life's too short to drive boring cars
the dealers are capitalizing they're maximizing their profits they're expanding on their
dealerships they're cracking record sales and some of them are earning more money than the
gdp of some small countries and there doesn't seem to be an end in sight but the worst part is
often the dealers are trying to pull a fast one they've got tricks and scams that can
talk circles around you and i as the consumer to help maximize their profits even further
and leave you and i deeper in the hole but i can't help but share an experience i recently had
as a matter of fact trying to get rid of that black bmw x5 resulted in me taking a trip down
to a local dealership i wanted to trade it in for a brand new vehicle the feeling was
time to get something new and more reliable but i already went in a little bit armed i knew what to
expect with what the dealers were going to come at us with and i went in there with some ammunition
but yet they still come up with some new twists and turns so firstly i went into the dealer i
drove the x5 i didn't advertise that i was going to try to sell it or trade it in that's one of
the last things as i said in previous videos that you want to admit i went in there i quickly asked
do you have any vehicles on the showroom floor or anything to test drive they quickly responded
with an absolute nothing available so that left me in a little bit of a pickle what do we do
that unfortunately is the common theme across the industry as a whole so then we sat down
with the car dealer the actual salesman came up to us approached us we looked around but then
the salesman took us to his little office and we reviewed the car in question that we were
interested in possibly specking we actually knew exactly what we were going to buy no more no less
and that's part of the battle don't let them fast talk you into something you don't necessarily want
make sure that you've got that car that vehicle a spec before we even
went into the dealership we already went on did a price and build your own on the local
canadian website version of that manufacturer so we already knew what we were up against
so then i started asking the basic questions start kicking tires how much playing a little bit stupid
so the salesman said put your 500 down in three or four months your car will probably show up at that
point you can take a test drive if you like it great if you don't leave it some other couple will
be waiting right behind you so my first question is if we write this deal today what can we do
we want to put in an offer we obviously see msrp or sticker and we want to make a counteroffer the
salesperson was very quick to admit and tell us that there's no offers it's msrp and that
we should be lucky we should literally be lucky that they are giving a sticker and not charging
us a bub sticker well that's a ludicrous time first of all but we accepted we said okay fine
how about this if you're not knocking sticker how about throwing in some extras we said what about
floor mats i said what do you have well he counted with the factory actually puts in a high quality
all-weather type floor mat that's great for winter okay perfect answer that what about expel or 3m
paint protection film can you throw some of that in and i know from past local johnny tint shop
can do the nose the half hood the mirrors and the a-pillars for about 300 bucks but i just thought
for shits and giggles i would ask the dealer can you throw that in he said well no we can't throw
anything in we're not going and we're not in that market we can't make any money but then he says
i'll tell you what i'll talk to my manager see if there's something that he can do for us and then
i'll let you know so i'll go away so he went away for 10 minutes came back lo and behold he had the
four square all drawn up with all the numbers and the criteria i literally called him out i said oh
no not the four square program no he knew right away he kind of chuckled he said okay sorry folks
he said okay well let's just look at the one number here's your rates based on the current
finance rate which was 4.19 percent on five years and they also haven't had a higher lending term
as well that they could offer for the same rate so then i actually quickly countered i said well
where's the paint protection film in all this he wasn't very quick to admit to it but then
i pulled it out of him and he said well it's actually blended into this rate so the monthly
rate that he offered us actually included what most dealers start to do they like to fatten up
the pricing they don't want to tell you the line items they'll just give you the lump sum because
again i've said in previous videos they like to give you a big number fit your monthly budget and
they put all that junk in there whether it's gap insurance undercoating tint paint protection film
you name it they're trying to scam you so i said oh okay look at those numbers all right how about
this why don't you go back to your manager tell me what that number looks like without the paint
protection film because he wasn't quick to admit that so he goes away for 10 minutes comes back
and it's a revised number now it's 20 dollars less per month on a 50 month term at about 20 dollars a
month more just because of that paint protection film that means i was gonna pay over a thousand
bucks for that paint protection film that i could have done at johnny spot just down the road for
about 300. so clearly they put all their markups on it that's where they're making the money so if
there's a takeaway make sure you carve out the base price of the vehicle before you even start
piling on the extras now what some of the dealers now are including etching and they're including
some of these other add-ons and they're saying it's actually part and parcel that's where you
have to call out and you want to ask them for that's explicit clause within the contract
that allows you to decline those options because in most cases those options are not mandatory and
they're entirely voluntary but the dealers don't always tell you that and they want to
incorporate some of those extra add-ons without you even questioning it but then there's another
unknown situation a lot of people don't think of it's the actual interest rates again as i said
they gave us a quote of 4.19 interest rate but everybody knows what's going on in the world today
interest rates are climbing i don't know what it's like where you're at but i know in the us
there's lots of rumors about interest rates getting notched up i know here in canada
interest rates are getting notched up we went up a half a point and there's talk by the end of the
summer we could be up another full two percent on the interest rates so what do you think that's
going to translate to if the bank of canada or your financial institutions start raising interest
rates but you don't get your car for another four or five months clearly you could be in snookered
in a position where you wind up having to pay on a revised interest rate so these are quotes
only well that's not entirely a dealer scam it is something to be grossly aware of because you could
go from say a 500 a month payment for your car all of a sudden by the time your car actually shows
up you could find yourself with a 600 a month payment just because an increase in finance rates
so i actually had to ask the finance manager what can you do to mitigate that because i don't
want to be stuck in that conundrum at the end of the day we're still able to walk away from
the deal and get our 500 back however you'd like to know that the dealer can do something for you
the best that they could say was we'll take care of you we'll make sure that we do the best thing
for you but we all know that you can't change the bottom line interest rates they might be able to
make some fine adjustments however it is what it is but then in the midst of this conversation
he never once asked about a trade-in now that's one of the key things that a lot of
dealers are asking or they traditionally ask is do you have a trade we always talk about that
that's one of the things you rarely want to admit on the front end because they usually
hose you down well i did get hose down now here we have the x5 now granted we know it's an older car
it's a 2009 it has 220 000 kilometers on it it's not worth a pile of money but i basically came
out and i said when we were basically at the end of the road almost almost signing the paperwork
and said oh i forgot to mention we actually do have a potential trade he asked me what it
was i told him he said well you know what you're better off just taking that selling it privately
because we're probably going to be more insulting than anything else i'll be honest at least he
was straight up about it but then he stopped and paused himself he said well what were you thinking
and i said well i have a number and i know what kind of retail is and i clearly i'm
not looking for retail but i'm curious what you guys are interested in he came back and told me
we would give you a thousand bucks for that car i looked over at my daughter who was with me
and we laughed we laughed so hard that people across the dealership could actually hear us
it is what it is we know dealers are always going to make the best of that situation
and granted he says admittedly the car is likely going to go to the auction and that's
definitely a fair thing to say 1000 bucks that doesn't even get you a set of wheels
we all know they're playing their scam game right there the trade and they want to low ball you
and just use those other factors well it's a bmw it's expensive for maintenance it's got high miles
clearly those are all hits against it however they're using those to basically take that car
off my hands and so he can send it to auction and probably pull you know eight nine ten
thousand dollars out of it at the auction which is a guaranteed result so at the end of the day
get to the base price that vehicle decline all options start from there if they start tacking on
all the extra junk definitely call out the clauses specifically within the contract because in most
cases the consumer has the upper hand in that situation and with all of that said be sure to
click right there why i will never buy another bmw hope to see you real soon catch you next time bye