Well, the new foster dog is all settled in, thanks be to crates and portable kennels. How did anybody ever introduce new dogs to a pack without ’em?
All went reasonably well. Robbie issued a few pro forma growls, then backed off on command, duty done. Ava — the most volatile of my pups — lunged at the newsomer’s crate repeatedly shouting, “I’m gonna rip your foul entrails out, you Spawn of Evil. If it’s my last act in life, I’ll tear your throat out of your wretched body and … oh, look. A tennis ball!” Nadja (who is one of the few dogs I’ve know to possess almost a human level of duplicity), stared persistently at the new dog — rude and provocative behavior, in canine terms — then protested, “But Mom, I’m only looking at her. What’s the big deal?”
Newbie Betsy seems perfectly capable of holding her own, growling back at my mob with vampire fangs. Give it a couple of days, and as you guys predicted all will be well. Still, at some point with three temperamental females There Will Be Blood.
—–
The vacant lot in town that usually hosts two or three private-party used cars for sale (and occasionally a logging truck or rock hauler) suddenly blossomed into a real car lot this week and opened today for a one-week sale. “Wholesale to the public,” said the manager when I bearded him yesterday before the official opening. “Liquidation of repos,” said a voracious salesthing when I stopped by today on my way home from picking up the new foster.
Now, you who live in Civlilzation are used to this sort of thing — car lots with hundreds of vehicles, balloons, flags, tents, and high-pressure tactics. For us here in the middle of nowhere, it’s as novel as the circus coming to town, complete with elephants and acrobats.
I don’t need a new (used) vehicle. But it’s occurred to me that the Xterra — purchased for regular 12-mile treks through desert washes — isn’t the ideal vehicle for around-town errands or even quick trips up the local logging roads. I love the Xterra. But 15 mpg is looking less likable all the time, and its one great flaw is that, for all its size and bulk, it doesn’t have as much cargo-carrying capacity as a little red wagon. I do garage sales. And dogs. And home improvemtent. Cargo-carrying is a Big Deal.
So I stopped to have a look.
A salesthing descended on me almost before I’d shut off the ignition and started trying to tie my brain in knots.
I haven’t been on a real car lot in 20 years. That’s when I bought the only new-new vehicle I’ve ever owned, the 1991 Toyota 4WD pickup truck that I had until just a few years ago. Nice truck, but I got completely snookered — from the bait-and-switch (“Oh, I’m soooorrry. I didn’t know the used 4Runner you called about had gone home with another salesman today. But you know, I can get you into a brand new pickup truck for the same price!”) to the $600 Scotchgard package and the 12% financing (because after three hours of being trapped at the dealership, I’d have agreed to anything just to escape). As I say, nice truck. But for 16 years, every time I looked at it, I thought, “Claire … you idiot.”
So I knew going in that I was absolutely, 100 percent, not going to buy anything today (not that I could have afforded any of these late-model vehicles, anyhow). Homework first, vehicle later. Pressure will be to no avail against the cynicism of experience and Kelley Blue Book on the Internet. But I got to enjoy the artistry of the high-pressure pitch.
I’ve never made a study of car sales tactics. That would be as unsavory as making a study of how congressional committees work. But it’s as if these guys go to school to keep the mark off balance. Everything is geared to seem both friendly and insulting at the same time. (At least this is the approach they take with women; can’t speak to how they treat men.)
I’d ask a question, and instead of answering it, the salesthing would ask me one — and never one related to my wants or needs, but only related to The Deal. “Do you have any used vans around X-price?” I’d ask. “What year’s your Xterra,” he’d respond, “and how many miles has it got on i?.”
“What’s the price on that one?” I’d ask, looking at a particular vehicle. “What do you want to pay per month?” he’d counter.
“Have you got one a few years older and maybe not so fancy?” says I, peering into a 2010 van whose interior looked like a jet liner and whose sliding doors closed by themselves once the handles were manipulated a certain way. (Neither my budget nor my lifestyle can cope with such ameniities.) “Let me put it this way,” he’d counter. “Would you accept this vehicle right now if you could get the payment down to $300 a month?”
Gaging the value of my supposed trade-in, gaging my credit-worthiness and income, gaging my willingness to give personal information. Trying to make me feel sold before I’d even had a chance to think about, let alone drive, one of the vehicles.
The weird thing is that there were no sticker prices anywhere. Each vehicle bore a bright yellow tag with a monthly payment on it — $471, $525, $597. I suppose it’s different for you folks in Civilization, but around here those are more like monthly mortgage payments than car payments. But there were no bottom-line figures. No asking price against which to make an offer.
Nor would the salesthing give one, no matter how I pressed.
“You don’t understand, M’am. As I explained, this is a liquidation sale. You find a car you like, you go into the tent there and tell them what you want to pay per month, they’ll look at your credit and tell you if they can do it. Just ignore the monthly prices on those tags. You can get the car for a lot less than that. It’s to your advantage, you see. You bid what you want to pay on the car, and if the bank accepts, the car is yours.”
“But what’s the sticker price?” I’d ask.
“M’am,” he say with the infinite patience one needs when trying to teach a retarded child to spell d-o-g and c-a-t, “I already explained that.” Then he’d explain again. “That’s the way these repo sales work,” he’d conclude, as if every human being on earth — except the benighted, totally hopeless dunce of a woman he’d happened to get burdened with — already understood.
“You mean,” I finally asked, “that if I want one of these vehicles, nobody will tell me the sticker price until I’ve given all kinds of personal information and applied for credit?”
“Yes, M’am. That’s exactly right. It’s to your advantage, believe me.”
“Ummmmm … I’ll see ya later.”
Of course, maybe I am exactly as ignorant as Mr. Salesthing implied I am. I don’t go to car lots, so I don’t know. Maybe this really is how things are done — at least in One! Week! Only! Liquidation! Sales! It’s not how I do things. Even if I could have afforded one of the vehicles (not likely) I knew going in that there was no way, nohow, that I’d buy a vehicle without doing excruciating research and having my bottom-line price already in mind before negotiating. Nor would I buy a used vehicle without having my blessedly wonderful, marvelously honest, spectacularly competent mechanic have a look first.
But it was masterly the way the salesthing strove to keep me off-balance, on the defensive, under pressure, and filled with self doubt from the moment he met me at my car door to the moment I walked away. A lot of the pressure carried the subtle — or not so subtle — suggestion that other people — smarter, more in-the-know people — than I were right there snapping up all the good deals while I was so foolishly dithering (and wasting his valuable time) over silly details like price.
I think car sales is where sleazebags go when they’re not smart enough to get elected to office. Or maybe politics is where sleazebags go when they’re incompetent at selling cars.
It may not be everyone, but my technique is, if I’ve seen something I’m truly willing to buy if the price is right, “Tell me the best price you can manage. If I like it, I’ll buy. If I don’t, I’m leaving.” Then, if the price doesn’t work, leave.
Once, a salesman actually grabbed me as I was leaving (not bargaining ploy; I was leaving), and demanded I close the sale.
I hear he lived.
But with the outfit you’ve described, I’d never get that far. Walk away, don’t look back. If it were really what sane and honest people call a liquidation, they’d already have definite prices. Refusing to give a price until they can run a credit check on you is… well, “warning indicator” doesn’t really express it properly. Maybe, “RED ALERT! FRAUD! SCAM! RUN!”
I’d be willing to bet that even after setting a “final price” for some sucker, these dirt bags tack another 2-3 thousand in fees on the contract.
LOL, so true … they NEVER want to tell you what the vehicle costs, only what the payments are …
I’ve had a couple cars/trucks repo’d in both the big city and rural (and rural wasn’t that long ago) and both times they went to an Auction…..I imagine by now (currently) they’re so swamped with em that they have to just drive out to the middle of nowhere and set up a lot for a few days – however I’d never buy off a lot like you describe…..it sounds shady, and there’s no telling if the car you do get isn’t gps’d back to a Bubba somewhere……
I know you don’t want to buy, so this was just “one of those experience” things, but it’s bad enough regular car dealer sales lots are ripoffs – these guys sound even worse than those (if that’s even possible LOL)……
I hate car sales people, and it’s exactly because of the way they (don’t) respond to women……yes, they screw everyone who walks by them, but women seem to be their biggest amusement……
Good luck with all the doggies, probably by the time they sort out who’s boss Betsy will leave for a home of her own, always works that way…..
Had a new/used dealer like that here once. I asked for a price, they ducked and dodged and I walked off. My friend dealt the same way, but told them he had wanted to pay cash (he did) and then walked off. Company is out of business now, declared bankruptcy, no clearance sale, after the Attorney General’s office started to investigate their business practice.
I’ve needed to get wheels a couple of months ago when I was completely flat broke, well not really but almost so, I’ve gotten a very small no interest loan from my father for a used Dakota. Turns out someone else brought it. I’ve been looking for a decent used pick-up.
But thanks to Obama’s car thing deal, a couple of years earlier, there aren’t, really, any cheap wheels out there anymore.
Because I needed wheels more than the swiss army ability of a pick-up, I’ve settled for one of those used VW New Beetle. A better car than I expected, and good on the fuel economy, which will give me time to see what the gas prices will do over the next 2-3 seasons. I do plan to eventually get a pick-up.
I’ve gotten the car from a used car dealer. When he asked me what I thought after the test drive, I told him that the car wasn’t ideal but I’d like to make an offer of only a little bit over the loan money I got, which was about $600 under his asking price. He thought for a moment and accepted it right there.
Most important is the fact that I will be able to pay my father back in full in the next couple of months with no need to shell out any personal info.
What you need to do is to research up front first, have only a little over any offer you make in your hands first, take the test drive, and f’r gawd sakes, don’t indicate that you need the car. As long as you know the blue book or similar price you should be able to make a decent low ball offer without knowing his price if he refuses to tell you. Knowing his price is better as he may actually be lower than the blue book, sometimes. Better to be able to walk away and TAKE YOUR TIME!
Yeah that place sounds like a big scam. You ought to check for a nearby private seller who will let you take the car to a mechanic before you buy it.
I remember last year my mom and dad got a new car. I went with them to the first place they looked (mainly because my old hunk of crap that sort of resembled a car was being traded in) and the employee out on the lot that discussed the cars and took us on test drives was the nicest guy imaginable. But the people in the offices that actually sold the cars were not only some of the most annoying assholes I’ve met, but they were pretty shady. Among other things, they actually had a policy of not allowing a buyer to see the interest rate on the car until you’ve already bought it. I think they literally expect you to wait for the first bill before you find out what the hell you’re paying in interest. And it’s not like they had some fantastic deals that would make you want to take a risk like that, pretty much just average MSRP. The scary thing is that this isn’t some run down lot on the corner, it’s like the biggest and most popular dealer in the area…hundreds of people around here fall for their weak sales pitch.
Needless to say…they went somewhere else and got a better deal.
salesthings are strange creatures indeeed
I’m a professional buyer. I’ve seen every kind of saleman ever made, and I always, ALWAYS, get snookered by used car salesmen. They’re really good in a really bad way.
Isn’t it interesting that an entire industry has prospered by making the experience of buying their product as excruciating as possible to a majority of their customers? I drive my vehicles until they are completely used up and worn out just so I don’t have to go through the process of buying one more often than absolutely necessary.
They do it to men, too, Claire, although perhaps a little more haltingly. After all, there’s the remote possibility that an Amercan male might know what some of the thingies under the hood do. 🙂
I got lucky in learning about car hustlers very early in life. Just out of the Navy, in college, and needing wheels, I found one on a Ford dealer’s lot. I made my offer and the salesman said no, but on an offchance he would “check with the manager.” The manager, the salesman, and two or three other guys in neckties got me in an office, surrounded me. The manager said he would help me out by dropping the price about $50 and, “Now, are *you* going to be **hard-nosed** about this when I’ve done everything a man could for you?”
It was my first encounter with accusatory selling. I didn’t even thank them for their time on my radip way out the door.
I have a favorite used car salesman. I guess he is actually a broker since he owns and runs the lot. It’s a small used car lot, but moves a lot of cars. He’s my favorite, because he tells people up front what is wrong with the vehicle and still convinces them to buy the car! I saw him sell two vehicles that needed new AC that the buyer paid to replace. Amazing. His prices are only average even. He doesn’t pressure the buyers, just talks nicely to them, discusses their needs, the pro’s and con’s of the vehicle and makes the sale. He does give every vehicle a 3month 3,000 mile power train warranty, but since he doesn’t take vehicles with power train issues it’s a safe bet.
My first new car was purchased in 1987 when I got a nice windfall… I had already decided (after much research – and no internet) what I wanted and found a dealer having a “sale.” I went in and let the salesman go through all of his tricks and pitches without much comment. I pointed out which car I wanted and resisted all of the little “add on” stuff, but generally let him think he had taken me in.
When we sat down with the “contract,” I whipped out my checkbook and wrote them a check for the agreed on sum – which was minus the credit crap, of course.
OH MY GOSH! He about came unglued. He had to go talk to his “manager” first, insisting that they couldn’t give me THAT price for CASH!! I just shrugged and said that I’d wait.
The manager came out and actually tried to tell me that I’d have to pay MORE in order to give them cash. They trotted out a sob story about how the credit contract was the only way they really made any money from selling cars….
Eventually, I told them to take it or leave it. With great reluctance and terrible faces, they finally took my check and closed the deal. Never went back there… figured they’d have my picture tacked onto the wall somewhere with a severe warning to any salesman who even spoke to me.
Lots of other dealers around. I pulled that twice more in the next 20 years. You can seldom pay less than something is worth, but it is very easy to get roped into paying a lot more.
Guess I’m not surprised to hear that snaky (and even downright bullying) used car sales continue to be such a universal experience — even for the skilled and savvy.
Matt, I wish I lived near your favorite car salesman! I had a similar experience to yours when I bought the XTerra. The place was a tiny lot. Car sales weren’t even the main business — just a sidelight to some type of auto-mechanic shop. They had only older, low-priced cars and the guy I dealt with (not even the main sales guy but the owner who mainly dealt with the shop) was upfront and scrupulously honest about the vehicle’s few problems. (It also helped that I had two knowledgable guys with me, including Joel, who used to be a professional mechanic; but I think this guy would have been fair, regardless.) He gave me a price almost as low as Kelly Blue Book said to expect from a private party sale & I left happy. But now I’m several states away from that place.
When the time comes that I need another used car, I’ll probably ask my mechanic to keep an eye out for one for me. Or go back to the local empty lot once the scammers have moved on and the private parties are once again parking their old vans and pickups.
MamaLiberty — That’s funny. A business that wants to give you a less-good deal for a cash sale. Very upside-down to the rest of the world. But nice job on your part.
And why is it that, when you tell a high-pressure salesthing, “Don’t pressure me. I won’t do any good,” they always — always — respond, “I’m not pressuring you.”
I was shopping for used cars recently. I did a lot of research on the internet first, and came to each dealer with a set of printouts showing the car and the asking price.
All of the dealers were respectful, none tried to pressure me. They would let me take it out alone for a test drive after photocopying my driver’s license.
The only odd thing I noticed was that the stickers on the cars had prices several thousand dollars higher than those advertised on the internet. I asked about it, and was assured that “the internet price” was valid. I’m pretty sure I could have gotten a bit off that price.
As it turned out, I decided not to buy. I did a calculation of all the costs: cash up front, insurance, taxes, title fees, registration, $500 annual maintenance, which is probably low. Then I calculated how long I would have to rent a brand new car from Hertz over a 10 year period in order to have the same Net Present Value as buying and maintaining one.
Renting means a new car and no maintenance or repairs. I had a fender-bender with my last rental when a guy bashed me in a parking lot. My credit card and insurance company took care of it with only modest hassle to me. Pretty cool: wreck a car, throw it away and get another one.
Renting turns out to be a pretty good deal; I would have to rent the car over 18 weeks a year for 10 years before it would be cheaper to buy. I get to keep the big wad of cash for a rainy day or other use, and shell out a few $ when I’m actually driving.
You might consider that option when you need big cargo space for moving multiple dogs or whatever. I don’t know what rental agencies are near your small town, there are places that rent older cars for even less money than the big agencies. Renting (never from an airport, they tack on huge taxes and fees) is a perfectly sound option if you don’t drive the car every day.
My Uncle buys cars for CASH. (Most Dealerships have lousy cash-flow, all that “Financing” don’cha you know!) He looks up the car HE wants with the options HE wants at several websites, decides how much it’s worth to him and then goes to the Dealership with a roll of $100.00 Bills big enough to choke a Bear.
He calmly tells the salesman exactly what he wants, and asks if they have it. When they offer something else he pulls out the roll and tells them to say goodbye to it. They quickly seem to “find” just what he wanted!
If any salesman were to let that much cash get out the door, his Manager wouild flambe him, just to apollogise.
Even in this age of plastic; Money, REAL Money, Talks!
I like to think I have learned how to deal with this kind of thing. Unfortunately, my wife considers my behavior rude. I think you need to fight fire with fire. Being obnoxious goes a long way towards getting some answers.
I must have used up a few months worth of good karma, last time I went car shopping. Old Car’s transmission died, not worth it to fix it, so a new car was on the agenda. Newer car, that is.
All used-car-only lots, off limits. Won’t go nowhere near ’em. See, I have a mechanic friend who occasionally goes to wholesale auctions, and encounters used-car dealers there. Slime they are, one and all, buying cars at auction for small amount$ and selling them for much larger amount$$. And you’re lucky if they do more than sponge off the exterior betwixt buying and selling. You want a used-car bargain, go to an auction yourself, preferably with a mechanic who can examine the cars and tell if there’s anything major wrong with ’em.
So no used car dealers. Auction cars -> last resort; first I surveyed local new car dealers via their websites. Found a decent-looking deal on a used car at a dealer near work. Aforementioned mechanic friend and I went to check it out, and found that it was a real bargain, priced well under the KBB value for that car with those options. Crawled all over it inside and out looking for problems — the dealer even put it on a lift so we could look at the underside. Nothing whatever could we find. No real point to trying to bargain when it was already well under list price, so I said “done, where do I sign” and that was that.
Yeah, they pull that crap on men, too. Especially younger ones.
Winston: “Among other things, they actually had a policy of not allowing a buyer to see the interest rate on the car until you’ve already bought it. I think they literally expect you to wait for the first bill before you find out what the hell you’re paying in interest.”
That’s a blatant violation of the Truth in Lending Act, and the owners of that company could be jailed for that.
(I worked for a credit card company once, and had to know the relevant credit and lending laws inside and out.)
I came into a sum of money and bought myself and my son each a used car. I went onto the car lot each time, picked out the car we wanted, told them how much I was going to spend which included tags, taxes, the whole enchilada and both times drove off with the car. In each case, what I paid was about $600 to $1000 less than what they wanted for it and that was all inclusive. I personally didn’t care what they had to say. LOL I told them flat out I was paying cash and what I would pay. In both cases… I got a better deal than the NADA guidelines in price. I don’t turn up my hearing aide until I see them nod yes to the price I want. ROFL
I tried my luck at car sales in my late twenties. My eyes were opened WIDE when I learned all of the tricks they use to milk money from customers. From offering interest rates that they KNEW were higher than necessary (they ran credit checks on customers every time) to giving less than necessary for a trade-in. The would banter back and forth with managers and claim to be giving the best available price…but it was a lie. Most of the public doesn’t know that the dealership gets a kickback from the manufacturer for each sales, so even if the dealership doesn’t make any money from the sale to the customer (which is RARE), they still get money from the manufacturer (called a Hold-Back).
I lasted four months and quit.
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