I got lucky with my previous car. I followed a few car buying tips given to me by my father and I purchased a great truck for a great price. The truck was great, it had everything I wanted — and I paid a good price for it. After driving the truck for about two years, I decided it was time to move on and get something with better gas mileage. I managed to sell the truck for only a few hundred dollars less than I had paid for it. Thanks to a few simple tips, I managed to buy the truck I wanted and get more than my money’s worth out of it.
One of the most important tips to follow is to make sure you have a large inventory of cars to choose from. If you are able to choose from a wide range of cars, you hold the upper hand in the bargaining process. If someone does not give you the price you want on a car, you can always just walk away and check out one of the other great deals that are out there.
If you do not feel like scouting your local car dealerships for deals, the best buying tips to find an inventory of cars to choose from is on the Internet. Websites like autotrader.com offer a huge database of cars and trucks to choose from. To get a list of cars you want to buy from a website like autotrader.com, simply type in the make, model, and year you want; the price you are willing to pay; your zip code; and how far you are willing to travel from your home to shop for a car. The website will then produce a list of cars and car prices that fit your needs exactly.
The bigger your list of cars, the better chance you will have to find the car you want, so avoid being too specific when requesting car searches. Depending on what car you want, how much you are willing to pay, and how far you are willing to travel to get your car, the lists can be hundreds of cars long.
Another one of the important vehicle purchasing hints to remember is to know how much the car you want is worth and how much you should expect to pay. If you are looking for a used car, there are many resources online and in print that give you the value of a car’s specific make, model, year, and condition. Resources like the Kelley Blue Book provide industry standard prices for all used cars and trucks. The Kelley Blue Book is online at kbb.com. On this site, you can simply type in the make, model, year, condition, trim package, and location of the car you are looking for, and you will get the retail, wholesale, and private party values of the car. The retail value of the car is what would be expected to pay at a dealership and is probably more than you would ever want to pay for a car. The wholesale price of the car is the lowest reasonable price and is what most dealers would be willing to pay. If you find a car that is priced under wholesale, it is probably a good deal. The private party value of a car is somewhere between wholesale and retail and is what you can expect to pay for a car that is being sold by an individual.
If you are trying to buy a new car, the best way to get prices is from the manufacturer’s web site. Virtually every new car manufacturer offers a detailed web site where you can type in the exact model and trim package and get the manufacturer’s suggested retail price.
Once you are armed with a large inventory of cars to choose from, and you know how much you car is worth, you are ready to bargain. One last car buying tip: never settle for a car or pay a high price just because you really like the car, because you may regret it for a long time.
By Alex Turman