This might be more appropriate in another thread, if so, move it, but others have commented about how the economy today has personally affected them, so here goes.
We needed to replace my wife's vehicle because she was involved in an accident just before Christmas, she's fine, her car not so much. I pretty much let her decide what she wanted, her stipulations being not a black exterior (AZ), leather seats (golden retrievers), and a large enough cargo area to fit the armored dog crate. She decided she wanted a Kia Telluride and we went to the local dealer that had 15 of them on the lot. Test drove 4 of them and she picked one trimmed in the mid to upper range, with lots of bells and whistles.
Now the fun part, dealing with the $$$. They wrote up a proposal and showed it to us, when I questioned what the extra 10 grand was the response was dealer adjustment. The explanation was lack of inventory, shortages, they have to do it to keep everyone employed and the dealership open. I said that from a consumers point of view it looks like greed. They brought in a sales manager that told me groceries are up, but you still buy them don't you, gas is up, but you still buy it, don't you. When I responded that wholesale prices have risen requiring stores and gas stations to raise their prices, would you show me the factory invoice that the dealership paid for this car? Is it over MSRP? They wouldn't do that, but said to make a counter offer, so said MSRP. They said no, we got up, and I commented that I hope they could sleep at night, which left the two of them dumbfounded. Drove a few miles further down the road, bought a new Honda Pilot at $200 below MSRP. Still a little pissed at the loan rates, and thinking why couldn't this have happened 3 years ago.
We needed to replace my wife's vehicle because she was involved in an accident just before Christmas, she's fine, her car not so much. I pretty much let her decide what she wanted, her stipulations being not a black exterior (AZ), leather seats (golden retrievers), and a large enough cargo area to fit the armored dog crate. She decided she wanted a Kia Telluride and we went to the local dealer that had 15 of them on the lot. Test drove 4 of them and she picked one trimmed in the mid to upper range, with lots of bells and whistles.
Now the fun part, dealing with the $$$. They wrote up a proposal and showed it to us, when I questioned what the extra 10 grand was the response was dealer adjustment. The explanation was lack of inventory, shortages, they have to do it to keep everyone employed and the dealership open. I said that from a consumers point of view it looks like greed. They brought in a sales manager that told me groceries are up, but you still buy them don't you, gas is up, but you still buy it, don't you. When I responded that wholesale prices have risen requiring stores and gas stations to raise their prices, would you show me the factory invoice that the dealership paid for this car? Is it over MSRP? They wouldn't do that, but said to make a counter offer, so said MSRP. They said no, we got up, and I commented that I hope they could sleep at night, which left the two of them dumbfounded. Drove a few miles further down the road, bought a new Honda Pilot at $200 below MSRP. Still a little pissed at the loan rates, and thinking why couldn't this have happened 3 years ago.
