car was and what the price would be for the sort of car I wanted.
I then took that information to a second dealership, who offered me more money than CarMax for my trade-in but was also charging more for the cars they were selling. I wasn’t particularly interested in their selection of cars, so I got their offer of the trade-in value in writing and took it to a third dealership.
That third dealership appeared to make their money from offering less money for trade-ins and lower prices for their selection. But the salesman said they would match any other offer that you had in writing. Since the second dealership was offering me 2.5k more than the third dealership had wanted to offer for my car, it meant getting an extra 2.5k for my car and then getting the car I wanted at the lowest asking price of its kind on the local market.
The salesman was so pissed that he basically just left me sitting at his desk by myself the whole time while he went off to try to make another sale. The finance guy then tried to sneak in an 8% interest rate on my loan to try to recoup some profits that way. Then I spoke up, saying this wasn’t the interest rate I was expecting based on my credit rating and asked if it was too late for me to back out of the whole sale and walk away. He knocked down that interest rate real fast.
Nobody who worked at the dealership seemed real happy with me, but putting in some extra work yourself can give you some good leverage when it comes to car buying.
We tried to buy a mazda van, once, and when my husband went to actually buy the car, he noticed that “she” (an unnamed employee who has filled out the paperwork) had made several errors, all in favor of the dealership. After a could of hours fighting them, he got the deal we’d agreed on.
A few hours later i got a frantic call from a clerk at USAA, my insurance company. (“oh, I’m so glad i reached you. The salesman said it was critical the car get registered before the weekend, and said you were hard to reach” (neither true. There was no hurry. I usually could answer my phone.) the salesman had sent paperwork for a different VIN than the one my husband had faxed to the company earlier that day.
I wrote a very nice letter about her service, addressed to her and her supervisor. We ended up with a Honda Odyssey, that served us well for many years
I’ve also bought cars in fairly normal transactions. I don’t think they are all sleazy. But there’s certainly a tolerance of sleaze in that industry that i haven’t seen anywhere else.
Back beefore cell phones and the like, Edmunds was a good source to figure out what a good price was for a new car. I would print out the information and put it in a folder that I took to the dealer with me… Whatever the dealer’s offer was, I’d open the folder, check it against the Edmunds price and say either okay or try again. Just the appearsance of having done one’s homework was an effective tool.
Nowadays of course Edmunds (and Kelley) work as dealership referral services and won’t give you any useful information about cars until you agree to let them send your info to every spammy dealership in your state. Who then will will tell you everything they want you to know about cars.
The data we all really want is accurate pricing data. What is the true dealer cost and what have [whatever] make, model, year cars actually sold for locally.
All that is info they guard like the crown jewels. Because that info is the crown jewels of their profitability. If consumers knew it, dealers would starve.
I bought a 25 Accord Hybrid Touring, this evening.
After identifying exactly the combination I wanted; I sent a very simple but direct e-mail to the 41 dealership within 500 miles that had one in stock.
After 24 hours I contacted the one, that gave me the best out the door price, from this e-mail.
Dozens of the others ‘demanded’ I give them another shot.
Salesperson was great, no surprises.
Finance/paperwork guy, even though I paid in cash; tried to slip in a $5k warranty, and started lying about the prior agreement, when I would not agree.
When I picked up the cashiers check, and called for an Uber, he decided they would forgo it.
Wonderful car, shitty experience.
I just bought a used Volvo S60. Found it online, wasn’t looking for a Volvo but this one was the right price and it looked good to me. I had confirmed the out-the-door price before I committed to meeting at the dealership to check it out and they didn’t play any games. I had a blank check from my credit union and the paperwork guy just made a quick call to them, filled out the check, I signed a bunch of stuff, and I was out the door for actually a little less than the price they gave me beforehand in about 90 minutes total. I had to go back a couple of times for a couple of things (cosmetic issue on the steering wheel, tags, and second key) but that was all quick, easy, and free.