Buying a car in Florida
 

Buying a car in Florida.
Please share your advice, experience, the good and bad of buying a new car in Florida.

A lot of people dislike the Jenkins dealerships but they own a bunch in the area. You can probably get a better deal outside the area.

Costco has an auto buying service
I’ve bought several cars through them up north

+1 for Costco for new.

Carvanna is good for recently used models.

Cars
 

Doing it now, sold my truck in Texas and looking to downsize here. Looking for a used Toyota Tacoma or Nissan Frontier, pretty much tell the dealer to send me a OTD (out the door) price then offer them 1 or 2k less, should be picking one up this week, be using CarGurus to do my search.

There are a lot of threads about this topic.

In our case, we determine the Out-the-Door (OTD) price we choose to pay for a certain type of car. Then we find a dealer who sells that type of car and make our OTD offer. If we do not hear a Yes, then we leave and try somewhere else.

That is how we have been buying cars since 1994.

need to go to Orlando or Tampa for good deal.- AutoNation is pretty fair

What does Costco do for you? I tried to use the service, but I cannot see that they do anything that is helpful. The people I talked to did not even work for Costco.

We bought a very nice used BMW convertible through the classifieds right here on TOTV about 8 years ago and feel that we got an excellent deal. There are many well to do old folks in the Villages who buy very nice cars, use them very lightly, always keep them well maintained and garaged, have very low mileage, and have never seen road salt or northern pot holes. Simple depreciation with age makes these cars a good value relative to the wear and tear they have on them. Unfortunately, since Covid supply shortages, and more recently tariffs, used cars have become a high demand item and good deals are much harder to come by.

Be prepared to get ripped off with outrageous doc fees and other garbage fees that are pure profit to the dealer.

Don't be prepared, just refuse to pay those fees. I never pay dealer (doc) fees or garbage fees, or even the extreme markups for dealer installed options.

By the way, Mullinax Ford doesn't try to charge any fees.

Yes, be super careful if buying from Jenkins.

Vehicle Purchase
 

We bought a new vehicle in December. I utilized auto purchase programs from Costco, Sam’s Club, AAA and AARP. It was a lot of dealers to juggle but I was able to compare them fairly well and play them off each other a little. When all was said and done I felt we got a good deal. It was helpful to be firm on exactly what we wanted and not allow the sales people to move us towards models or options we didn’t want or need.

If you buying a Ford, I know a very good Manager in Sanford. He is really good.
I buy a lot from him and most of the time depending on the car or truck i get invoice or right around there, with not BS fee's

All of this is good advice to anybody buying cars anywhere.
I’m a widow….have had to buy several cars on my own. In my married life I just drove whatever car my husband purchased.
I watched a lot of YouTube’s and follow their advice.
Beware of the upcharges and bull**** fees. One dealer even added a $1000 ceramic topcoat to the car, between the time of my commitment to purchase and the closing. I guess he thought I’d feel obligated to pay but I absolutely refused.
Know what you’re willing to pay going in the door. Then stick to your number.