The Ford Ranger is a smaller truck that can handle tough jobs and off-road adventures. It's popular because it's strong and can be used for both work and play, especially with special versions like the Tremor that make it even better for rough terrain.
An addendum is extra information added to the price of a car. It can show additional costs that the dealer wants to charge on top of the regular price.
Aftermarket products are items you can buy for your car that aren't made by the car's original manufacturer. They can improve performance or change the look of your vehicle.
Trade-in value is how much money the dealership will give you for your old car when you buy a new one. Knowing what your car is worth can help you get a fair deal.
Financing is when you borrow money to buy a car and pay it back in monthly payments. It's important to know how long you'll be paying and what the total cost will be.
Monthly payments are the amount of money you pay each month when you borrow money to buy a car. It's important to know how much you'll be paying each month to plan your budget.
Vehicle history is like a report card for a car, showing what has happened to it over the years. It helps you know if the car has been in accidents or had many owners, which can affect its value and reliability.
Warranty history is like a record of what repairs and services were covered for a car. It shows if the car had problems that were fixed for free, which can help you decide if it's a good buy.
Carfax is a tool that gives you a report on a car's history, like if it has been in accidents or how many owners it has had. However, it might not have all the details, so it's good to check other sources too.
AutoCheck is similar to Carfax and gives you a report about a car's history. It might show different details, so using both can give you a better picture of the car's past.
A powertrain warranty is a guarantee that the important parts of your car, like the engine and transmission, will be repaired or replaced if they break down. It helps you avoid big repair bills.
Complimentary maintenance means that the dealership will take care of certain services for free for a set time or distance. This can help you save money on things like oil changes and check-ups.
Ongoing expenses are the regular costs you have to pay after buying a car, like insurance and gas. It's important to think about these when deciding on a car.
The Jeep Gladiator is a truck that looks like a Jeep and can go off-road easily. It’s special because you can take off the roof and doors, which makes it fun for outdoor activities and adventures.
Carvana is a website where you can buy and sell cars online. They even deliver the cars to your home, which makes it different from traditional car dealerships.
The 'stink test' is a way to see if something smells bad or is not right. When buying a car, it means checking if the car has any bad smells, like smoke from cigarettes.
Informed buyers are people who know a lot about what they're buying. They do their homework and understand prices and details, which helps them make good choices when shopping for cars.
LIVE
Well ready or not it's here almost are you going shopping again today it is
Christmas Eve I guess you still have time if you're one of those like me that
put your Christmas gift buying off I think my last stop is gonna be Harbor
Freight I cleaned up at Harbor Freight there are things in Harbor Freight for
the ladies guys just so you know and ladies if you need like a floorjack or
a welder I mean they've they've got them they've got them on sale so depending
on how mechanically minded you are I mean every every lady needs a welder
right I mean you never know when you're gonna have to put some things together
or maybe even a torch where you can cut things apart yeah that would be a good
gift good well it's probably too big for a stocking stuffer okay so actually we
are closed at Gateway Ford and Gateway Nissan on Christmas Eve we started
doing that a couple years ago and it my employees just loved it because basically
we were closing at just after noon anyway so we were open from like 730 to
noon and most of them just hated being there they weren't happy they wanted to
be with their families and shopping and so we are closed but our website is
wide open and so if somebody wants to shop or if they want to come down to the
dealership and see everything that we have because we are having our big a
year-end sales event starting on the day after Christmas and that will go
through well New Year's Eve and a lot of people put off their well I guess if
they're like me they put things off when it comes to buying stuff so they put
off buying a new car till right at the end of the year that year-end deal
because these are probably the the best times to buy now it'd be great if you
wanted to come down to Gateway and buy a Ford or a Nissan or a nice use car but
if you are a Honda lover you can care less about what I have to offer but you
know or a Toyota or a Subaru so if you are in the market it's a good time but
the most important thing is don't let your guard down okay and don't lie we had
a customer come in here the other day and they're wanting to buy an expedition
Ford expedition and they don't live well I say they came here they sent a
representative here the buyer wasn't here and the representative said well we
have found a dealer that is going to give us the $4,000 rebate and a $4,000
discount on a tremor expedition now that's really unlikely as far as the
discount I mean there's gonna be a bit you can get a big discount I'm sure but
it's not gonna be $4,000 on something as hot as a tremor but Ford has extended
the tremor package originally it came out on the F-250 and 350 and now it's on
the 150 and the expedition and the Ranger even there's a tremor package on
it is there one on a Maverick maybe there is it's something that's in high
demand and dealers don't have to discount them too much to to sell them
because they can actually sell them to other dealers for close to MSRP right
now if it's a expedition tremor and one more thing there's no $4,000 rebate on
expedition I don't care where you live in in eastern United States it just
doesn't exist and this customer is insist is insisting that this dealership
has given them a $4,000 rebate the actual rebate from the manufacturer is
$1,000 where do rebates come from that's right they don't come from the
dealership that's called a discount that's when the dealer decides to give up
some of their profit margin now how can they give up even more profit margin
than a competing dealer well it's simple you just add an addendum when to
sticker that's the sticker beside the sticker so there's a dealer up in the
tri-cities he adds $5,000 approximately to the window sticker the MSRP of every
vehicle that he sells and so he'll have a customer come in and they're maybe not
ready to buy today so he says well we'll knock off $8,000 off of this Nissan
Center well there's not $1,500 markup in a Nissan Center so where's he getting
all that extra discount well he's got it marked up $5,000 that's real easy to do
and do you think the average customer is gonna pick up on that no because they
don't listen to my car guru so they don't pick up on it so they go shopping to
another dealership and they swear up and down that the other dealership is
knocking off all this money off of MSRP folks don't forget the four targets you
can read all about it in the my car guru guidebook and I'm not gonna go over it
in detail today I will maybe on the next show or maybe a week from now but the
four targets are negotiate the sales price the trade value the terms of the
loan and the aftermarket products one at a time and separately don't let the
dealership combine those on you because each one is really subject to
negotiation and if you don't negotiate let's say you work really hard and get
a good sale price you're buying it close to invoice minus the rebates it's a
good deal and then you just lay down you know you have your trade and they
give you they end up giving you three or four thousand dollars less than what the
true market value is for your trade so you're overpaying by three to four
thousand dollars there because you're not paying attention or you don't know
better and then you don't understand the terms of the loan you know they've
tried to close you on monthly payments you think you're financing it for 60
months you're actually financing it for 84 months and then they sell you an
extended warranty and gap insurance and they mark those up too much that's why
we need to talk about these four targets and you need to get the my car guru
guidebook because I explain it in detail how do you get it it's free send me your
email address to my cell phone number text it 423-552-2020 if you don't do
that stuff texting and email and stuff you can actually call my dealership
423-639-5151 and just tell the suite operator say listen I need a copy of
the my car guru guidebook here's my address will you get Lenny to print it
out for me yes it's 32 pages but I'm willing to do it I'll print it out I'll
neatly fold it put it in an envelope and you'll have it within a couple of
days it's that simple and then you don't overpay matter of fact you don't
overpay for the car that you buy newer used if you're selling your car you
don't take too little for it if you're trying to buy a used car you understand
what the steps that you have to do such as pulling the vehicle history finding
out the warranty history on the vehicle a lot of people just stop with the car
facts and that's not far enough the car facts will lie to you you know sometimes
you have to pull the auto check that's from experience because sometimes they
tell a little a slightly different story and then you call the dealership that
sells that brand and get the warranty history and if you are really diligent
you find out who owned the vehicle and you call them say what kind of
experience did you have with this vehicle it was awful they couldn't fix it now if
you hear that are you going to be interested in buying that used car heck
no nobody would so these are simple things that you can do and have more
money to spend today at Dick's Sporting Goods for those last-minute gifts so just
think about it okay I'll be back in just one so this guy didn't finish the story
he said that he had a $4,000 rebate $4,000 discount I mean what do you say to
somebody I mean do you just say well sir you're a liar no you can't do that that
is usually not taken very well you could say sir I think you're mistaken about
the room I'm not mistaken you calling me a liar you know that's we get that
sometimes so what I tell myself people I said listen don't argue with a
customer just write what we can do the best we can do and if it's a fair deal
of course we have a lifetime power train warranty at my dealerships we also have
three years complimentary maintenance so they're getting that you know it's
amazing how how people say well that's not worth anything really so if you're
keep this car it has a hundred thousand miles on it and the engine blows up and
it's no fault of yours and you have a lifetime power train warranty that's not
worth something of course it is and complimentary maintenance three years I
mean depending on the kind of oil that you use and how expensive the filters
are I mean that could be seven to nine hundred dollars that you get here that
you don't get maybe at one of our competing dealers now there are many
dealers that offer lifetime warranties but if I'm looking at one Nissan dealer
that doesn't versus one that does is that something that you should take into
consideration absolutely money's money you know I know that you're worried
about your upfront cost you worry about about your monthly payment but what
about those ongoing expenses that you have you got to look at all of you got
to look at insurance you got to look at gas mileage you really need to look at
maintenance because it can change the game for a lot of people so just don't
be deceived we're not going to call this person a liar but he's been deceived
and if we tell somebody that there is no four thousand dollar rebate it's one
it's just a thousand what's the first thing that they think well this is this
guy's a car dealer or a car salesperson he's probably lying to me and that's no
way to be in the spirit of Christmas but I understand it I do I get it
customers that don't play by my rules which are just common sense for me over
a 47 year career would not be common sense for the average person they just
don't know you know they're ignorant and that's not necessarily a bad thing I'm
ignorant too you know I'm my brother's a retired cardiologist I'm ignorant when
it comes to doing open-heart surgery of course he didn't do that but he did
stents and angioplasty and all that sophisticated stuff but he can't do
what what I do he's ignorant about a lot of business things that I do there's
there's nothing wrong with being ignorant unless you're going in to do
something that you're not educated or qualified to do so it's going to be a
difficult atmosphere for a lot of people and they're they're going into the
snake pit in a lot of stores and I wish I could tell you who they are the
dealers to stay away from but I can't because I don't want to get sued and if
you don't live in this area I mean I'm sure you need to check the Google
ratings you need to read some of the reviews that's one of the best things
you can do I mean all the reviews at my dealership aren't perfect but you will
never read one where somebody said that they were deceived that they were lied
to over the price the payment they bought things that they didn't intend to buy but
if you read some of the reviews of some of the other stores you just got to dig
deep enough because some of these dealers pay for good reviews they really
do I mean for a good review some dealerships will pay $100 and that's
good money for somebody that all they have to do is go in there and tell a fib
online anonymously but yeah I mean read the reviews see what they're saying if
you see anything that's really egregious you know it says my goodness that person
was really run through the ringer that's what they're doing to just about
everybody except the ones that stand up to them because they understand the four
targets and they understand the negotiation techniques that I talk about so
I you know I really don't want to be all mean and hateful to those people because
tomorrow is Christmas but day after tomorrow it's going to be like the
gladiator ring for a lot of people now how many what percent the dealerships are
like that 10% maybe 20% 80% number great you know they have great
processes they take care of their customers they don't play games they
disclose everything up front there is no bait and switch they're not promising
things that they can't deliver on I was listening to another car dealer had the
other day and these these folks are good people but they're quoting payments in
the $200 range on a brand new car and it's a lease and it requires a
tremendous amount of money down to get to that and so people say I'm gonna go
get me a car for $2.49 a month and then they get in there and it's $7.49 a month
and but they're already in there and so they settle at $5.49 a month because
you know they don't want to waste any more time let's just go ahead and do it
you know and then they get a terrible Google rating but this is this is what
you're in for if you're not careful go in with your eyes open you don't have to
be mean you know I talk about that all the time too it is the season to be nice
so you go in there with your eyes open and you you sit down with a salesperson
first I always recommend this don't just start looking at cars say can we go
inside and talk sir oh yeah what we will talk about well I just want to I want
to lay the groundwork for this successful sale for you okay so you go
and sit down at his desk and you say okay this is what we're gonna do we're
gonna test drive a bunch of cars we're not gonna buy a car today well you're
not gonna buy a car today no we're not gonna buy a car today well what if the
deal is really good sir we're not gonna buy a car today but we want to test
drive the cars that we're interested in and then we will make our decision will
you go along with that well my boss might give me that well I don't really care
about your boss or you're willing to work with us and let us test drive some
cars well sure and so you test drive the vehicles that you're interested in and
you find out if this salesperson really quickly knows anything about him
because maybe he can't open the hood or show you how the the second row of
seats fold down so people can get to the third row and you ask him about you
know whether it has Apple CarPlay well I don't know I have to ask my boss you're
at the wrong you're either talking to the wrong salesperson or you're at the
wrong dealership because they're supposed to know their product and that's
what you're doing right now is you're investigating I was going to a funeral
the other day and we took one of my wife's good friends and she said Lenny
is that has the internet really hurt your business I said no internet has helped
my business you mean it's better when you have informed customers come in
absolutely I love an informed customer and when they come in you know they
pretty much at least they think they know what they want and sometimes when
they test drive the car they say you know this doesn't drive near as good as I
thought it would and I can't see out of it she said what about Carvana I said
anybody that buys a vehicle on Carvana unless they've driven one unless they've
driven a car just like the one that they're buying from Carvana and they've
done the research to find out if the Carvana price is competitive and they've
pulled the history on the Carvana vehicle so that they know where the car
came from you know you still can't do the stink test on it you won't know if
it's a smoker car until they deliver it to you and then you have to settle for
that that'd be a big problem for me I cannot drive a car that has been driven
by a smoker no offense to smokers but it gives me a headache so yes we like
informed buyers but if it weren't for the internet we wouldn't sell cars all
over the country I've sold cars from California to San Juan Puerto Rico
shipped them to London England because of the internet so no I love the internet
I get to sell my local customers and I get to sell people from Ohio and Illinois
I mean the internet has been wonderful but you know a lot of salespeople can't
handle it very well especially an informed buyer especially a person who's
not a payment buyer they're cash buyer they've saved all their life and they're
not going to put up with a bunch of crap from a salesperson who doesn't know
what they're talking about so even if you are a payment buyer and you're at that
dealership if you follow that process say I'm not buying today I'm just test
driving vehicles and then when you're ready you go back in it's okay this is
what we're going to do I want to know what you're selling me the car for I
want to know what you're paying me for my trade in and then we're not going to
talk about payments until we're ready but I want to make sure what I'm buying
the car for and what you're paying me for my trade in and that supplemental
addendum window sticker that's on that car out there I'm not paying any of that
well you have to know I don't there's other dealers that around me that don't
have that so I'm not trying to be mean or anything but I'm not paying for market
value adjustment I mean you go in there with some words like that they will
scramble you probably end up talking to a manager he's just going to repeat
everything the salesperson said and because the dealership wants to be in
control the sales staff wants to control you rather than you controlling them and
my cargo is all about putting the power with the people okay I'll be back in just
one minute okay so we're done talking about cars and I want to celebrate the
birth of my Lord and Savior and express my thanks to all of my listeners who have
been so gracious to me over the years not only coming down or coming from
wherever I say down or up or east or west to do business with us at at my
dealership but also just the the stories that we've shared the the people that I
have been able to help who live in Texas and in California and Washington State
and New York and Ohio and Florida and all the different countries you know that
the my car guru podcast goes to it's over 2,000 different cities and it's
approaching 100 different countries and I just don't know how those people were
able to understand a boy from East Tennessee but apparently they can and
apparently what I have to say has value to those folks as well I do want to meet
the guy in Luxembourg I've just got to know is that he said Luxembourg or Luxenburg
I don't know but I want to meet that guy I wish he would call me four two three
552 2020 I'd love to hear from a few foreigners I don't know how much it
could cost to call from a foreign country but I think that would be something
could that would be my Christmas gift if somebody from Canada or let's say I got
a lot of listeners in Singapore Australia Africa South Africa Europe I'm
trying to well just all those countries I didn't know there were that many
countries that's crazy but that's what the internet does it spreads it spreads
a lot of nonsense as well but one thing that is definitely not nonsense and
that's what Christmas is all about and I hope and pray that you have a wonderful
Christmas with you yourself your family your kin folk your friends that you
understand that there are plenty of people out there that are lonely and
don't have anybody to celebrate Christmas with and pray with those
people if you know who they are if they live close go visit them find out about
them I learned so much just talking to the elderly folks that come into the
dealership and and that I encounter in waiting rooms I've just become a real
blabbermouth when it comes to meeting folks and I hate silence and a bunch of
people listen are looking at their cell phones all the time I will break that in
a heartbeat but if you need me you know how to reach me 423-552-2020
Merry Christmas everyone and I'll see you on Friday
About this episode
Christmas Eve brings a unique perspective on year-end car buying, emphasizing the importance of being informed and cautious. The host shares personal anecdotes and practical advice on navigating dealership offers, particularly around rebates and discounts. Key strategies include understanding the four targets of negotiation and being aware of hidden costs. The episode also touches on the spirit of Christmas, encouraging kindness and connection, while reminding listeners to remain vigilant during the busy shopping season. A heartfelt message wraps up the episode, celebrating community and gratitude.
