The biggest car sales event of the year! All vehicles must be sold off! Bank repo's, off-lease vehicles, trade ins, we're overstocked and they must go now! All credit applications accepted! Save thousands! This weekend only!
Next to figure is the cost and time to move all the used inventory to some off site location, where they've rented tents, generators, the location itself, an around the clock security company, moved their computers, bought balloons, bought food and drinks, and brought in a team of special event sales people. These people will be gone in a week, and more often then not, the promises they make you will never be delivered upon.
Call me crazy, but that sounds like a whole lot of trouble to go through to sell a bunch of cars for a loss. Now there may be dealers that have sales where they really do need to move some inventory, and will make some great deals just to move some older vehicles off their lot and get the cash flowing. For the most part these events are not pleasant experiences for most customers, and you will not get any screaming used car deals.
The first sign that this Big Sales Event is a sham, is when you see something like this on the windshields: WAS $687 Mo. NOW $478 Mo. If they were really "slashing" prices, they'd show you Kelly Blue Book, NADA, Black Book (what guide dealers use will depend on your geographical region) retail and their "slashed" liquidation price. Not just some bogus reduction in monthly payments.
I'm in Arizona and my dealer will have these types of sales from time to time. Trust me the guys and gals that fly in from around the country to pay their own way staying in a hotel for a week, are not here to enjoy the beautiful Arizona desert, and the 120 degree heat in the summer. They fly out here to try and make $5000 - $6000 for the week and then they're off to where ever they came from, to spend your hard earned money.
By the way, my dealerships average profit, during these sales, is $4400 per vehicle. I don't know about you, but that doesn't sound like much of a bargain to me.
A lot of times during these sales events, there will be incentives like mailers with keys to new cars in them. All you have to do is go down to the sale and if your key starts the new car you get to drive off in it. Well, guess what? The key that starts that car is mailed out all right, so they can stay legal, but it's usually mailed seven states away. So please don't fall for that one.
To quickly sum this up, when you hear of one of these sales events, STAY AWAY! Trust me, you'll get better service and a much better deal visiting a car dealership on some random Wednesday night closer to the end of the month, then you will at one of these price gouger sales events. If you're one of those people that just has to know if that key will start the car, just don't say I didn't warn you about the three ring circus you're about to walk into.
Avoid sales like this. Use a site like CarsDirect, and their new car buying service. They'll quickly show you MSRP, Invoice and their guaranteed low sales price for the vehicle you want. It's a very easy site to navigate and there are NO sales people to deal with!
You'll also find a huge array, I believe it's close to two million used cars there. In addition, the car dealerships that advertise their used vehicles are screened by CarsDirect, and if they pass they are labeled with a "trusted" logo. Each dealership assigns a specific person(s) to be the CarsDirect
contact person(s). Trust me this person will treat you right. They are not going to risk losing an account as large as this one.
There's also sites like Edmunds.com where you can make new and used car inquiries, and you'll find a wealth of information when it comes to research.
In the mean time...
Take care and beware!
J the Car Guy
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