I'm a car salesmen, Go ahead and ask me anything

[Sylvanfan]

What % of extended warranty's actually end up being worth the money for the customer. I had the bussiness manager at the dealership I dealt with in tears practically when I refused to cough up money for the extended warranty. I basically told him that it made no sense for me to spend money for 5 years of coverage on a vehichle that was being leased for 4 years and had bumper to bumper for 3 years. The guy tried all kinds of ways to spin it, but I absolutely refused to give in. Including that well if you finance it over 48 months, it's only like $25 a month. My counter arguement was that I can put $25 a month into a real estate based mutual fund and get 6% interst and after 4 years I'll have around $1200 that I can use to help cover any repairs, and still have if I don't need any. Sure I could get burned in the end on this, but I've always held the opinion that if they didn't make money on it, they wouldn't be selling it so hard.

I should add that my history of vehichles suggest that I won't put more than 20,000km on a vehichle in any given year, and that the vehichles are stored in garages for most of their lives. Plus I do keep my vehichles maintainance up to date. I could have problems, but I'd have that I'd need to be one of the really unluckey guys to run into something major.

[TimSJ]

Originally Posted by North East Goon

When you take the first offer to the sales manager, you are really just talking about the weather or the Flames or what you are going to do this weekend. You are not actually talking about the transaction are you? What would you list a 1999 VW Golf GL with 84,000 original KM's auto, no ac for a private sale at? Some rust however.

Sometimes we talk about the weather, most of the time though we are genuinly trying to figure out how to put a deal together for you

$5 or $6K would be my guess

[TimSJ]

Originally Posted by toonmaster

if i were to walk onto a used car lot and say "i'm looking to buy this car, paying cash for it today, how low can you go" what kind of deal would i be looking at for say a 2005 grand am gt, 60k kms

Hard to know how much they would have in it.. How much are they asking for it.

[DuffMan]

have you ever read this?

[TimSJ]

Originally Posted by oilers_fan

For the sake of the example, let's say one buys a car for around 24,000...what does the salesman make off of the sale? What percentage of that?

Well if it is a new car

profit at 8% $1,920
say a $500 discount

takes us to $1420 profit

lot fee that the dealer takes on each car $500 say

So the salespersons commsion is figured on $920 and is generall 25%

So we would make approx $230

Dealers nickel and dime us salesguys to death.. I know that i have had a good year the year before when they chnage my commsion plan. Dealers don't like us to make too much money.

[TimSJ]

Originally Posted by DuffMan

have you ever read this?

Yup..

good read

[toonmaster]

Originally Posted by TimSJ

Hard to know how much they would have in it.. How much are they asking for it.

asking 14,900 which i find pretty high, there are multiple 2005 grand am se's being advertised for 11,800 with lower kms (by almost half)

i guess i am curious as to the benefit or "deal", if any, of walking onto a lot with cash in hand, and what kind of percentage can they cut the price by

[TimSJ]

My guess would be that they would have between 8-10 into it. I don't know a ton about the domestic stuff though.

[ken0042]

I was just shopping out prices on Grand Ams (because of mine being stolen last week) and I think that 15K was about the norm. Anything lower priced seemed to have horrible options. (4cyl, steel rims, no spoiler, no CD, etc.)

[ericschand]

Originally Posted by TimSJ

<rant on>It has always been a pet peeve of mine. Everybody wants to buy a car for nothing. How do people expect car dealers to stay in business to service them if we can't make a profit. <rant off>

Let me, as a consumer who dislikes dealers, answer you.

You claim to make 8% on a car. That's fine.

If you were to be upfront about the car, all costs with purchasing it,
warranties, cash-back that you receive from the manufacturer,
performance, service, etc., I would have no problem giving you the
8%. I give a helluva lot more than that on other stuff I purchase,
and given that I will pay extra for good service, I have no qualms about it.

However, when I go into a dealer, I am consistently lied to about the
car; it's warranty, extra costs at time of purchase, service, and maybe
about the features of the car itself, then I really don't want to pay you
8%. At that point I don't even care that you break even.

Go to another dealer? Sure, and get the same hassle.

Why is it that I can haggle for 30 min and get $2,000 off? Why didn't
you give me that up front, and save me my time?

Oh wait...you want us, the buyer, to be honest, and think about you,
while you can mangle what you call honesty all you want, and think
about yourselves.

I've purchased 2 new cars in my life, from different manufacturers.
I will never own another new car in my life. I'll go used, private sale,
thank you.

ers

[BlackEleven]

How many cars does a good salesman sell in a month? How about an average salesman? What would be a good month for a salesman in terms of comission?

[JiriHrdina]

What's really better for the customer - owning or leasing?

[VANFLAMESFAN]

I used to work for Nissan, do the salesmen really hate lot guys?? Because I put up with a lot of **** a few years back.

[TimSJ]

Originally Posted by BlackEleven

How many cars does a good salesman sell in a month? How about an average salesman? What would be a good month for a salesman in terms of comission?

Depends on what they are selling..

Personally i work at a Mercedes-Benz store and sold about 120 new/used last year.

[TimSJ]

Originally Posted by VANFLAMESFAN

I used to work for Nissan, do the salesmen really hate lot guys?? Because I put up with a lot of **** a few years back.

LOL..

We don't hate you.. we just like to give you guys a hard time..

[TimSJ]

Originally Posted by JiriHrdina

What's really better for the customer - owning or leasing?

Depends on the situation..



Personally i like leasing and reccomend it to most of my clients especially on expensive cars.

the biggest advantage of leasing is that it gives you a guarenteed downside. You know going in how much it is going to cost you to drive the car for the next 3 years as an example. If the car is worth more than the buyout you always have the frirst option to buy it out. So you can get your equity. It is an easy write off as well 100% write off on a lease is $750 month plus tax. no worrying about mileages and stuff like that. you are also defering the tax a bit. On a lease you pay the tax on the payment and not the whole amount upfront.

As an example i had a customer who was on a lease and his residual was $67500. Now i can buy his car at the auction everyday for about $52k. So the leasing company is on the hook for the $15k not the customer.

Now if you are a person who keeps a car 5 plus years it likely makes more sense to buy the car.

[TimSJ]

lol..

If your car is making a noise insist that a tech or service advisor goes on a test drive with you when you drop it off. So that you are all hearing the same noise. I have run into it many times we think we fixed something but the customer was hearing something else alltoghether.

The dealership gets paid by the manufacture to do the work. maybe if it is a comeback they have to eat it.. but

[JiriHrdina]

Originally Posted by TimSJ

Depends on the situation..



Personally i like leasing and reccomend it to most of my clients especially on expensive cars.

the biggest advantage of leasing is that it gives you a guarenteed downside. You know going in how much it is going to cost you to drive the car for the next 3 years as an example. .

Yeah I agree, I leased my current car (first time doing so) and I love the certainty of it - and the fact that at the end of the lease I have an easy decision to make based on the mathetmatics of it at that time.

Peace of mind wise, its great.

[brownie]

When going to a dealership to buy a new vehicle,should I just bring a jar of vaseline and bend over right there in the showroom???

[Hack&Lube]

My friend is interested in purchasing a Mazda 3 GS (bottom of the line). Dealerships say they might not get any in stock until March, etc.

Any suggestions for him or where he can get a good deal or even what he can negotiate? He's never bought a car before and has no idea what to do.