Price paid, plus dealer info
- Thread starter JKroll
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subsonicdriver
New Member
The Costco website seems to offer up-to-date incentive information: https://www.costcoauto.com/new_cars/buildvehicle.aspx?trimid=412424
Punch in a zip code, then click Manufacturer incentives. If you put in a CA zip code, it currently shows a $6500 manufacturer to dealer incentive from 9/1/20 - 11/2/20. For many other states, it shows no incentive. Playing around with this, it looks like the incentive is available in CA, OR, NY, NJ, MA, CT, RI, VT, ME, MD — which looks like all the ZEV states except WA and CO, for some reason.
That would explain why buyers are seeing higher prices in WA.
I see no reason, however, why a WA resident couldn’t buy a car from a dealer in OR at a significant discount to MSRP.
I see no reason, however, why a WA resident couldn’t buy a car from a dealer in OR at a significant discount to MSRP.
If you are interested in 2019 silver touring at 8000$ off for out-of-state purchase let me know. I got the last white touring for $29,530 form CA dealer. I'm in NC and paid $1225 to get it delivered to me. I'll be paying tax locally and registering it here once I get the title document. Everything done over phone and email. I paid cash (penfed check + credit card).
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subsonicdriver
New Member
As I understand it, the dealer receives the incentive payment from the manufacturer based on the state of registration. So an OR dealer currently would not be incentivized to give a discount to a buyer who intends to register the car in WA. This was at least my experience as a non-ZEV-state resident shopping remotely for a Clarity from CA dealers.
I've been trying to do the same thing but to no avail---the dealers that I called keep saying the incentives are based on the state of registration/residence. Some have no clue that the incentives even exist. Would you mind sharing the dealer location/info?
Plus, I've been getting a wide range of numbers about the incentives as well---some dealers said $4500, some dealers said $2000, some don't know they exist. Apparently the whole incentives structure was printed on a piece of magic paper (not in the computers) that everyone was digging up different papers. Also no one I talked to has heard of the Costco deal.
It sounds like the rules are a bit different than last year. The salesperson informed us that they would be selling another Clarity, in Oregon, to a buyer from Washington and that the sale would occur before the end of August 2019, in order for the buyer to take advantage of the $5K Honda incentive.
It’s also possible that the dealers don’t know what the smack they’re talking about. I experienced that from one CA dealer in the early stages of the buying process. They said things like, “This car can’t be shipped out of state because it is “special”. And that “the sales tax I would have to pay if I drove the car off the lot in CA would be refunded when I registered the car in Oregon”. Idiots.
It’s a shame that market meddlers have created incentives to meet sales goals in specific states and the rules for receiving the incentive inhibits sales in other states.
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This was back in mid-2019 in the same region as you, but I try to do all my car negotiation by email to the internet sales teams, and I was only getting high quotes that didn't account for the incentive (even when I specifically asked about it) until I got a Costco quote to forward. Then I got several dealers wanting to match/beat that. That's why I only deal that way; easy to just ignore the bad quotes and follow up/counter the ones I want at my leisure. I can imagine that in-person would be worse, where they know some percentage will give in and not walk away like you did. It is a manufacturer to dealer incentive, so I guesss they are entitled to try to keep as much of it as they can get someone to pay (and I, of course, am entitled to not buy a car from them or anyone if not at a price I like!).
Even the first Costco dealer I called pulled up a price without the incentive; I had to point it out and she found it on another screen (and the Costco contract does require them to pass along mfr to dealer incentives, AFAIK). They didn't have any in stock, which was good because she was willing to say the price without me coming in. I redid the Costco site with a different Zip code to get another dealer, and that one was willing to forward a quote by email (he only had one in Black, my only no-go color, or I would have bought from him for sure).
Well said.
It certainly isn’t much of an incentive for a buyer, if the dealer pockets the money that is seemingly, just going by what it’s called here folks, intended to incentivize the sale of the vehicle. I’ve never dwelled in the dark side of car sales, but, wouldn’t a dealer essentially be selling the car at MSRP even if they offered the entire incentive to the buyer?
No one with 2 or more brain cells to rub together pays MSRP for a vehicle. Tesla owners would be the exception.
Hedgefundie
Member
leehinde
Active Member
Congrats. You did a grand better than me.
(Same place, same day)
Sent from my iPhone using Inside EVs
BrianRC
Active Member
Still a good deal leehinde. Congrats and enjoy!!
I think he was just trying to reply to me, anyway in was the standard 34.3k msrp. They came down to 25k with costco pricing, also had touring for 28k
Yup, Costco pricing for a touring is at $28,200 with a few dealer adds. Almost $11k off MSRP here in SoCal