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Seriously. My last car (BMW) from seven years ago, I did entirely through email. Sent a handful of dealerships their cost sheet with the options I wanted, until

Seriously. My last car (BMW) from seven years ago, I did entirely through email. Sent a handful of dealerships their cost sheet with the options I wanted, until I got the price I was looking for. Few months later when it was built and shipped from Germany, I drove my old car to the dealership, and drove off with the new one. Done. As an aside, I just ordered a mattress site unseen from an online only company, and it turned out to be one of the best mattresses I've ever slept in. https://www.saatva.com/ https://www.saatva.com/ $1000 for the luxury firm Queen, and that included shipping and taking the old one.

vvanders 10y ago
This is the only way to do new car shopping. Get the price + windows sticker in writing over email. Send it out to all the dealers in the nearby area and tell them they have your business if you can beat the deal. Repeat 2-3x, pick the lowest price dealer and be willing to walk out the door if anything funny comes up. Also quite a few dealerships are directly or indirectly part of a franchise so they won't compete with each other. In that case you usually need to expand your radius to ~100mi. Here in PNW there's great Subaru competition but when we looked at Mazda they didn't haggle at all until we went to dealers in a different state.
- overcast 10y ago
  Yes, when it comes to a lot of luxury European cars, cities typically only have a single dealership, and there isn't much wiggle room. Ended up with one back home 240 miles away. Picked it up my way home for Thanksgiving right off the thruway. Pulled into parents with the new ride :)
  - vvanders 10y ago
    Yeah, we were cross shopping Mazda/Ford/Subaru and it was totally obvious that all the Mazda dealerships were owned by a franchise. When we'd mention a quote they'd push us really hard on where we got it from and wouldn't come back with a counter offer or "we can't beat that". Pretty transparent and only changed once we started emailing dealers across state lines. Either way they lost our business. Subaru on the other had has a pretty diverse set of dealers and we ended up with one well below "inventory"(that's a whole nother bit of misinformation) at a dealership ~15mi away. That said Tesla still wipes the floor with any dealership experience I've had which is why I'm pretty excited to see the Model 3 hit the market and more people experience it.
  - lagadu 10y ago
    Can't you simply have the manufacturer send the car with your desired options to the dealer and you just pay them the MSRP listed for your configuration in the manufacturer's website? Any negotiation that happens is for a price reduction on that or for extra stuff. It's how it's done for new cars in Europe, if the dealer doesn't have stock (though it can require up to a couple months for the new car to get to the factory to the dealer). I did it just this year.
andykellr 10y ago
I did the same thing when we bought my wife's 328 wagon 2 years ago. I emailed about 5 dealerships with a PDF of the options + msrp and they all got back to me in a day or two. I sent a followup email to the others to see if they wanted to beat the best price I received and they all said they couldn't. I also ordered mine because we wanted a specific set of options like adaptive cruise control, upgraded sound system, but no navigation and a very specific color combination that we couldn't find anywhere. Our other car is a Tesla and while I prefer ordering online and checking out with a credit card, emailing multiple dealers was pretty painless. EDIT: If you're curious why we didn't want navigation, this video explains it pretty well: https://youtu.be/hCDt02UXzkQ https://youtu.be/hCDt02UXzkQ Not to mention it's really expensive, hard to input destinations, I generally know where I'm going, and phones work great.
- overcast 10y ago
  I've actually gone back to using a new Garmin standalone device. The screens are huge, don't have issues with data networks not being available, and free up your phone, for phone stuff.
  - JBReefer 10y ago
    Don't go your phone while you drive.
    - illumin8 10y ago
      Hear hear! If you feel you need _any_ phone functions while you're driving, stop, just full on stop, don't pass go, don't collect $200... Just stop, because you're doing something stupid!
      - massysett 10y ago
        Answering an incoming Bluetooth call generally takes fewer steps than tuning the radio.
- smnscu 10y ago
prawn 10y ago
Do you have government/fleet auctions in the US? In Australia, government fleet vehicles are auctioned after a couple of years of use and you can pick up cars before they are grabbed by dealers and topped by margins. Last car I bought was through an online auction. Didn't actually see the car in person until I went to pick it up.
- overcast 10y ago
  Yes we have government auctions, I just don't buy into someone else's problems, even though it's significantly less in cost.
criddell 10y ago
I tried to buy a car via email. I picked out four different cars (a Kia Optima, a Honda Fit, a Toyota Prius, and a Subaru Outback) and emailed all the dealerships for those cars within a three hour drive. None of them would give me anything other than MSRP by email. Most of them called my phone within 15 minutes of me sending the email and all they wanted was for me to come in and talk to them. I eventually went to the Toyota dealership because although they wouldn't negotiate via email, they didn't phone me either. When I told that to the salesman, he said that he could get in trouble for that because he was supposed to call. Like every other car buying experience I've had, buying the Toyota sucked. They want to know what payment I want and all I want them to tell me is the out-the-door price. We would go back and forth and eventually they would bring some paperwork with an offer and they had accidentally changed the term from 48 to 60 months. Whoops! I think it ended up taking close to 3 hours to come to an agreement. To this day, I'm still getting emails and phone calls from some of the dealers I initially contacted and there seems to be no way to make it stop. I would happily pay a small premium to buy from Amazon or direct if I could avoid giving my details to a local dealer. That reminds me, I'm always getting junk mail and phone calls from scammers trying to sell me some aftermarket warranty. How did they get my name, phone, address, and car information? Is that a public record? The dealer swears they don't sell or share their customer lists.
- dlubarov 10y ago
  > None of them would give me anything other than MSRP by email. Most of them called my phone within 15 minutes of me sending the email and all they wanted was for me to come in and talk to them. Maybe you weren't insistent enough? Many dealers don't like negotiating over email, but they also hate to lose a potentially valuable lead. If you make it absolutely clear that you'll only negotiate a certain way (e.g. via email with OTD price quotes), most will play ball. I'd also suggest starting with a service like TrueCar. The prices they give are generally not the best you can get, but it makes for a good starting point for the email negotiations. I also used CarWoo in the past, but they've closed down. Edmunds has a similar service, though I haven't tried it.
- Agustus 10y ago
  They do. In all of their items they say: We will share your data with qualified partners.
baby 10y ago
I don't understand this trend of spending 1k for a mattress. Bought this 200$ one and it's the best bed I ever slept in: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B005A4OP8Y/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1 https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B005A4OP8Y/ref=oh_aui_sear...

vvanders 10y ago

This is the only way to do new car shopping. Get the price + windows sticker in writing over email. Send it out to all the dealers in the nearby area and tell them they have your business if you can beat the deal. Repeat 2-3x, pick the lowest price dealer and be willing to walk out the door if anything funny comes up. Also quite a few dealerships are directly or indirectly part of a franchise so they won't compete with each other. In that case you usually need to expand your radius to ~100mi. Here in PNW there's great Subaru competition but when we looked at Mazda they didn't haggle at all until we went to dealers in a different state.

overcast 10y ago
Yes, when it comes to a lot of luxury European cars, cities typically only have a single dealership, and there isn't much wiggle room. Ended up with one back home 240 miles away. Picked it up my way home for Thanksgiving right off the thruway. Pulled into parents with the new ride :)
- vvanders 10y ago
  Yeah, we were cross shopping Mazda/Ford/Subaru and it was totally obvious that all the Mazda dealerships were owned by a franchise. When we'd mention a quote they'd push us really hard on where we got it from and wouldn't come back with a counter offer or "we can't beat that". Pretty transparent and only changed once we started emailing dealers across state lines. Either way they lost our business. Subaru on the other had has a pretty diverse set of dealers and we ended up with one well below "inventory"(that's a whole nother bit of misinformation) at a dealership ~15mi away. That said Tesla still wipes the floor with any dealership experience I've had which is why I'm pretty excited to see the Model 3 hit the market and more people experience it.
- lagadu 10y ago
  Can't you simply have the manufacturer send the car with your desired options to the dealer and you just pay them the MSRP listed for your configuration in the manufacturer's website? Any negotiation that happens is for a price reduction on that or for extra stuff. It's how it's done for new cars in Europe, if the dealer doesn't have stock (though it can require up to a couple months for the new car to get to the factory to the dealer). I did it just this year.

andykellr 10y ago

I did the same thing when we bought my wife's 328 wagon 2 years ago. I emailed about 5 dealerships with a PDF of the options + msrp and they all got back to me in a day or two. I sent a followup email to the others to see if they wanted to beat the best price I received and they all said they couldn't. I also ordered mine because we wanted a specific set of options like adaptive cruise control, upgraded sound system, but no navigation and a very specific color combination that we couldn't find anywhere. Our other car is a Tesla and while I prefer ordering online and checking out with a credit card, emailing multiple dealers was pretty painless. EDIT: If you're curious why we didn't want navigation, this video explains it pretty well: https://youtu.be/hCDt02UXzkQ https://youtu.be/hCDt02UXzkQ Not to mention it's really expensive, hard to input destinations, I generally know where I'm going, and phones work great.

overcast 10y ago
I've actually gone back to using a new Garmin standalone device. The screens are huge, don't have issues with data networks not being available, and free up your phone, for phone stuff.
- JBReefer 10y ago
  Don't go your phone while you drive.
  - illumin8 10y ago
    Hear hear! If you feel you need _any_ phone functions while you're driving, stop, just full on stop, don't pass go, don't collect $200... Just stop, because you're doing something stupid!
    - massysett 10y ago
      Answering an incoming Bluetooth call generally takes fewer steps than tuning the radio.
smnscu 10y ago

prawn 10y ago

Do you have government/fleet auctions in the US? In Australia, government fleet vehicles are auctioned after a couple of years of use and you can pick up cars before they are grabbed by dealers and topped by margins. Last car I bought was through an online auction. Didn't actually see the car in person until I went to pick it up.

overcast 10y ago
Yes we have government auctions, I just don't buy into someone else's problems, even though it's significantly less in cost.

criddell 10y ago

I tried to buy a car via email. I picked out four different cars (a Kia Optima, a Honda Fit, a Toyota Prius, and a Subaru Outback) and emailed all the dealerships for those cars within a three hour drive. None of them would give me anything other than MSRP by email. Most of them called my phone within 15 minutes of me sending the email and all they wanted was for me to come in and talk to them. I eventually went to the Toyota dealership because although they wouldn't negotiate via email, they didn't phone me either. When I told that to the salesman, he said that he could get in trouble for that because he was supposed to call. Like every other car buying experience I've had, buying the Toyota sucked. They want to know what payment I want and all I want them to tell me is the out-the-door price. We would go back and forth and eventually they would bring some paperwork with an offer and they had accidentally changed the term from 48 to 60 months. Whoops! I think it ended up taking close to 3 hours to come to an agreement. To this day, I'm still getting emails and phone calls from some of the dealers I initially contacted and there seems to be no way to make it stop. I would happily pay a small premium to buy from Amazon or direct if I could avoid giving my details to a local dealer. That reminds me, I'm always getting junk mail and phone calls from scammers trying to sell me some aftermarket warranty. How did they get my name, phone, address, and car information? Is that a public record? The dealer swears they don't sell or share their customer lists.

dlubarov 10y ago
> None of them would give me anything other than MSRP by email. Most of them called my phone within 15 minutes of me sending the email and all they wanted was for me to come in and talk to them. Maybe you weren't insistent enough? Many dealers don't like negotiating over email, but they also hate to lose a potentially valuable lead. If you make it absolutely clear that you'll only negotiate a certain way (e.g. via email with OTD price quotes), most will play ball. I'd also suggest starting with a service like TrueCar. The prices they give are generally not the best you can get, but it makes for a good starting point for the email negotiations. I also used CarWoo in the past, but they've closed down. Edmunds has a similar service, though I haven't tried it.
Agustus 10y ago
They do. In all of their items they say: We will share your data with qualified partners.

baby 10y ago

I don't understand this trend of spending 1k for a mattress. Bought this 200$ one and it's the best bed I ever slept in: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B005A4OP8Y/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1 https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B005A4OP8Y/ref=oh_aui_sear...