[Dead Fish]

I've been reading the boards now for weeks and envy all of you and wish I could contribute, but unfourtunately I don't own a tC.... yet.

I'm in the research phase right now and have gone so far as to contact my local Scion dealer (Naples, Fl) about a test drive. They said that they only have one tC in stock and guess what? It's on the showroom floor and is only available for sit down demo... All there tC inventory was sold within 3 days, they kept one for the showroom and just sold that one today

)

So basically, if I decide to buy one. I won't be able to take a test drive.

Anyway, what I would like to know is, what was your experience with the dealership like?

For those who ordered, did you print out what you wanted from a site like this or Edmunds.com and take it to the dealership? Is it that easy? The people at the dealership made it sound that way....

Also, is the "what you see is what you pay" as the Scion website says really true? There is no way to widdle the salesman/women down a few hundred dollars?

My situation is this:

Paying Cash, but won't let the salesman know that untill/if I can get the price that I like. My trade is a heap, I'll be lucky if I get $100 for it

.

I'll be happy if I pay less than 18k, because I want the auto tran

. Is that reasonable or should I expect to be paying more with the fees etc....?

Any help welcome!

 

[Eric]

Welcome to the site!

You won't be able to bargain w/ the sales people... they have to charge what every other Scion dealership charges... It's supposed to make the whole exchange easier and friendlier, I suppose... They also go by black book value, which is lower than blue book, so if you think you can get more for your current car elsewhere, you should go for it (that's what I'm doing). Lastly, you'll probably pay closer to $19k out-the-door, after taxes & fees & whatnot...
Oh and, if I were you, I'd call around & see if there are any other dealers close enough for you to get a test drive in

 

[imasaf]

Hmm... I hope you have an easy ride to tC ownership. I don't know how the dealers do it in the East Coast but on the west coast... we have 2 different types of dealers.

1.) Dealers who are fair (sort of) and takes deposits only so that the customers get what they want on a first come first serve basis.

2.) Dealers who are not fair and don't take deposits. This is so they can sell whoever walks through their dealership the pimped out & accessorized ($$$$) version of the tC.

I recommend you find a dealer that will allow you to put a deposit down. Even though you have to wait, its better this way. Make sure the deposit is refundable. I wasn't sure myself if I was going to buy the tC when I put my deposit down cause I wanted to test drive the car first. My dealer only had a demo tC in a manual... (I am manual deficient). My dealer told me that the only way I could test drive an automatic is if I place a deposit or wait until the demand drops. The reason for this is because they've pretty much presold all of their allocations and they can't let people test drive other people's cars. Which I thought was honest and fair. So I put my deposit down and when an automatic (silver) one came in, I took it out for a test drive even though I knew I wasn't quite interested in that color.

If you are adding accessories you know that are on back order... such as CAI or Exhaust, I would consider twice about including it into your purchase price... cause you may end up like some of the other folks on this forum with no products while their interests are growing...

Stick with the color of your choice... don't back down and don't believe what the dealers tell you. Most of the time, I don't think they really know what is going to be allocated to them.

There is no haggling on the price of the vehicle itself. Make sure the items you plan on purchasing with your vehicle (accessories, extended warranty) are not priced more than what is advertised by the http://scion.com website.

Oh yeah... read this good tC allocation thread...

http://www.scionlife.com/forums/viewtopic....ight=allocation

 

[nae02etc]

my dealer had me sit at a computer with him and go to the scion.com website to build my car. i told him what i wanted and he printed out the options with the total price. it's the same print out that you could do yourself at home.

the price you order is supposed to be the price you pay (along with taxes, doc fees, etc). but that's also not to say they won't try to tack on a few accessories to your car before you drive away with it. the dealer definitely sticks to the no haggle price, though.

depending on your sales tax and fees, i think you could get an auto tc for a little more than 18k.

 

[QuadinScionTC]

Hey dead, im on the east coast of florida, so go ahead and put a deposit down on the your tC, b/c its going to be 3 weeks before you get it. im finaly picking mine up today in westpalmbeach. Good luck!!

 

[LoopyLady_1]

Hiya! Just to add my $.02....

I put down a $500 deposit on the car before I ever saw one in person (heck, I even signed the papers before I drove it...hehe.)

Being a girl (and a first-time buyer) I expected the worst...but the buying process was cake!!! When I went in to tell the dealer what I wanted, he sat down with me at the computer and went over everything on www.scion.com (color, options, etc.) and made sure I was happy with my choices. He said that the car would come into the dealership and he'd go over everything again with the car actually in front of me. If i liked what I saw, it was mine. If I didn't, it would just go to someone else and they'd hand back my (UNPOSTED) $500.00 deposit check.

Well, 4 weeks (to the day, actually) after I put down my depost, I went to the dealership to pick up my baby. I was expecting a buttload of paperwork and a fight over extra fees they were throwing at me. Seriously though, he sat down and went over the paperwork with me and, surprisingly enough, the $17,410 I got as my bottom line on scion.com is the same $17,410 that he was showing me on paper. Of course, they added on the standard sales tax and processing fees (which were much lower than I had expected), but nothing "surprising" at all...no extra accessories tacked on and no extra "we need to be paid for opening the door for you" fee.

Now, they did have a woman sit down with me and go over the extras I could add on (the protectant coat, Scotchguard, Flat Tire repair, etc...) but I said "Nope" once and that was that. I signed a paper saying I declined the extra options, she went through my care package with me ( car manual, scheduled maintenance guide, first-aid kit, and warranty guide) and then they walked me out to my brand new car.

What you see IS what you SHOULD pay.

Also, regarding your trade-in....I'd definitely look into a possible private-party sell. My dealer told me that he is bound by Scion to offer the black book value for the car and recommended that I sell it myself (since it's in pretty good shape and the blue book value was nearly twice as much). So, I didn't trade-in. If you can't sell your car for much more than the black book value, maybe it's not worth the hassel, but it's certainly worth looking into.

Finally, regarding the little extras they will offer you...know what you want before you go in to talk with them (to pick up the car) and keep in mind that you don't necessarily HAVE to get those extras tacked on right then. If you want extended warranty that's cool...but remember that you can add that on any time within the original 3-year warranty....don't let them make you think that it's a do or die thing while you're sitting in their office.

It's cool that you can pay cash for the car...just sorta' sucks that, unfortunately, it won't help you with haggling on the price.

Good luck with your decision on the car buying!!!

 

[LoopyLady_1]

WOW..sorry for the long post....that was more like $.50, huh?

 

[sciontc_mich]

kind of enjoyed it actually

 

[LoopyLady_1]

Just because you got to use that cute little smiley, right?

Hehe.

 

[sciontc_mich]

hmmm... uh oh.. you've found me out!!

 

[whosthatrussian]

hey Deadfish,

I've probably posted this somewhere else on this site, but here's my experience with the dealer:

I've done plenty of research about the car before i headed in to a dealership relatively close to my house. They claimed that they were the #1 volume dealer on Long Island (NY) and they'd get my car in no time. They did NOT have a single tC at the dealership, not even to sit in or look at. Since I already knew that this was the car that I wanted, and sold my parents on it, we decided to head in, and i set up an appointment with one of the sales guys that i've been speeking with. When i get to the dealer, there is no parking at their lot. It's packed with double parked cars, and was almost impossible to drive through. Finally we found a spot and went inside. There was a lot of buzz, b/c i think it was on the 5th of July, and supposedly they were pretty busy. Turns out my guy was busy with a customer, even though we had an appointment. We ended up waiting for 25 minutes, reading an outdated Scion brochure, which didn't even have the tC in it. Finally the guy is done, and begins to help us out. Basically, he took the order, very mattre-of-fact, didn't explain any of the line items, expenses, and when I asked for the final price for the car, he said 16,500, which is the MSRP. So then I had to ask for the FINAL final price, with all the taxes and charges included and that came out to be 18,500. A slight difference, don't you think? so even though i was slightly annoyed at that, my dad and I signed the pink slip as well as the financing papers, and that was it....Wham bam thank you mam! So another day, there is a dealer that's really close to my house that i found out had a tC on the floor to look at, so I immediately went with a friend to check out this car. Turns out one of the sales guys at that dealer went to my high school, and was friendly with my friend. He was also the inventory manager, and we got to talking, and it turns out that they HAD to have a tC in stock, otherwise scion would take away their allocation. So i've been duped. Also there is an "Administrative" or a "Doc Prep" fee that's already on the application that was for $350, and my friendly sales guy said that SCION DOES NOT HAVE TO CHARGE THAT CHARGE. (At least in NY). So i've been duped two-fold. So immediately i filled out another order at this guy, and called the other guy to cancel. I made up an excuse that my grandma was just diagnosed with cancer (i know thats terrible, but hey) so he refunded the money within two weeks. So, by going to a different dealer, i got much more info on the car and the expenses associated with it, and also saved about 400. The only additional thing i got was the floor mats, which i might cancel, and buy from an online store for cheaper.

Another tip, if you're somewhat handy, you can install a lot of the "accessories" yourself, and save a ton of money on the price and installation. Read the other posts on this site, as they are very informative and detailed. Good luck on your tC shopping!

 

[Dead Fish]

Wow, thanks for the help everyone!

I think the tC is going to be the car I choose.

It's amazing how the dealer throws in "fees" that aren't needed just so they can make a few extra $$. I know they need to make a profit, but with Scion all there profit is made by add-ons. So I would figure that they'll stop at nothing to add the "extra" fees in there somewhere just incase you opt out on the add-ons.

Well, all-in-all it's worth it, the tC rules and it's at a good price anyway. I just hate dealerships!!

 

[LoopyLady_1]

Well, GRATS on choosing the tC, and best of luck to you at the dealership!

There are definitely some good and bad eggs out there, but have faith that you're dealing with a good one (and then double check the bottom line just to make sure).

 

[topworm]

Originally posted by Dead Fish@Aug 11 2004, 12:05 PM
I know they need to make a profit, but with Scion all there profit is made by add-ons.

Don't forget that the "pure price" is still about $800 over factory invoice (according to consumer reports pricing), but there's no way to dip down into that amount so they get it all. I guess the consolation comes from knowing that no one else is dippin' down there either. This just makes the extra fees even that much more ridiculous.

 

[Eric]

Has anyone tried Cars.com?

I added their New Car Search form to the front page of the site

http://www.yoursciontc.com/index.shtml

 

[TCrazy]

wow, very impressed with the great advice in this thread.......very nice! And, welcome to the site Dead Fish. - T

 

[e rock]

I'm going to agree with what has been said above . . . I called every single dealership in NJ, out of the 20 or so i called only 2 were helpful...
and only a few had ones in stock and they weren't the color i wanted(indigo ink) I even had a few sales people tell me good luck on finding one in less than 3 months! --what a great way to sell cars!
anyways I ended up going to scion of morristown(would recommend them to anyone in NJ!!) and my salesguy tell me i didn't have to call around to all the stores he can look up when the next indigo ink will be arriving in the state . . . one dealer was getting it a week b4 they were scheduled to get theres in at morristown, so i called the other dealer and someone had already put a deposit on it, so i called back morristown talked to the same salesguy and we set up an appointment for me to put the deposit down, there was NO pressure to get any add-ons. The price was exactly what i had figured before i went in with the taxes and what not. the car came in when they said it would and they gave me a free hat, car visor cd thing and 2 tshirts(1 for my mom). This dealership is 45 minutes from my house i could have gone to at least 10 closer to me, but they were so awesome, it was totally worth the drive

sorry that was kinda long, but basically the moral is shop around until you are happy with your service

p.s if anyone goes to scion of morristown go to nate or will--they're awesome!