Car Lots... and the cheap section in the back...

Rot

Rot

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SSSOO...

Jan's son wants a used car... So I take him to the usual places...

He takes one look at the prices at the front and starts the "I don't think so" look..

I tell him there's always a cheap, banger section they have in the back... hidden away...

Eventually he settles on one... and I am left to think...

Maybe if they had the cheap section in the FRONT... it'd bring in more customers... and then they could try and upsell...

Or.. am I missing the point here?

xROTx

PS. This aint a Smallwood Riccan family abuse thread... Don't make me move this mofo into the War Room :keke:
 
Heinz

Heinz

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Well I can only see this as a good thing, not immediately going for the higher priced vehicles. Always start with a fuckin beater, they have soul and you form memories around them.

No one fucking cares about your story of a perfect working order car that never breaks down.
 
JoeAwesome

JoeAwesome

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Negative, Rot. You display the good stuff upfront to bring in the rubes. Everyone knows it's the cheap stuff you can really negotiate with because sellers want that stuff gone, not just at the right price.
 
snes_collector

snes_collector

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Dealers around here have pretty much stoped selling trades unless it is only a few years old or something expensive. They park all the old stuff in the back and refuse to sell to individuals. It all ends up going to car sales for people with dealers license.
 
Cylotron

Cylotron

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The thing that surprises me is the Tesla's and the software/firmware restrictions. The Model 3's for instance... you can either buy the "long range battery" version or the "performance" versions(there's a $10,000 price difference). However they are both the exact car. The only difference is the restrictions put in place in the software/firmware.
A co-worker was planning on buying a 'performance'($64,000) model 3 but the dealer just had the 'long range battery'($53,000) model on hand. They offered to upgrade the firmware on one to make it a 'performance'(and of course charge the performance price). Apparently he tried haggling with price but didn't get anywhere. Ended up paying the full price anyway.

At least he's getting the Federal Tax Credit... but still... $10,000+ price difference just by changing the firmware? :shame:
 
StevenK

StevenK

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95% of second hand car buying decisions in the UK now are made on the internet, on one single website, before the buyer even makes it to a car lot. Because of this there's no margin left in the cars, you can't just stick a grand on the asking price and hope for someone who doesn't know what they're looking at anymore.

However, there is good money to be made in the cars that people trade in. People will practically give away cars with minor faults on them because they're scared of what it will cost them to fix. Finance deals and extended warranties are good earners too, though I often cringe as I watch people hang themselves with cars they neither need nor can afford.

Having said that I've had enough, I'm in the process of selling up my stock and moving onto new things. It was great fun for a while but the love has gone.
 
Syn

Syn

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Around me, dealers put one or two cheap cars upfront so people think there's a good selection or variety of prices.
 
theMot

theMot

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SteveNK said:
Having said that I've had enough, I'm in the process of selling up my stock and moving onto new things. It was great fun for a while but the love has gone.
Click to expand...

What are you getting into?
 
StevenK

StevenK

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theMot said:
What are you getting into?
Click to expand...

I'm sticking around cars for now just because I've built up a lot of contacts over the last 4/5 years. I've set up a couple of companies, one is a breakdown recovery company, though I'm trying to avoid breakdowns and deal more with basic car transportation and the other is a used car parts business. The former made sense just because I know lots of people who need cars picking up, moving around and dropping off all the time plus I had a few recovery trucks already. It's going ok, but it has all the hallmarks of a real job - organising people, dealing with customers and bullshit admin, I'm thinking it will be short-lived. The latter however is doing bzarrely well, I'm waiting for something unforseen to come along and fuck it up but so far it seems perfect.....Famous last words.....
 
itsofrustratin

itsofrustratin

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SteveNK said:
95% of second hand car buying decisions in the UK now are made on the internet, on one single website, before the buyer even makes it to a car lot. Because of this there's no margin left in the cars, you can't just stick a grand on the asking price and hope for someone who doesn't know what they're looking at anymore.

However, there is good money to be made in the cars that people trade in. People will practically give away cars with minor faults on them because they're scared of what it will cost them to fix. Finance deals and extended warranties are good earners too, though I often cringe as I watch people hang themselves with cars they neither need nor can afford.

Having said that I've had enough, I'm in the process of selling up my stock and moving onto new things. It was great fun for a while but the love has gone.
Click to expand...

Most new car dealers here make the vast majority of their money on service. The new car sales are basically a loss leader. With entry level cars they tend to lose money on the sales and hope to make it back on the service. Summer and winter maintenance packages are high profit and rust proofing is basically free money that borderlines on a scam. They also make a fuck ton on winter tires here to the point where i wonder how dealerships in warmer climates get by.
 
aha2940

aha2940

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itsofrustratin said:
Most new car dealers here make the vast majority of their money on service. The new car sales are basically a loss leader. With entry level cars they tend to lose money on the sales and hope to make it back on the service. Summer and winter maintenance packages are high profit and rust proofing is basically free money that borderlines on a scam. They also make a fuck ton on winter tires here to the point where i wonder how dealerships in warmer climates get by.
Click to expand...

Here in Colombia we have no seasons. Also, almost no rust on the cars, unless you live near a shore or near the beach. What car dealers do here is that they tell you (kind of "mandate") to do maintenance to the cars every 8000km (5000miles) and if you don't do it with them, they may void the car's warranty. It's a dirty trick, but i guess that's how the fill in the gap of rust protection and winter tires they can't sell around here.
 
Neo Alec

Neo Alec

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Our Prius was a salvage title with less than 30,000 miles on it. Haggling with the guy who fixes them up and sells them wasn't necessary. The prices were already dirt cheap. Paid less than 11,0000. It still had the new car smell. Best decision I ever made.
 
norton9478

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On my last car search, I ran into a dealer that sells almost all stuff with salvage titles. He self-finances the transactions since banks won't.
His core customers couldn't get a bank loan anyways so it all works out. I guess.
 
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