People will believe anything they are told when they start feeling pain from anywhere.  With the high prices of gas now a days, the latest trend is filling car tires with nitrogen to get better gas mileage.

While this may save you pennies in the long run. There is greater impact on your gas mileage by changing your driving habits. Read the truth about this from a reliable source. ConsumerReports

Car dealers and media will sell you anything if you are willing to buy it. Buyer beware!

This pretty much confirms that we must not believe everything we hear about in the news.

Just search for “car dealers” on YouTube and once you get past the car dealer promo videos, and news coverage of car dealers who did bad, you will see lots of other videos where customers tell you how they were duped by a car dealers. ( I don’t mean to single out car dealers, but any business that tries to take advantage of their customer needs to be aware that customers are now empowered to use the internet for word of mouth to share their experience. )

There is for instance is a Mercedes car dealer in Vancouver that quoted a customer $6500 for a repair when in fact a car repair shop did the fix for $141. (Name of this video is “Mercedes Dealer Ripoff “. There is another car video from a guy who bought a Suzuki immobilizer, but landed up getting something else. Video is called “how the car dealer cheats” etc etc.

While this does not apply to most car dealers out there who run a honest business, customers who are unfortunate enough to befall prey to unscrupulous dealers can fight back. You can usually complain to the manufacturer, tell the local news, complain to BBB or of course make your own video.

Best defense is a good offence, and in this case it means going into the car dealership knowing everything there is to know about car buying and service, and of course getting multiple quotes before paying for a service.

This innocent question has been misused to charge customers higher for cars.

Here is how the misuse happens.
Lets say you can afford to pay $300 a month on your new car.
Great!
1) With a car loan at 5% a year over 5 years you can afford to pay the car dealer about:$14,600 (Before taxes)
2) With a car loan at 7% a year over 5 years you can afford to pay the car dealer about: $13,900 (Before taxes) for the same car.

A) There have been cases reported where the car dealer sells the buyer a cheaper car at $13,900 and give the the buyer a higher interest loan at $300 a month. Why? Because the dealer also makes more money selling the higher interest loan to the buyer.

B) Another method that has been used is the dealer gives the buyer a big discount on the price of the car, only to set the buyer up with a higher interest loan. Note the dealer makes up for the “discount” by increasing his or her commissions on the car loan.

C) Another variation of this I have seen is when the car dealer tells the buyer, at the time of closing the deal, that they want to give something to the buyer for “free” at the same monthly payment. How do that do that? Well, they give you $1000 worth of say undercoating “free” then they drop the interest rate on your loan before you sign the papers, and use the extra loan money you can get for the same monthly payment to pay for your “free” gift.

Moral of the story. Never ever negotiate a car deal with a car dealer thinking about how much you can afford to pay each month. You need to do that calculation at home first. I even encourage you to get a pre-approved loan for a website or your bank before you talk to a dealer so you go into a dealership only ready to negotiate the other aspects of car buying.

Here is a great auto loan calculator to figure this out for yourself.

One of my friends recently bought a new car and  shopped  around via her phone  having used her  buddy’s car buying service (ps.  her buddy being me.)  . She told the dealers that her best buddy is in the car business and that she was looking to only buy her car if she can get the car below invoice price. After two car dealers rejected her proposal, the third one who had 3 cars that she liked agreed to her proposal. Of course she did go around to multiple dealerships test driving various vehicles, and had determined exactly what she wanted before doing her telephone shopping. What surprised me was the ease of her getting the friends and family discount once she made it clear that she knew how the car dealer insider deals are all about, and that she qualifies. Kuddos to you buddy. (I have been asked to keep her name anonymous. )

Moral of the story: If you have a friend or family member in the car business, definitely have them shop a car for you, or at lease use their leverage of being an auto dealer industry  insider to get you an awesome deal.

Not quite! The only thing my Lexus car dealer let me put on my credit card the last time i purchased a new car was the tax. The rest of the amount had to be paid by other means. Anycase, putting $3000 on my credit card earned me miles and also enabled me to defer spending $3000 for another 30 days. I have never heard of a car dealer allowing anyone to put the whole car on a credit card. If you have, would love to hear your story. Also, the car dealer rater give you a car loan himself (via his loan provider) than have you benefit the credit card companies. The biggest motivation for the dealer to do this is of course that fact that the car dealer has to pay the credit card companies 2.5% of the amount just to provide you a convenience of enabling you to pay by your plastic. That is money right out of the car dealers pocket.  Bottom line is that its worth asking the dealer what he/she is ready to do. In today’s economic times many car dealers are ready to go the extra mile to close the sale. Good luck!

Wow, some people seem really scared to talk to dealers. Some car dealers have picked up on this fear and have come up with the complete car buying experience online. Check out this news story about the A-to-Z of car buying completely online.

Come on, we (car dealers) are not so bad. While the in concept the complete online car purchase idea seems wonderful,  you will be leaving many a dollars on the table for the luxury of avoiding your car buying fears.

I still advocate, doing your car buying research online, and getting multiple quotes from dealers from the ease of your home computer, and then doing the legwork and talk work at the dealers who respond so that you get the car you really want. Besides, there is no substitute for actually getting behind the wheel of a car before making the purchase.

Good luck!

Helping you find your perfect car for the right price is a competitive space. We, the online car dealer liaisons do our very best to get you a great deal. While my competition offers vast knowledge base of different cars to engage you, and extensive dealership reach to almost all the dealers in USA, MissCarDealer works hard to give you a unique insider knowledge of the car dealership industry, how the dealer thinks and also puts you in touch with the exclusive dealers with internet departments who are ready to make a lowest price deal. We are a boutique website with very compelling pitch to our customers. All we ask is you give us a chance to serve you and show you why we are better than our bigger competitors. Check out an interesting article comparing online car dealer sites here.

While most ideas here have been explored on my site, i found a few nuggets in here that will give you a few more hundred in savings. The article below covers the following eight money saving tips at car dealers.

1. Decide what type of vehicle fits your needs, lifestyle and budget.
2. Don’t rationalize an expense that is far beyond your budget.
3. Shop around on the Web. (Definately check out MissCarDealer network prices vs others)
4. Buy at the right time.
5. Try to avoid a down payment for a lease unless it lowers your monthly payments.
6. If you’re offered either cash back or a lower interest rate, choose the latter.
7. Be aggressive.
8. Don’t get snookered into snazzy, but superfluous, extras.

For more details click on the link below:

Click here for more details

In today’s tough economy car buyers have become more prudent. Car dealers have catered by being more open about how their competition compares.
As today’s buyers do a lot more home work before talking to a dealer, car dealers give them less run around to close a sale.
As car buyers have become more sophisticated in their lifestyles, new car dealers now offer gourmet coffee instead of the usual house brand.
Even car dealers are opting to hire non typical car salesy people as internet buying has lowered the need for song and dance sales people. Read the excellent article here:

Click here for more info on this article

If you have the luxuary of time before you buy your next car, consider this new flash. Every little leverage you can get with car dealers, you will drop your ultimate car buying price by a few hundred dollars. Read my section on car buying for all the tips to get that awesome car price.