Ask a car salesman anything...anything at all.
Discussion
when I was in car sales one of my colleagues who had been at the dealership for donkeys years and had lots of repeat customers, used to regularly get a bottle of scotch. We also had one very long standing customer whose whole family always bought cars from the dealership, who used to bring a bottle of wine in for every member of staff at Christmas.
A question if I may. I'm not expecting a definitive answer, more some guidance on used values/buffers.
I've seen a car I'm potentially interested in, i'd be a cash buyer.
The car in question has been up for sale since August/September last year, is really a summer/fair weather car, three years old. It's priced at £33,500.
Would I be insane to offer £28,000? Similar vehicles/mileage have been up for £31k (so presumably achieving this or under 30k).
Being in sales myself, I'm sure there's a mark up/buffer, but at the same time, i don't want to go back and forth. I don't want to pay over £30k.
Thanks for any advice!
I've seen a car I'm potentially interested in, i'd be a cash buyer.
The car in question has been up for sale since August/September last year, is really a summer/fair weather car, three years old. It's priced at £33,500.
Would I be insane to offer £28,000? Similar vehicles/mileage have been up for £31k (so presumably achieving this or under 30k).
Being in sales myself, I'm sure there's a mark up/buffer, but at the same time, i don't want to go back and forth. I don't want to pay over £30k.
Thanks for any advice!
Quags said:
No I'm, a private buyer. I'd offer £30k but that is my absolute max.
Still more than 10% off asking, which is unlikely to garner *too* much excitement from the dealer, but it's in the realms of what most would consider "dealable". If there are others at £30-31k asking prices, as that dealer I'd ask why aren't you buying one of those instead, where your budget gets you and the seller much closer to a deal?
5% off most asking prices is generally a reasonable expectation, post-haggle. Unless a particular vehicle is already the most competitively priced on the market, taking into account age, mileage, spec, condition, history etc. of course.
I've known family members use this method of haggling, go in and offer your best price (£30k). Advise the salesman that is your absolute best offer you're coming in with. If he says no, you walk away, or they say yes. If you walk away from the deal the salesman will know you're serious and you may get a call back a few days later when they've had time to reflect on it.
A friend has a mint 4 year old, low mileage, RR Freelander that he bought from a JLR main dealer 2 years ago. He recently went back to the same dealer with a view to upgrading. There was a two year old £28k RR Discovery Sport in the showroom that looked good.
He was attended to by a salesman in his 50's who gave it all the usual speel. My friend asked what the Freelander might be worth as px and wanted a price to swap. Salesman said he didn't value cars so didn't even look at it (it was 30 yards away outside the showroom). Instead the salesman fired up Evans Halshaw 'buy any car' and said that will be a good indication - but that the px value may be a bit less if any marks / imperfections. Evans Halshaw came out at £12,000. And that was that. Discussion over. Sales pitch over. My friend left the building somewhat bemused.
Next day, putting the details of the £28,000 Discovery Sport into Evans Halshaw came back at £22,000. It would have been interesting if, after the Salesman had done that with the Freelanderest, my friend had asked him then to then pop in details of the Discovery Sport then see how he explained the £6,000 gap.
Clearly a ploy to soften up the punter re px value so when the 'man who can do valuations' steps in the salesman will have already told him about the punters reaction to the online valuation.
My friend is now looking at other brands......
He was attended to by a salesman in his 50's who gave it all the usual speel. My friend asked what the Freelander might be worth as px and wanted a price to swap. Salesman said he didn't value cars so didn't even look at it (it was 30 yards away outside the showroom). Instead the salesman fired up Evans Halshaw 'buy any car' and said that will be a good indication - but that the px value may be a bit less if any marks / imperfections. Evans Halshaw came out at £12,000. And that was that. Discussion over. Sales pitch over. My friend left the building somewhat bemused.
Next day, putting the details of the £28,000 Discovery Sport into Evans Halshaw came back at £22,000. It would have been interesting if, after the Salesman had done that with the Freelanderest, my friend had asked him then to then pop in details of the Discovery Sport then see how he explained the £6,000 gap.
Clearly a ploy to soften up the punter re px value so when the 'man who can do valuations' steps in the salesman will have already told him about the punters reaction to the online valuation.
My friend is now looking at other brands......
OddCat said:
then see how he explained the £6,000 gap.
It's literally how the motor trade works............ We buy at one price and sell at another.The whole WBAC/Evans Halshaw pricing tact is a bit crap though, do the job properly, explain why the PX is worth X and the car for sale is worth Y and he likely would have sold a car.
Exactly, quote a fair trade in and you're far more likely to cut a deal. I've never understood why some dealers come up with these joke trade in valuations, unless they really do not want your business. Last one I has was hilarious, dealer quote was so ridiculous I walked out and went elsewhere.
Don't get me wrong, sometimes we make an offer and it's so wide of the mark it's untrue, but it is normally for something we don't 'want' (i.e doesn't fit our profile, too old, too obscure, too many miles etc etc) but if you've qualified properly you've normally sounded out the person quite well by that point and you know it's going to be a sticking point.
Recent one is a chap with a Merc Vito Dualiner, starship mileage bit still a nice bus for someone, we offered £6500 I think and he wants £10k, never going to happen in a month of sundays from us, but he had been offered £9500 by a LR dealer. I had to explain that either:
A) That LR dealer (or their trader) reeeeeeeaaaaaaaallllllllllyyyyyyyyy wanted that Vito, or, more likely
B) They were using some overallowance to give an inflated PX figure to appease his valuation (which he'd given them upfront) to get the deal done.
Either way I unfortunately didn't sell him a car, and likely he would be telling people how I offered him a s
t PX price 
Recent one is a chap with a Merc Vito Dualiner, starship mileage bit still a nice bus for someone, we offered £6500 I think and he wants £10k, never going to happen in a month of sundays from us, but he had been offered £9500 by a LR dealer. I had to explain that either:
A) That LR dealer (or their trader) reeeeeeeaaaaaaaallllllllllyyyyyyyyy wanted that Vito, or, more likely
B) They were using some overallowance to give an inflated PX figure to appease his valuation (which he'd given them upfront) to get the deal done.
Either way I unfortunately didn't sell him a car, and likely he would be telling people how I offered him a s
t PX price Butter Face said:
OddCat said:
then see how he explained the £6,000 gap.
It's literally how the motor trade works............ We buy at one price and sell at another.Odd though that they didn't even try to put together a deal for a repeat customer.
Mexman said:
You will need a very healthy margin on any JLR product as the reliability is poor and the recon costs and warranty issues are/can be expensive.
Entirely different scenarios of different makes though.
You wouldn't have/expect to have a 6,k margin over a Ford Focus for example.
Yep and you will also want to build in the possibility that the car may hang around for a while and through a few heavy book drops. Entirely different scenarios of different makes though.
You wouldn't have/expect to have a 6,k margin over a Ford Focus for example.
We px'd dads Freelander at a Jaguar dealer, i looked on both WBAC and Evans halshaw to get a rough idea of its valve, we then asked the dealer to price it up and they came to the same figure, in the end we go £10500 for it which was fine with us given we got a large discount off the F Pace, cost to change is the important thing not what the PX is worth, as the the discovery sport, the car might stand them at 25k ......
Oh and we found the old Freelander for sale, the dealer appears to be trying to make a profit with it being £2500 more than we px'd it for.
Oh and we found the old Freelander for sale, the dealer appears to be trying to make a profit with it being £2500 more than we px'd it for.
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