I'm looking to buy a new VW Rabbit to replace my 10 year old Golf. My requirements are 4-doors and a manual transmission.

Apparently that combination is currently in short supply. The deal located two cars: one in California and one in Utah. He says they can get one, but I'll have to pay a $500-600 charge to ship it to Oregon. When he said that my BS detector went wild. I'm going in Friday to talk numbers with him so I'd like to be prepared with some collective knowledge from "the club". This sounds like BS to me... don't dealers transport cars all the time as part of a national network?

Also, I noticed on some cars a "dealer market assessment" charge of $2000 over the factory sticker price. Again, sounds ridiculous.

Please let me know your thoughts on these, and any other charges they might throw at me. Where can I negotiate and where can I not?

I live in the Atlanta area where there are half dozen dealerships for each brand. If I don't like one, I go to the next one.

You better shop around...

Cars and trucks arent selling good write now.With the messed up economy you should have some bargening room ..i would not pay that fee

Get the invoice price, and don't pay any more than that. With the industry the way it is right now, they will sell you the car.

Sounds like they have been selling to a lot of suckers lately.

Go to the dealer that has the car, buy it, drive it home.

If you can't do that for $500, what part of the fee do you feel is unreasonable ?

-everything- is negotiable as long as you're willing to walk away from the deal.

(With the possible exception of big discounts on Priiiius...)

Good point, and that's exactly what I'm wondering - Is it customary to charge this fee to the customer, is this a negotiable charge, or is it just the way it is?

When I lived in Northern Nevada it was fairly common for locals to buy cars from San Francisco or Sacramento dealers and take delivery in NV to avoid the CA sales tax (and paying it again in NV...) There was usually a fee, since it often involved the dealer sending two guys in two cars for the delivery. I heard on several occasions that after taking the delivery guys to dinner, the charge was mysteriously waived...

in OR you have a significant advantage taking local delivery (no sales tax, yes? maybe still a 'use fee...').

It's all negotiable. But ('dumping' provisions...) there actually are prices below which dealers can't sell a car. (While it's "new" presumably, after it's prior-year and the manufacturers cut the dealer cost, I donno...)

So sure, it's customary for the dealer to try to charge you all sorts of stuff.

You have to decide what the deal is worth to you, in light of all the options.

(A friend of mine bought a car and the sales guy got him a really good deal. Friend was gonna pay cash but asked the sales guy how long he had to carry the dealer financing so he'd get his commission on the finance sale. Turns out it was 6 mos. So to throw the guy a bone he took the dealer financing for 6 mos, paid off the car, and everybody was pretty happy.)

The line items aren't too interesting, you need to concentrate on the bottom line. I once told a dealer he might as well get credit for the sale since he was going to have to deal with the warranty service anyway.

Have your 'total, delivered' price in mind and walk if you have to. This kinda is a buyer's market unless you want a Priiiiiiiius or a Diesel...

4 door 5 speed Rabbits non-existent! I find that extremely hard to believe. If you would like I can roll down to the local dealer and see what they have. It is not a luxury car. Manual gearboxes should be fairly common. The $2000 market adjustment is nothing but dealer profit. VWs are popular in the NW, but that seems a little steep. If you are going to give them most of the $2000, then I would think they would eat the shipping costs if it means a sale. Definitely check around. 4 door and 5 speed should be a pretty common configuration. I'd just make a couple calls to the next nearest VW dealers. I bet one of them has one, especially if you are not picky about color and options.

the internet is your friend with this.

you can look on line and make an offer on cars on-line, these dealers are so hard up to sell right now i'm sure you'll get your deal for your price.

there are many places to find what the new car invoice is/ or should be [edunds.com, kelly blue book, autotrader]. do your home work and it'll pay off.

The new economic numbers have just been released.
Automotive retail sales are dragging the retail consumer index down by 5-7% for the past two months.
This is the worst level of sales for the past 12 years.

DO NOT pay anything over invoice.

Rich

I sold cars for VW and Mazda in the mid-'80s, and I learned a lot about how things work.

The $2000 "dealer market assessment" is simply the dealer trying to add profit. "Adjusted Market Value" is another term.

All new cars are required to have a factory Monroney sticker on the window. Most dealers will also have an addendum to the right of the Monroney. The addendum is all suspect... either BS or dealer installed items that are high profit.

You can't custom order an import like you can a domestic car. Dealers can "locate" a car based on criteria that you give them... color, transmission, options. The more specific you are about the options that you want, the less likely you will find the car that you want. Once the dealer finds a car that suits you, they have to negotiate it away from the dealer that owns it. For reasonably local locates, this usually involves a trade of vehicles, and a driver drives one vehicle to the other dealer and swaps them. For longer distances, the vehicle can be shipped, and this charge will normally be passed on to the customer.

Check each local dealer yourself to see what they have.

Herzog-Meier
Rey Reece
Armstrong
Hannah

No need to drive... call and ask. Call Salem, McMinnville, Seattle... find the car yourself. The problem, I think, is that for 2009, apparently the Rabbit is not available with 4 doors and a 5 speed. You are stuck looking for a 2008 at the tail end of the model year.

Sales tax on a vehicle is paid with the registration, so it is based on where you live. You can buy a car in the Couve and still pay no sales tax.

Negotiate $500 off the price and pay the shipping? Pit each dealer against one another... all of them can sell you the car. They will be more inclined to deal towards the end of the month... there are always bonuses for the next sales level. Ask dealers about incentives. Right now, VW has 2.9% on 2008 Rabbits for 60 months.

http://www.edmunds.com is a great resource when buying a new car.

In case anyone was wondering, nope - no relation.
Some days I wish I could use an uncle in the industry, but I have only two living relatives, and only half of them share my name. I'd be astonished if anyone here knew either one...

VW dealers usually do suck.

Walk away, when he calls let him know that you didnt like the way you were treated.

use Autotrader.com and find a dealer that wants to sell a car...

Shop around, deals are less rare than disposable income.

My online seach just said Herzog-Meier in Beaverton has a new 2008 grey 4door manual in stock.

http://www.herzogmeier.com/index.cfm?fusea...1a8925d19f&

Yup, that's the dealer I went to for the test drive. Unfortunately, that car isn't on the lot, who knows how often they update their website. Thanks for checking though. I'm going to send the link to the sales rep. Imagine if it really was there... stranger things have happened.

I know that's a pretty old picture though, as this is our dry season, and the pictures of that car were taken on a wet day.

Thanks everyone for your insight. I appreciate the input.

You actually could special order if you wanted to......though it's hard to say how long the wait would be. A friend of mine special ordered his GTi (Tornado Red, 4 door, 5 speed, no sunroof, premium sound, cloth seats, Votex aero package, and no nav). I believe he ended up paying pretty much MSRP for it and had to wait 4-5 months before he could take delivery of it. But he got exactly what he was looking for. At the time all of the 4 door GTis in the country were fully loaded, and only 2 of them were red.