Used Car Dealership Strategy?

[saxdragon]

I'm going to help my son buy his first car, and we've decided to look at the local dealerships for a used one. I haven't bought a car from a dealer in at least thirty years, so I don't know what their latest "approaches" to selling are now. After all, a lot's changed in the last couple of decades. And since we're in the last week of the year-end sales, I could use a crash course in Buying Used Cars From A Dealer 101. Any advice would be welcome!

He's 24 years old and a pretty smart, sensible kid. We're looking low mileage, mid-size, 2002 to 2011, not too ugly, good gas economy, auto trans.

Oh, and what about their financing? Good idea or bad idea?

Thanks, y'all!

[saxdragon]

OP here. I forgot to mention we're trying to keep it under $10,00.00.

Thanks again.

[MagicRat]

Most dealers unfortunately still have no respect for the customer. Their job is to get as much money from you as possible. The fact that they deal in cars is secondary.

Personally, I would not touch a dealer with a sterile pole, unless you have plenty of money are are willing to overpay for the sake of convenience.

You might consider a private lease buy-out site. Leasebusters is a Canadian example, but there is likely another site operating in your area. This is where you can take some else's car and assume the remainder of their lease or finance terms. There are plenty of people out there who want to get out of a lease, but do not want to pay the penalty to do so at the dealership.

You still must do your homework and carefully study the terms of the lease. The important issues are mileage, mileage allowance, lease time remaining and buyout prices. The idea here is for the car to have less mileage for its age than the lease allows. If its overmileage you have fewer miles available to you than the lease allows, thus decreasing the value of the vehicle. To compensate, the seller may provide you with a cash payment to compensate.

For financed vehicles, the homework is more simple. Finance terms assume you will own the car after the terms of the lease, so you must decide if the car is worth the net-present-value of the remaining finance payments. If more money is owed on the car than what its worth, the seller can compensate you in cash.

Finally, with this method, you get a car with no money upfront. You are simply assuming a financial obligation from someone else. For leases, the great benefit here is if you are prepared to buy the car or refinance at the end of the lease. If you do your homework, you can get a great car for way less money than a used-car dealership.

[tannerr52]

When I was shopping for my second car, every "big box" car dealership (the kind with 50 of the same car out front and a giant gorilla on the roof) seemed to be snobby and didn't want to deal with some kid buying himself a car for college. My budget at the time was $4,000 dollars and I mightve done financing if I found a car I love. However, we went to many car dealers where they sit you in a chair and give you the "lookover" where they went to "Search their inventory", then proceed to take you to a $1000 car. That is where you get up and leave, which we did about 3-4 times. The best places to go are the mom and pop car dealers, where salesmen don't swarm you. We bought my car, my jeep, at a outlet center of my small hometown. The larger dealer being in a larger down with all new cars. (The outlet center had a lot of clean, reasonably priced trade in vehicles) Now on the other hand, finding a cheap, low mileage, car with great gas mileage can be hard as that is what everybody wants. Make sure to get a carfax!