Say I walk into a car dealership with the funds to pay in full. I walk up to a salesman, point to a brand new car on the showroom floor, and say: “I want that one.” No test drive, no trade in. How long would it take before I’m driving it off the lot?
I paid cash for the last 3 Ram trucks I bought. Yeah, I’m a fan of the Ram. Anyway, wanted to avoid the sales hassle at all cost so when I went to the stealership, I told the salesman I was paying cash for the truck and wanted a no-haggle price for it. I spent a few minutes walking around the lot looking for the color and package I wanted, took a test drive, and told him I wanted it. When it came time to do the paperwork, I reminded him I was paying cash and I didn’t want to buy any “extras” that they try to convince you to buy. He showed me the dealer’s invoice and told me the best they could do was a few hundred over the dealer’s invoice. That jived with the opinions of several friends in the automotive industry (plus Consumer reports) so I told him that would work. Being prepared really helped save time in the negotiation process. As far as the extra upsell packages, he told me they had a company policy to at least ask, so I told him I understood but asked him to relay my wishes to the staff members processing the paperwork to respect my “no-haggle” wishes. They did and we zipped through the paperwork in less than an hour. I wrote them a $65,000 check and drove it away. The whole process took about 1.5 hours from the time I walked in the door and drove out of the lot. By the way, I sold my old truck privately so I didn’t have to do the trade-in song and dance.