Haggling with dealers - hints and tips required!

Squink

Squink

Squink

Soldato
Joined
25 Apr 2007
Posts
5,255
Following on from my recent thread about needing a newer car, I'll be heading off to look round some dealers soon. Everywhere says that you need to haggle, which is something that's new to me. Say I was looking at a car with a windscreen price of £3999, I imagine the conversation would go something like:

Me: "Well I like the car, but I can't really afford more than £3500"
Dealer: "But sir, my children have to eat! [Or words to this effect]. I can throw in a tank of petrol and get the lads to give it a service, but these models sell like hot cakes"
Me: "Hmmm I don't really know, I can maybe go to £3700"
Dealer: "Tell you what, I'll throw in this warranty that's not worth the paper it's written on and we'll call it £3900"
Me: "Hmmmm..."

In other words, if faced with a hard-nosed dealer on a car that does genuinely sell like hot cakes, I'm going to struggle. How does anyone else approach this? I know the final answer is to walk away and see if the dealer comes bounding after me, but I don't want to drag out the process any longer than I have to.
 
It's always good to find another example of the same car nearby for a little bit cheaper than the dealer is selling. If he won't budge on the price then you say you'll go have a look at this other car instead.
 
tummelv said:
It's always good to find another example of the same car nearby for a little bit cheaper than the dealer is selling. If he won't budge on the price then you say you'll go have a look at this other car instead.
Click to expand...

The answer I expect you would get back from that is either, "well, why don't you buy that one?" or "here is why X car is cheaper than Y car" I.e miles S/H owners...

Edit: OP, for haggling cash is the key, turn up with a pocket full of reddies and tell him what you want to pay for it, then go over the motor with a fine tooth comb and mention any defects or wear. If your going for a more expensive motor on finance they have even more room to budge as the have the commission from the finance company on top of the price.
 
Last edited:
If a car is well priced and a popular model then yes you will struggle to get a discount.

There is no magic secret to haggling. What you need to do is look for what similar cars sell for on autotrader/eBay/cap guide price and estimate what you think a fair market value is if the dealer can't meet your valuation within a reasonable amount just walk away
 
I'd say start with finding any faults with the car. Was out with my Dad last year when he bought his Merc, it had chips in the paintwork and the electric seats weren't working. In the end we managed to get a grand or so knocked off and for them to fix the paintwork and seats.
No idea where I'd start on a car that doesn't seem to have anything wrong with it. That was the issue I had on the first car I bought, at the time I didn't realise how overpriced it was... Lesson learnt - was only £1200!
 
First thing to do is try to haggle on the phone Before you even go see the car, Ring the dude & chat about the motor & just plain ask what's the best price he can sell it to ya for. This way a 1500 quid car can be 1350 by the time you go view it, Then when you go view it you just find as many faults as you can & knock cash off the 1350 to put it right.
One thing about this technique is that if the Dude says on the phone I won't chat about price etc then you know he won't budge when you get there. This can be taken two ways, Either he is a dealer & just move along or he actually has a Decent motor he knows is worth what he is asking for it.
The skill is in working out which approach is best & how to deal with the seller without offending him.
 
No dealer is going to negotiate a price over the phone.

What you must remember is, YOU phoned them. As soon as their phone rings they know that there is a reason for you to be interested in that motor, if it was advertised too high you would never have rung ;)
 
I've personally found the days of "haggling" are near enough over. When I was looking for my car 12 months ago, main dealers wouldn't budge on their price by 1 penny. Walked away from 3 cars, purely because they wouldn't do any kind of a deal, not even a tank of petrol!

I ended up finding a well priced car at an indy, and got £500 quid off the asking price. Seems indy's are still traditional in their ways of dealing
 
I find haggling on a car one of the things in life that I simply am in capable of doing.

I ended up getting quite a good deal on our Grande Punto but that was more luck than judgement.

I always end up answering questions honestly which then leaves me nowhere to go in terms of negotiation. So when asked how much I want for my car I'll tell them but the figure I end up giving is the figure I want so when they come back £300 lower I'm left with the awkward scenario of having the dealer taking the stance of well I'll move a bit if you will how about £#.#k

so er... in answer to your question don't do what I do and remember to go in low for the one you are buying and high on your trade in (if you have one).

It is also worth considering your options with regard to trading in or not. Last time I was looking at a car I was adamant that I wanted to trade in so when I came back from the test drive the dealer was ready with a below book offer for my car. I thought not a problem, and started to talk about what we could do on the screen price and was stonewalled with a "Oh no, the screen price is fixed if you are trading in". What I should have done was left it more open ended I guess.
 
4T5 said:
First thing to do is try to haggle on the phone Before you even go see the car, Ring the dude & chat about the motor & just plain ask what's the best price he can sell it to ya for. This way a 1500 quid car can be 1350 by the time you go view it, Then when you go view it you just find as many faults as you can & knock cash off the 1350 to put it right.
One thing about this technique is that if the Dude says on the phone I won't chat about price etc then you know he won't budge when you get there. This can be taken two ways, Either he is a dealer & just move along or he actually has a Decent motor he knows is worth what he is asking for it.
The skill is in working out which approach is best & how to deal with the seller without offending him.
Click to expand...

I did similar, I asked about any faults and was told there was nothing of any significance for a 15 year old car. Turned up and the gearbox and clutch was shot. Left me in a strong bargaining position :)
 
I've bought and sold a load of cars but mainly private sales.

I'd simply say that you like the car, but it's more than you're willing to pay. In light of X, Y and Z, the best you can offer is £x.

See what he says and go from there. He may only come down a little, in which case just say the absolute most you could go to is X. If you think it's too expensive just walk away. Similarly, if the car is priced keenly then he may just wait for someone else to buy it.
 
MeEsH BaKkA said:
What you must remember is, YOU phoned them. As soon as their phone rings they know that there is a reason for you to be interested in that motor, if it was advertised too high you would never have rung ;)
Click to expand...

Apart from where the advertise a high price KNOWING they will get knocked down a few quid and the punter thinks they've got a deal, and the dealer has got the price he wanted in the first place. Most of the dealers i know work that way.
 
SB118 said:
Apart from where the advertise a high price KNOWING they will get knocked down a few quid and the punter thinks they've got a deal, and the dealer has got the price he wanted in the first place. Most of the dealers i know work that way.
Click to expand...

I'm pretty certain this is not the case for actual car dealers, getting someone sat down in front of you is the key. It's not good potential buyers dismissing a car due to a high price on the hope you can please someone with a bit of a deal.

IMO of course.
 
A lot depends on your circumstances, if you're in the market because you need a car within 2 weeks to start a job, your ability to walk away and haggle hard is going to be less than someone who is looking to upgrade but is in no rush.

I would just say decide on your budget, and your 'budget-plus' for the 'perfect' car. Then go and look at a few cars on the lot at a range of prices from what you are willing to pay to a couple grand extra so you can get a feel for what the dealer has. Decide on what you want and how much you are willing to pay, if they aren't willing to move, be ready to walk away and keep looking and see if something else turns up.

If after doing this a few times you keep getting turned down by dealers without any follow up calls etc, you're probably being unrealistic about the discounts/level of car you can afford :p
 
be prepared to walk away; especially if its a run of the mill car.

Have a price and don't budge, they won't hit it move on. Don't make it personal in private sales, just move on and find another. If its a low value car take cash, does help when they see it in front of them.
 
MeEsH BaKkA said:
.

Edit: OP, for haggling cash is the key, turn up with a pocket full of reddies and tell him what you want to pay for it,.
Click to expand...

not always the case. most dealers don't want to deal in cash for security and bank charges purpose.

the key point to remember is do you want the car? there's no point getting a shed load knocked off a car that you don't really want.

after over a month of internet searching, i purchased a mk4 golf aug 2004 from a dealership, travelled all the way to loughborough (about 2 hours from me) to view it because it was in a colour, trim and spec i liked and a 3 door (3 doors in non gti spec were scarce) i let slip that i liked the colour to the salesman (metallic orange - you either love it or hate it) and from that moment on, he had me over a barrel!

the car had been reduced by £200 about a month earlier and i got a cambelt MOT and service thrown in (discs and pads replaced on MOT failure) but i only managed to get £30 off the price, i argued this to cover fuel for the return collection and that took me about 20 minutes to agree! but i really wanted the car, i was happy with everything, the salesman knew this and used it to his advantage but i was never going to walk away from the car.
 
Cash isn't the clincher these days, I have to pay 1%+ VAT to pay it into the bank so we encourage the customer to use a debit card for all transactions, we and a lot of other dealers will refuse to take large amounts of cash due to money laundering regulations, a lot of how much I'm prepared to negotiate on a car depends on A) how long I've had it and B) how much I paid for it.

If I've had it forever and a day I'll do what I can to get rid of it, or if I paid good money for a particular car but know it will sell I won't take a poor deal on it just hold out for the right one which most times does come along, however if I've bought something and I managed to get it really cheap as opposed to being greedy sometimes I'll let it slip if I get a decent deal on it.

In short there isn't a set amount or percentage I'd allow on each car, it's a combination of how desirable the car is, how much I've got In it, how long I've had it, and how much prep I need to do to it.
 
Get a good feel for what similar cars cost. I agree with Fox about checking on the phone first. They're more likely to negotiate if they actually think you might be willing to part with some cash!

It's not just price you can haggle on. Do your homework on the car. I went to see an awful lot of older VAG group diesels last year and found out as much as possible about the cars in general. For example I knew the service schedule like the back of my hand. I had couple of dealers willing to throw in cambelt changes, servicing, tyres etc if even if they didn't need doing for a good few months (even more than a year on occasion).

Get to know what is a reasonable price for the car you're looking at. Price guides are a decent start but you'll only get a feel for what's realistic by actually talking figures with the dealers. Be prepared to talk figures but don't go too low too early. I only offended one dealer and he was prepared to continue negotiating after quick apology by email a few hours later.

When I bought my current Honda Insight, I basically found the best value one (for age and mileage) I could find from a franchised dealer in the UK. Got in touch with the dealer by email and when they started discussing a possible sale with me over the phone I basically told them to make it worth my while to bother travelling the 100 miles to look at the car. I named a price I knew was borderline ridiculous (because I didn't really fancy driving 100 miles to see a car I might not buy). Cue the old "I've got to speak to the sales manager" routine but to my surprise they bit. Ended up with another grand off the cost to switch, a service and a tank of petrol better than what what already a far better price than I'd found anywhere local to me. Car was valued on Parkers etc for about £13.5k. I got it for just over £10.5k. 4 months later and I've only seen one similar age car advertised for less than I bought mine for and it has more than double the mileage. Supposedly they were willing to go for a quick sale because they needed to meet a target or something. Don't know if that's true or if it's just a salesman's talk.

Edit: I decided I'd better sharpen up after buying my old Skoda Fabia in 2003 (my first buy from a dealer) and paying the price on the screen. Afterwards I realised that I'd been well and truly done and decided it wasn't going to happen again.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom