re: bolded above: this is not the way to get the best price, but it might be worth it to you, I simply don't know. But obviously they can't cut you a deal when the supply is for one and the demand is for one. At that point they have most of the power in setting the price.

It's also rarely best to by a car the year it is released unless you expect demand to sky rocket and know they don't plan on making many of the model. After initial release the market is still foggy and it's unlikely a dealer will be willing to take a low ball offer unless initial feedback has been poor and they have tons of them on the lot.

I can't tell you what you should do, because there are lots of personal factors that determine what is best for you personally. You might ultimately find the most happiness out of going and buying the Taurus right now without haggling at whatever price point. The value of having it immediately might outstrip the money you could save by waiting, find competing dealers, knowing the market price point, and haggling between the dealers. I just don't know. but a combination of what I outlined before and what conquistador wrote is pretty much your best bet.

also in sklanskys last book he outlines the same method that conquistador did in case you want to have a written published more detailed version of the method. He claimed in a 2p2 thread that he saved time with the last car he purchased by simply walking into the dealer with the book and showing them the chapter and telling them to give him the best offer and save them all some time.

You just lost most of your bargaining power

fwiw I never did either. I was a poli sci and civil engineering double major in undergrad and got a masters in eng management where we never took true econ classes. However about 4 years ago I decided I needed a better understanding of basic economic principles and I found that text book for $10 in a used book store and bought it. It's actually a fairly easy read and really informative. There is almost no math or stuff like that, it's kind of like reading a history textbook. It's definitely worth your time. I used to keep mine above the toilet and just read a few pages every day during my morning constitutional.

thats not a bad idea, i do need to get some better grasp of economics. i've never been much of a reader while on the can tho. i feel bad cuz i never read books. my dad and mom get me some sort of book like every year for xmas and it just sits on my shelf. they got me the tim tebow book and i haven't even opened page 1 yet.

It's also very overweight, with tiny windows and poor visibility for such a large car, with soft and wallowy suspension because most people who buy a Taurus are probably aged 50 and older. But hey 375 HP!

Butnahhhhhhhhh.

Not with 4400 lbs + disco's weight lol.

Yea, when I sold my old car I had a bunch of people asking if they could finance through me. I was just perplexed how anyone could even ask this.

How does one acquire the invoice?

lots of ways, google is your friend. Some dealers will tell you (make sure to find out about rebate programs etc so you understand how the dealership is making money off the sale), you can check edmonds website, cars direct might help, you can use consumer reports, you can google search, there is still some value in various published guides (kelly blue blook, black book, etc), and I'm sure there are more ways.

info is out there. just takes a little research.

I just bought a new car last week (2012 Jetta). My trim level Jetta is $22,185 MSRP (with dest. charge), and I got it for $19,238 (more than $1500 UNDER dealer invoice). A friend of mine used to be a car salesman and told me not to trust those invoice prices you find online (often times dealers get rebates and specials that make the price of the car a lot less than invoice, but they will try as hard as possible to hide this from you).

His suggestion was to deal with cars online. So I found every Volkswagen dealer within 50 miles from my house, and looked at their websites which have their new car inventories. They'll often times have internet prices that are significantly lower than MSRP (like $1k - 2k less) and will actually honor the price (however you cannot negotiate that price at all).

The main reason why I found my Jetta so cheap is because I wanted a stick shift, and stick shift's don't sell as well in Texas (I think my car had been sitting in the dealer's lot for a few months).

If you're not super picky on the color, and you're not in a rush to buy a new car, then check the websites and wait until your car shows up. You can call ahead and make an appointment, and they'll pull the car out for you so you don't even have to wait to do a test drive.

The nice thing about the internet pricing was that there was no haggling involved at all.

A lot of dealerships will offer special interest rates (Volkswagen is 0% APR for 60 months), but a lot of places have like 1% interest. I think keeping the $25k capital in your bank account is worth the small amount of interest you end up paying over 5 years (assuming you get a low enough rate).

Whatever you do, don't just show up to a dealership and try to haggle the sticker price. You will get horribly screwed by professional hagglers. They know all the numbers while you know practically none of them. Very negative EV.

lots of good stuff here. especially bottom bolded. you're 100% right. you've got to have a number in mind (whether paying cash or leasing) when you walk in and you have to stick with that number. If you go in not knowing and are trying to work off of the information that you gather while at the dealership you have no chance.

but don't be afraid of car salesmen. once it's clear that tactics and bull **** aren't going to work on you they're no different than the check out lady at the grocery store. Just processing a transaction for an agreed upon amount.

This is from DUCY by noted poker author David Sklansky!

the most annoying thing about buying a car is the amount of times the dealer needs step out of the office to go "talk to his boss and see"...

hate the game but you gotta play it or else you gonna get ripped.

so funny and true. when i bought my car the guy said the best interest rate they could do for me was 18.9%. i basically told him to gtfo and started leaving and he was like hold up let me go talk to the finance manager and see what we can do. he came back like 30 seconds later and was like ok we can do 3.9% lol

I went to the dealership with a bag of 5 $10K bricks. That was fun.

I've always wanted to do this except w/ a suitcase full of money. Unfortunately all my car purchases I made w/ checks

how ****ing mundane. i bought my ballin hyundai with cash but unfortunately it all fit in my pockets

random question, but I am thinking of subscribing to Bart Hanson's Crush Live Poker series. Kind of sad I know, but I am looking for some insightful help on playing live, deep NLHE. Anybody have seen these vids and has an opinion? thanks in advance.

SCUMMY SH*T

I pretty much did this, but better yet, I did it all via e-mail. When one dealer and I agreed on a price, I walked in, gave them the cash, and they handed me the keys. Signed the papers and was gone. No hassles whatsoever.

Okay here's a semi-related question involving cars. Actually it's pretty much the busto'd version of his problem.

I'm currently driving a leased car and deliver pizzas because I was way under mileadge and seemed like the easiest money ever (it is). But now the miles are catching up and am considering buying a "clunker" or w/e. Someone at work said I should spend 400ish and then they told me their story of how they took a same priced car X amt of miles. My concern is this job rly doesn't mean **** to me but it's a nice stress free passive income (15/hr minus 2(gas)) and if I could spend 400 and get a year or something out of it with only a couple hundred put in then I'd snap do that but it seems like a stupid gamble. If I end up a) sinking too much money into the car + (b) working it off at a pointless job i'd be extremely life-tilted, and the thought of that is making me lean strongly towards quitting soon. Is it unrealistic to try and keep this job?

if you're talkin about bart's dc videos they pretty decent. but his videos are mainly 5/10 1500 cap i think.

never finished his series but it was nice to get reassurance on some things in regards to live fish/regs and also a sanity check that the type of **** i was pulling was not ultra spewy in a live setting lol...

anyone want lock money for bcp money?

wow tuma they pay 15/hr for delivering pizzas? regardless of volume? my store pays like 5/hr or like 3/delivery, whichever is higher. my brother had a delivery job elsewhere and got paid like 6.75/hr. and our min wage is way higher than yours iirc (ours is like 10.50)

pretty sure he's talking about with tips added in, isunk.

waste...unless that pic is of u then HAAAAI