Car shopping tips

[tvguy]

I know this is an older thread, but I'm starting the process to buy a new car now, and this thread is so helpful! When do you start the email process to ask for the best deal over email -- do you wait until the last few days of the month to start emailing, or earlier in the month?

I bought a new car last June. I e-mailed in advance. I will never do that again. In the 30 minutes from the time I got a price from the dealer, to the time I went to the lot, the car mysteriously disappeared. Nobody on the lot knew where it was. Really? Bait and switch, however, it worked out better in the end. The one year old used car with 30,000 I was interested in, ended up being only $1,000 cheaper than what I paid for a brand new vehicle. Although the hard sell was on to lease, not buy. But when they looked at my trade in, a 31 year old vehicle that had been paid for for 27 years, they understood why I didn't want a lease.

 

[Klayfish]

Yes, I would love the details, if you don't mind sharing! I was thinking maybe I could try posting it on NextDoor first; my neighborhood has a fairly extensive network who use NextDoor, and that might help limit the shady characters.

The nitty gritty stuff comes in dealing with Craigslist. I've never tried NextDoor, so I can't speak to that. The Craigslist stuff can be a bit intimidating. For a car that cheap, as I mentioned you're going to get a ton of responses. This is especially true if the ad is well written...as in complete sentences and tell a good short story about the car. I'm not kidding. There are SO many junk car shady dealers/flippers out there and their ads stick out pretty easily for people who shop the market. They are usually written in incomplete sentences, poor grammar, and very clearly hastily done. So when a well written ad for a cheap car shows up, people who have familiarity with buying these cars will spot it in a heartbeat. That's what draws the responses. Not everyone who responds are people you may want to deal with. They could be scammers...those are pretty easy to spot. They'll be the ones saying "My dearest, please accept my $2000 offer for your $1000 car and my shipper will contact you...." or something like that. Don't respond to those, simply delete them. You'll also get car flippers or responses that seem to come from the same people writing the shady ads. That's where I sort through responses. I forgot to mention earlier that I never give out my phone number in the ad, it's e-mail only. When I get the responses, I weed through the ones that are clearly garbage. If the response is clearly not a scam and at least decently written (you can just tell), then I'll respond by e-mail. Exchange an e-mail or two and by then I'll get a pretty good feel if the person is someone I'm willing to deal with. From there, figure out where to meet for a test drive. As I said, I don't go with them. Not worth the risk. Heaven forbid they wreck it, I don't want to risk getting hurt. If they steal it, then pretty stupid on their part to risk car theft charges on a $1000 car. Besides, as I said I've already gotten a good feel for the person and am pretty comfortable that they won't. If they want the car, then figure out the transaction...always in cash.

It sounds intimidating, and it can be if you're not comfortable with dealing with it. For me, just using some common sense has always steered me well. Never had even the slightest of issues...actually met some nice people. People buying for their kid, etc... It's how I buy a cheap car too, I look for those well written ads and photos that are well taken. Those cars sell super fast, I can tell you from experience on both sides.

 

[Skellingtonj]

I bought a new car last June. I e-mailed in advance. I will never do that again. In the 30 minutes from the time I got a price from the dealer, to the time I went to the lot, the car mysteriously disappeared. Nobody on the lot knew where it was. Really? Bait and switch, however, it worked out better in the end. The one year old used car with 30,000 I was interested in, ended up being only $1,000 cheaper than what I paid for a brand new vehicle. Although the hard sell was on to lease, not buy. But when they looked at my trade in, a 31 year old vehicle that had been paid for for 27 years, they understood why I didn't want a lease.

Can I ask why trade in a 31 year old car? Why not just donate it for the tax write off? No sarcasm I’m honestly curious

 

[CookieandOatmeal]

I know this is an older thread, but I'm starting the process to buy a new car now, and this thread is so helpful! When do you start the email process to ask for the best deal over email -- do you wait until the last few days of the month to start emailing, or earlier in the month?

We always email about a week and a half before the end of the quarter because we know they usually have some sort of target that they need to meet for sales. We will basically negotiate through email with several dealers and pit them against each other until we get a price we like. Basically we don't step foot into the dealership until we go to sign on the dotted line. However, I do admit that we found this tactic to work well when buying luxury cars (Acura/BMW) but not so much at Honda when they pulled a bait and switch on us. We just got up and walked out.

 

[tvguy]

Can I ask why trade in a 31 year old car? Why not just donate it for the tax write off? No sarcasm I’m honestly curious

Those are legitimate questions.

1)The charities here don't want cars over 10 years old or with more than 100,000 miles on them.*
2) I can't itemize so there would be zero tax write off.

* All the charities here hire the same, private for profit company to run their vehicle donation programs.

 

[fla4fun]

I bought my last car using a referral from a coworker. I had been researching and pricing what I wanted, and I noticed one of my coworkers had a new car from the same manufacturer. I asked where they bought their car and whether they were happy with their experience. They raved about the good deal they got and how the salesman was great, and gave me the phone number for their salesman. They also contacted the salesman to let him know I would be calling. I told him what I wanted and he tracked it down. The initial offer from the dealer was below what my initial offer would have been, and they lowered it a second time without my ever making any kind of offer or counteroffer. I picked up the car the next day, which was the last day of the month. It was the easiest buying experience I have ever had.

I sold my trade in privately, but it was a fluke. The same day I asked the coworker about the referral, a former coworker called out of the blue and asked if I was thinking about selling the old car. They also made an offer higher than I would have received as a dealer trade in, and they paid cash.

Sometimes the planets just align . . .

 

[HeatherC]

I haven’t read all the threads so forgive me if I duplicate a thought.

We recently (last March) purchased a used Kia Sedona with close to 40,000 miles on it from a used car dealer nearby. The reason I’m mentioning it is that it was still under warranty since Kia has a long warranty. It was a rental car from Hertz and only a year and a half old but had high mileage. We decided to get it because we checked with Kia beforehand and they told us the warranty was still valid as a second owner. We also decided that any used car is a risk so to speak, but we figured Hertz would have done all the maintenance regularly to keep it in good running condition.

A year later, we have done a 10,000 mile cross country trip in it as well as regular daily use. We have not had a single problem with it and would definitely do the same thing again.

Maybe look for a new used car still under warranty. We saved several thousand dollars on it because of the high mileage,but the warranty gave us peace of mind.

I would also say that I personally believe AWD does make a difference in bad weather. We have great tires on all our cars, but my dh has the AWD and it is sooomuch better in the snow here in New England without a doubt.

Good luck whatever you decide to do!

 

[Skellingtonj]

Those are legitimate questions.

1)The charities here don't want cars over 10 years old or with more than 100,000 miles on them.*
2) I can't itemize so there would be zero tax write off.

* All the charities here hire the same, private for profit company to run their vehicle donation programs.

Got it! Thanks!

 

[tvguy]

I haven’t read all the threads so forgive me if I duplicate a thought.

We recently (last March) purchased a used Kia Sedona with close to 40,000 miles on it from a used car dealer nearby. The reason I’m mentioning it is that it was still under warranty since Kia has a long warranty. It was a rental car from Hertz and only a year and a half old but had high mileage. We decided to get it because we checked with Kia beforehand and they told us the warranty was still valid as a second owner. We also decided that any used car is a risk so to speak, but we figured Hertz would have done all the maintenance regularly to keep it in good running condition.

A year later, we have done a 10,000 mile cross country trip in it as well as regular daily use. We have not had a single problem with it and would definitely do the same thing again.

Maybe look for a new used car still under warranty. We saved several thousand dollars on it because of the high mileage,but the warranty gave us peace of mind.

I would also say that I personally believe AWD does make a difference in bad weather. We have great tires on all our cars, but my dh has the AWD and it is sooomuch better in the snow here in New England without a doubt.

Good luck whatever you decide to do!

Or just go to a Hertz Sales lot if you have one near you. They keep the best of their former rental cars for sale on their lots, and wholesale the high mileage and damaged cars to dealers. Our family have purchased 3 used Hertz cars. Great price. condition, price etc. We still have 2 of them. The third got totaled by my son, but it had 180,000 miles on it. We bought it with 25,000 miles.

 

[firefly_ris]

The nitty gritty stuff comes in dealing with Craigslist. I've never tried NextDoor, so I can't speak to that. The Craigslist stuff can be a bit intimidating. For a car that cheap, as I mentioned you're going to get a ton of responses. This is especially true if the ad is well written...as in complete sentences and tell a good short story about the car. I'm not kidding. There are SO many junk car shady dealers/flippers out there and their ads stick out pretty easily for people who shop the market. They are usually written in incomplete sentences, poor grammar, and very clearly hastily done. So when a well written ad for a cheap car shows up, people who have familiarity with buying these cars will spot it in a heartbeat. That's what draws the responses. Not everyone who responds are people you may want to deal with. They could be scammers...those are pretty easy to spot. They'll be the ones saying "My dearest, please accept my $2000 offer for your $1000 car and my shipper will contact you...." or something like that. Don't respond to those, simply delete them. You'll also get car flippers or responses that seem to come from the same people writing the shady ads. That's where I sort through responses. I forgot to mention earlier that I never give out my phone number in the ad, it's e-mail only. When I get the responses, I weed through the ones that are clearly garbage. If the response is clearly not a scam and at least decently written (you can just tell), then I'll respond by e-mail. Exchange an e-mail or two and by then I'll get a pretty good feel if the person is someone I'm willing to deal with. From there, figure out where to meet for a test drive. As I said, I don't go with them. Not worth the risk. Heaven forbid they wreck it, I don't want to risk getting hurt. If they steal it, then pretty stupid on their part to risk car theft charges on a $1000 car. Besides, as I said I've already gotten a good feel for the person and am pretty comfortable that they won't. If they want the car, then figure out the transaction...always in cash.

It sounds intimidating, and it can be if you're not comfortable with dealing with it. For me, just using some common sense has always steered me well. Never had even the slightest of issues...actually met some nice people. People buying for their kid, etc... It's how I buy a cheap car too, I look for those well written ads and photos that are well taken. Those cars sell super fast, I can tell you from experience on both sides.

Yeah, we sell stuff on Craigslist a lot -- but a few months ago, when I was very close to buying a 'new' used minivan, we knew we wanted to sell ours privately, so I took some photos and put it on Craigslist. I wrote a pretty good and honest description. I put it on there for $2500 just to 'test the waters' because I wasn't sure how easily I would sell a 13 year old minivan with 140k on the ticker. Anyway, my husband's inbox was FLOODED with responses within about 3 hours. It was unbelievable. About half of them were legit (like klayfish said... you can just tell). Then I was thinking maybe I'm not asking enough here, ha. It does have a lot of creature comforts for its age (leather, heated seats, power sliders etc) and it has very, very minimal rust for our area (Buffalo) so I guess it's more of a hot commodity for people looking for cheap commuters than I thought. Anyway, we ended up not coming to an agreement on the van I was looking at and put the whole thing on hold and took the van down, but I was just not expecting quite that response either. Ultimately I think I'm sticking with my buddy until the transmission falls out.

 

[akl432]

Thanks, everyone, for your help! I am still undecided on whether to sell the car on cragislist/nextdoor or trade it in, but this information will help me make the decision! Also, thanks for the information on your buying experiences and for sharing all the advice!!