[Beyond The Wall]

My mother in law had the same kind of experience at Jenkins Hyundai. Never again. She was treated very fairly at Phillips Buick.
Only way to stop this practice is get up and walk away .

Originally Posted by Number 10 GI

If it actually worked all the dealers would be doing it. I think it was Saturn who had fixed price, no haggle buying and they aren't around any longer.

If all dealers had to do it, it would work. They would have to be satisfied with a fair profit like any other honest business instead of making an inflated profit by lying, pressuring, and scamming their customers. What they do may be legal but that does not make it honest or moral.

[moe1212]

when you lease a car you are paying for the time frame in which you have it. It is the value of the vehicle less the residual value (the vehicles worth) when handed back divided by the number of months leased (taxes can be part of the equation as well. You do not pay for the list price of the car. Also most leases do not included any of the maintenance you mentioned above. Car dealers / salesman can be opportunistic to be kind. Typically there are three things involved in a deal like this. 1) price of new auto 2) trade in value 3) monthly payment (interest rate). All three of these should be considered when leasing or buying. If you talk to a salesmen they will tell you surprisingly enough that each individual will worry about just one of these three variables. In this case your friend may have told the salesperson what they are willing to spend each month and they built the deal to match it. subsequently not getting a fair shake. Just a thought.

[retiredguy123]

Originally Posted by Mikee1

That is strictly illegal. That is called price fixing and restraint of trade. It is also illegal for a manufacturer to sell its own vehicle at retail. They have tried in the past thru arm length companies and it has been a huge failure. Ask Ford, GM.
While you may have a desirable point, it cannot be done.

I wasn't suggesting illegal price fixing. But, the manufacturers could require their dealers to stop engaging in deception and dishonesty when they sell a car. The behavior that car dealers engage in doesn't happen at other retail stores. I think the process will improve eventually because customers will demand it. But, car manufacturers could certainly help. The first deception that all dealers use is to show the customer an "invoice" that is supposed to represent what the dealer actually paid for the car. It doesn't. After that, the deception gets worse.

[donfey]

To me, this is the best answer. The car dealer buys and sells cars, and does so EVERY day. Anyone who goes there is at a disadvantage in the first place. To do so without some sort of assistance, like a knowledgable friend, not prudent.

[Tsmart]

And leases are taxed monthly.

[meridian5850]

Originally Posted by retiredguy123

For what it is worth, I think it is more common for young people in their twenties to be ripped off by a car dealer than a senior citizen. And, young people are less likely to be able to afford to get ripped off. But, I blame the car manufacturers. They should require their dealers to advertise a fixed price for the cars without all of the games and ripoffs. I actually think it would increase sales and profits.

Remember the Saturn division of GM? The business model was no haggle, fixed prices.

Also, regarding your most recent post; where are all the places you shop and demand to see the invoice of what the retailer paid for an item?

[kappy]

Jenkins Hyundai in Ocala gave me the best price to lease a Sonata. I checked with dealers in Leesburg, Claremont, and Orlando. I was able to lease my Sonata for the same terms as I had leased two other Sonatas in NJ even though almost all Florida dealers have dealer fees ranging from $699 to 1,299, which they do not tell you about until after you have finished negotiating. In ads, these dealer fees are shown in the small print on the bottom of the ads. If you research “Florida auto dealer fees”, you will see that these fees are nothing other than pure profit for the dealers.

[Scorpyo]

Let me ‘splain dealerships to you (car, m/c, boat, etc). Next time you pass by a dealership take a look at it and try to imagine how much it must cost to run that place. It’s huge so the lease or whatever must be huge. How do they pay for that? They have to make a bunch on each car right? No, wrong. The gross profit on the car is usually the least of their concerns. The more, however, the merrier. There are 5 money making machines in a dealership – Sales (new and used), F&I, Parts and Service. First you’re met by the barracuda, the salesman (new or used). He usually gets paid a commission on the gross profit from the sale. So, the more the gross profit the more the commission. A savvy buyer will minimize the gross profit. So how do they pay the bill for that huge dealership? Well, the next step in the process is the Great White Shark, the F&I manager. In most cases he’ll make some good money off the buyer, however, from me maybe a few bucks on the Extended Service Agreement (AKA Extended Warranty). Again, how do they pay the bills? The other 2 departments are Parts and Service. The parts department will generally make at least 40% on all parts sold to customers and to customers through the service department. There is a thing called the absorption ratio. That is the combined net profit of the parts and service departments. A good dealership with have an absorption ratio of 100% or more. What that means is the profit from parts and service are covering 100% or more of the expenses for the entire dealership. So, they didn’t make anything on me in sales and F&I but they’ll make some money from me on parts and service. We know parts makes 40% gross profit but how does service make money. How well a service department does is determined by their productivity and efficiency. Productivity means how much work management is able to bring in. For instance, if they have one technician and he is there for 8 hours and they bring in 4 hours of work then they are 50% productive (should be over 90%); 8 hours – 100% productive, 100 hours – 100% productive - they can’t do more than 8 hours so the maximum is 100%. Next is efficiency. That is the technician’s ability. He may have only worked 8 hours but he may have billed out 16 hours of work. So, he’d be 200% efficient. If he had 8 hours of work and it took him 16 hours to do it, he’d be 50% efficient (get rid of him). Good technicians are usually over 150% efficient. So, the profits in a really well run dealership are not made on how much they got from you on the sale of the vehicle but instead on the ability of the parts and service departments to cover the expenses of the dealership. So don’t worry about trying to bleed them dry on the sale.

[Number 10 GI]

Originally Posted by theruizs

If all dealers had to do it, it would work. They would have to be satisfied with a fair profit like any other honest business instead of making an inflated profit by lying, pressuring, and scamming their customers. What they do may be legal but that does not make it honest or moral.

And who decides what is a "fair profit"? Do you not notice the difference in prices between Walmart, Public, Winn Dixie, etc. on food products? Where are the set prices here? Using your idea a gallon of milk should be the same price at all stores but that is price fixing and quite illegal. All the extras, the lady mentioned in the OP bought, would be available even at fixed prices. How would fixed prices affect the trade in value on a car allowed by the dealership? Sometimes lessons learned can be harsh.

[Sherrilee]

Did she sign a contract??

[richs631]

Name the dealer.

[jarodrig]

I find it interesting that the OP took the time to start this thread about the treatment of his friend , yet he refuses to post the name of the dealer so that the readers are warned......

[Denvercane]

Until you are willing to post the dealership and the sales man's name, this is just a story. If all was/is true, there is no liability in posting facts. Give the names and the story will have profound effect

[Jacob85]

I work for seniorsV Crime when we are open. I do know some of them are working by phone at home. So maybe if you call the sheriff department in lake Sumter they can give you a number to call. It sounds like a civil Florida case but they could still try to help by phone. Good luck