You got that right! And if they negotiated a good pay plan they made a ton of money!!!!!!!
Finance manager experience...
- Thread starter gregk24
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When I worked at the local Honda dealer some 11 years ago, when I drove a car from detail to final delivery I would walk by the finance offices. The F&I managers would hustle the add-on KARR alarms, paint & fab, and all sorts of add-ones. I’ve seen the more well-to-do leave the office in 20 minutes and people with bad credit would usually be in there for at least an hour while they try to secure financing. We made it a goal for everyone to drive away the same day.
if you see an addendum sticker, try to negotiate those. If you see a KARR/SWDS sticker on the car, RUN. Those alarms are worthless and molest factory wiring.
if you see an addendum sticker, try to negotiate those. If you see a KARR/SWDS sticker on the car, RUN. Those alarms are worthless and molest factory wiring.
My wife knows how to crush the finance office dreams of making any profit. She starts conversation off with I have 15 mins and we are using our credit union crushing all profits.
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Exactly, the finance manager is now, and has been for a long time now, ”the person to watch out for” at the dealership when buyin a car.
I found this out 22 years ago buying a new car...everything went really well and smooth until they handed me over to the finance manager. And the funny thing is, the look on the salesman’s face as he passed me along to this person was very nervous. Here I am this young guy thinking...oh, this wasn’t that bad after all. until I met the finance manager. And we fought over an interest rate. I denied undercoating, an extended warranty, paint protection, special floor mats, a service plan. That’s when I looked at her and said, ok I’m leaving. And then I received the interest rate I wanted.
Experience two...different place several years later. Same thing. Interest rate. Extended warranty. Everything. At this point in time I was older, so I pulled a bank check out of my pocket and handed it to him. He told me, it’ll take me hours to redo the paper work. So I sat and ate free donuts for two hours.
Experience three. New truck. I simply said to the salesman and sales manager after completion of the sale that I did not want to see their finance manager and that the salesman and or sales manager would have my paper work ready for me upon pickup, and if they couldn’t do that I would walk. So the young salesman tried to upsell me at this point the extended warranty, undercoating, bed liner, interest rate...and it although it still wasn’t exactly pleasant, at least he wasn’t rude and didn’t want to lose the sale. And I wasn’t rude either, the kid was great.
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Well said. And I agree 100%.
It is a pain to walk away at that point, but you have to make it known you will.
People just don’t know that the finance manager has become “that person” at the dealership. They are the salesman now. The upsell person. The extended warranty, undercoating, paint protection, tire and rim warranty, maintenance contract, sales person.
And at THAT point in the process the customer is tired, they have already chosen the vehicle, test drove it, shopped around, went through the sales process, the sales manager negotiating...and then they get hit with the worst at the end. And a lot of people don’t know it’s coming. It’s actually a great idea for the car selling people. Buyers are on the ropes at that point, and then they have to go into round 12 with a fighter that might be the most experienced and driven person in the dealership. Lol
During my most recent experience, buying the LaCrosse at the Subaru used-car dealer, the finance guy tried to sell me on the extended warranty. I declined, he pointed out politely that the electronics on these modern cars can cost $$$ to fix, I declined again, and that was that. I don't really recall troubles with finance guys during earlier purchases, either. Maybe I've been terrifically lucky, or maybe this was before the hard upsell became obligatory, or something.
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I’m probably exaggerating it a little bit.
One of the two I dealt with were rude. And the other one I never saw because I refused and they allowed the sales people to handle it.
Even the first one, the rude one, I did buy the car after haggling over an interest rate.
The good car salesmen(including finance guys/managers) are excellent at psychology. They can read a person pretty fast and gauge accurately whether or not they're going to make a killing on them. Your credit score will tell a lot about you too before you ever meet the finance manager.
That doesn't mean a finance manager won't upsell everybody and anybody.. The good ones though know who to spend time with and who to get out the door ASAP because trying with them will be a waste.
I learned how to negotiate buying cars from my grandfather and oddly a lesser extent from my father. Basically, find a salesperson who has no problem going through hoops and doesn't pressure. Back in 2004, my grandfather took me as his wing man when he wanted to buy his last car pretty much (he is still alive but retired from driving about 15 years ago) which after some consideration, he was interested in a Buick Rendezvous. I helped him out researching what dealer had the best inventory; I remember using I think it was the "find your car in stock" tool on GM's website in that time period; he was wanting to go for new, but I found that the Buick dealer about one town to the north of us in Upstate NY had in the "Certified Used" section a 2003 Rendezvous with VersaTrak 4WD and trailer hitch with only 7500 miles on it. Price was I think was like 17K, which was actually pretty nice since the 2004 and 2005 models at the time were listed at like 25-27k MSRP.
I put it on the list of car dealers to look at; after my grandfather and me being pushed around by several dealers who didn't seem to want to actually sell us what we wanted, we go to that Buick dealer. The salesman that found us, he was a nice guy and guided us to that vehicle; immediately let us do a test drive, peek and poke any anything, got us the service history, everything we can ask, he got an answer. Long story short, the owners of the vehicle became deceased, daughter of the owner did a trade-in on it. When it came to sitting down to push numbers, it was easy. We even had the dealer owner there who legitimately was doing raise evaluations. I think we pushed the paper back and forth like 2 times and got the price down to 14K which was pretty good.
Salesman of course, then goes "So, I know you said you want to do cash for this, but would you be interested at all in entertaining talking with your finance guy?" My grandfather said to him "You have been the best salesman at all the dealers I've been to today. I'll tell you what, I'll talk with him, but I am not considering anything worse than the rate my bank of 35 years will give me which is 5%" So the salesman takes us other to the Finance Manager, who we explain this to and is still present in his office. He plugs in his info, he is adamant he can get something lower than 5% thru GMAC and a few other lenders. 5..4..3..2..1..and.....GMAC gives him 5.1%, the others were all about the same, but nothing lower than 5%. Salesman and me and my grandfather just start laughing. Finance manager just looks at his screen super confused and then goes "I've never seen GMAC do that before..." and the salesman goes "Well, we tried...lets go do paper work and visit the cashier..."
My father however, he liked making the sales and finance people jump and mean jump. I think it was on when we bought his 1993 Wrangler Sahara Edition from the used section in a Ford dealer, the night we went to go pick it up, we had to meet with the Finance Manager. My father had financing already lined up as I recall thru his bank at the time, but the sales person insisted that all sales paperwork must be stamped and signed with the finance manager before they give him keys. That seemed fishy to him considering that my father is a big believer in just walking out the door when thing go weird at a car dealership, however he was happy with the salesman and the dealer overall at this point, so he would go visit him, which was appointment time of 5:30 PM. I was 8 years old at the time, my dad told me while we were driving over to the dealer with in our trade in car (1989 Nissan Sentra Wagon) that he is going to test this "money goon" as he called him; he wanted me when he grabs my arm, to start complaining to him that I am really really hungry since we had not had dinner yet thanks to this guy..."
So 5:30 becomes 6:00 and we finally see the finance manager who had an office at the back of the building by the service department far far away from the sales reception area. He tries to push Ford Credit on my dad, an extended warranty that is only valid at their dealership, and something else silly like free tires with the purchase of TruCoat. My father politely said no to all of those, but the finance manager was just not liking that. So my dad grabs my arm and I say "DAD! DAD! DAD! I'm hungry...really hungry...why did this guy make us come at dinner time to get our Jeep? He's mean!" My dad I can see wanted to murder me for going THAT far, but hey, I was 8! The finance manager goes "Oh, I didn't know it was that late...there is no one over at Ford Credit right now to complete this tonight even if you said yes. You got your bank info ready? We have you done in 5 minutes and on your way in the Wrangler."
So 10 minutes later and we are walking to the Wrangler with keys in hand and the salesman we were talking to comes up and goes "I heard he was being pushy on you. I tried to tell him before hand you got better financing and it didn't make even sense to the SALES manager to try to sell you the dealer extended warranty on an non-Ford vehicle, but Mr X disagreed. I also heard your son was hungry so I hope you don't mind I bought him on the house this Burger King Kids Meal for putting up with that and giving me a sale."
Likewise, later when I became an adult, when the "Cash for Clunkers" program was going on in 2009, I was interested in getting a brand new car. Decided since my friend was really happy with his Chevy Cobalt. I decided that would be a good car for me. One of the dealers that went to was has a huge reputation for having odd customer service issues, but I gave them a shot since they had a lot of Cobalt on the lot which appeared to be from other dealers that GM closed at the time. I had planned ahead and got fiancing thru my credit union, even the CU told me that dealer is one they reguarly work with, Found one with good options and a decent sticker price oddly, was a Cobalt that came an closed dealer. 1st salesman I talked to, he had to jump start it and put gas into it for the test drive, but was fine other wise. I was going to require they replace the battery when it came up.
Anyways, time to talk turkey and...I get passed off to another salesman who was lets say was your classic sleaze. He showed me a different price at first that was $2000 more than sticker for "NW delivery charges" which I called him out on should be listed on the sticker that clearly shows it came from a different dealer. He magically got rid of that and the price was right, but not a good deal like I said. I can't remember it was now for the life of me. He asks about financing, I told him I have something lined up from CU which is around the corner, which liked but said "Can I get your info again to give to our finance manager still?" Which I said, I can give you the info from the CU, which he said he needs it all for the application, which I said I am not filling out again for you to run it. Which there was some back and forth of no and yes, then finally he goes "Lets not fill out anything...just tell me the basics so I can verbally tell him so we can get thru this." I'm clearly reading they don't want to sell this car to me, so I just give him rough income info, which he writes down an post it note, goes into the next room and about 15 minutes later, comes back and goes "Well, our finance manager wants a co-signer for this..." which I respond with "That's funny, my CU doesn't...so....who said that?"
Which the sales guy said "Well, OUR financing said that."
"But I didn't ask for your financing...I have mine!"
"Well, we would be more comfortable using a more reliable source of credit than a CU here..."
"Who is we?"
"Well....uhhh....our finance manager..."
"I told you have my own arrangements..."
"Hey, look if we can just get you to an application, we probably can match your CU's rates..."
"I'm done here. No wonder this dealer has an reputiation. Have a good day..."
Then I walked right out. Changed my mind and held onto my current car till a deer took out my car and I just bought a decent used car from a private sale. But the the funny thing was that I got a follow up survey from GM in the mail regarding why I did not purchase the vehicle, which I wrote it was the dealer experience. I got a call from GM Customer Service team who wanted to follow up on that process because the whole sales process is not an standard GM dealer practice and there has been multiple complaints about that dealer since they became the only GM dealer in the area.
I put it on the list of car dealers to look at; after my grandfather and me being pushed around by several dealers who didn't seem to want to actually sell us what we wanted, we go to that Buick dealer. The salesman that found us, he was a nice guy and guided us to that vehicle; immediately let us do a test drive, peek and poke any anything, got us the service history, everything we can ask, he got an answer. Long story short, the owners of the vehicle became deceased, daughter of the owner did a trade-in on it. When it came to sitting down to push numbers, it was easy. We even had the dealer owner there who legitimately was doing raise evaluations. I think we pushed the paper back and forth like 2 times and got the price down to 14K which was pretty good.
Salesman of course, then goes "So, I know you said you want to do cash for this, but would you be interested at all in entertaining talking with your finance guy?" My grandfather said to him "You have been the best salesman at all the dealers I've been to today. I'll tell you what, I'll talk with him, but I am not considering anything worse than the rate my bank of 35 years will give me which is 5%" So the salesman takes us other to the Finance Manager, who we explain this to and is still present in his office. He plugs in his info, he is adamant he can get something lower than 5% thru GMAC and a few other lenders. 5..4..3..2..1..and.....GMAC gives him 5.1%, the others were all about the same, but nothing lower than 5%. Salesman and me and my grandfather just start laughing. Finance manager just looks at his screen super confused and then goes "I've never seen GMAC do that before..." and the salesman goes "Well, we tried...lets go do paper work and visit the cashier..."
My father however, he liked making the sales and finance people jump and mean jump. I think it was on when we bought his 1993 Wrangler Sahara Edition from the used section in a Ford dealer, the night we went to go pick it up, we had to meet with the Finance Manager. My father had financing already lined up as I recall thru his bank at the time, but the sales person insisted that all sales paperwork must be stamped and signed with the finance manager before they give him keys. That seemed fishy to him considering that my father is a big believer in just walking out the door when thing go weird at a car dealership, however he was happy with the salesman and the dealer overall at this point, so he would go visit him, which was appointment time of 5:30 PM. I was 8 years old at the time, my dad told me while we were driving over to the dealer with in our trade in car (1989 Nissan Sentra Wagon) that he is going to test this "money goon" as he called him; he wanted me when he grabs my arm, to start complaining to him that I am really really hungry since we had not had dinner yet thanks to this guy..."
So 5:30 becomes 6:00 and we finally see the finance manager who had an office at the back of the building by the service department far far away from the sales reception area. He tries to push Ford Credit on my dad, an extended warranty that is only valid at their dealership, and something else silly like free tires with the purchase of TruCoat. My father politely said no to all of those, but the finance manager was just not liking that. So my dad grabs my arm and I say "DAD! DAD! DAD! I'm hungry...really hungry...why did this guy make us come at dinner time to get our Jeep? He's mean!" My dad I can see wanted to murder me for going THAT far, but hey, I was 8! The finance manager goes "Oh, I didn't know it was that late...there is no one over at Ford Credit right now to complete this tonight even if you said yes. You got your bank info ready? We have you done in 5 minutes and on your way in the Wrangler."
So 10 minutes later and we are walking to the Wrangler with keys in hand and the salesman we were talking to comes up and goes "I heard he was being pushy on you. I tried to tell him before hand you got better financing and it didn't make even sense to the SALES manager to try to sell you the dealer extended warranty on an non-Ford vehicle, but Mr X disagreed. I also heard your son was hungry so I hope you don't mind I bought him on the house this Burger King Kids Meal for putting up with that and giving me a sale."
Likewise, later when I became an adult, when the "Cash for Clunkers" program was going on in 2009, I was interested in getting a brand new car. Decided since my friend was really happy with his Chevy Cobalt. I decided that would be a good car for me. One of the dealers that went to was has a huge reputation for having odd customer service issues, but I gave them a shot since they had a lot of Cobalt on the lot which appeared to be from other dealers that GM closed at the time. I had planned ahead and got fiancing thru my credit union, even the CU told me that dealer is one they reguarly work with, Found one with good options and a decent sticker price oddly, was a Cobalt that came an closed dealer. 1st salesman I talked to, he had to jump start it and put gas into it for the test drive, but was fine other wise. I was going to require they replace the battery when it came up.
Anyways, time to talk turkey and...I get passed off to another salesman who was lets say was your classic sleaze. He showed me a different price at first that was $2000 more than sticker for "NW delivery charges" which I called him out on should be listed on the sticker that clearly shows it came from a different dealer. He magically got rid of that and the price was right, but not a good deal like I said. I can't remember it was now for the life of me. He asks about financing, I told him I have something lined up from CU which is around the corner, which liked but said "Can I get your info again to give to our finance manager still?" Which I said, I can give you the info from the CU, which he said he needs it all for the application, which I said I am not filling out again for you to run it. Which there was some back and forth of no and yes, then finally he goes "Lets not fill out anything...just tell me the basics so I can verbally tell him so we can get thru this." I'm clearly reading they don't want to sell this car to me, so I just give him rough income info, which he writes down an post it note, goes into the next room and about 15 minutes later, comes back and goes "Well, our finance manager wants a co-signer for this..." which I respond with "That's funny, my CU doesn't...so....who said that?"
Which the sales guy said "Well, OUR financing said that."
"But I didn't ask for your financing...I have mine!"
"Well, we would be more comfortable using a more reliable source of credit than a CU here..."
"Who is we?"
"Well....uhhh....our finance manager..."
"I told you have my own arrangements..."
"Hey, look if we can just get you to an application, we probably can match your CU's rates..."
"I'm done here. No wonder this dealer has an reputiation. Have a good day..."
Then I walked right out. Changed my mind and held onto my current car till a deer took out my car and I just bought a decent used car from a private sale. But the the funny thing was that I got a follow up survey from GM in the mail regarding why I did not purchase the vehicle, which I wrote it was the dealer experience. I got a call from GM Customer Service team who wanted to follow up on that process because the whole sales process is not an standard GM dealer practice and there has been multiple complaints about that dealer since they became the only GM dealer in the area.
With regard to finance rates I only look at cars being offered with 0% finance. That narrows the field substantially. I have good credit so I qualify. I also avoid dealers that have “enhancements” that raise the price. I’m at a point in my life where if things at the dealer don’t go my way I walk.
The worst part of buying a new car. I'm v. good at the process and have all the details worked out ahead and have never had anything tried like this but you never can skip the F&I BS. "No" is all you need to say. The funny story I have is buying my Sportwagen. As soon as the F&I guy knew I was a "no" man, he focused and looked at my wife the rest of the time..hahahaah..."You really don't want to break down and get stranded do you?". It's pure sales science how the better ones operate. I'd pay hundreds more to close the deal and not have to deal with that crap.
Good work by you. It pays to read what the vultures want you to sign. If you're not that thrilled about your interest rate and you are or can become a credit union member, you can refinance your new loan at a better rate after six months with most lenders without a penalty. In my experience, car loan rates at credit unions are always better than banks, and I'm not a fan of dealer or manufacturer financing anyway.
Dealer financing is not a fun experience. I financed through my dealer since the rate wasn’t that awful and I put a substantial amount down, but they tried to convince me to put less down so they could get a higher amount financed. I was like..no. He was like, “Just take $565/month with 0 down for three months!”
In any event, I plan to pay the car off in 24 months before wracking up the interest so they’re not getting that nice finance charge.
In any event, I plan to pay the car off in 24 months before wracking up the interest so they’re not getting that nice finance charge.
We bought our '97 Mazda MPV from a local Mazda dealer in 2001. We had set ourselves an absolute cap of $15,000 including 13% sales tax, which meant we couldn't go much over a pre-tax price of $13,000. Even that was quite a stretch for us at the time. I'd phoned in on a Saturday afternoon to see if there were any vans not listed on their website, as websites in those days were not always kept up to date. As it turned out, the owner answered, and he said he could sell me a nice '97 AllSport with < 100,000 km for $15K including tax. (They were asking $14,995 plus 13% sales taxes. We'd seen it, but thought it was out of our price range.)
We drove the van a couple of days later, and took it to an Indy garage for a mechanical inspection. I negotiated in a factory service manual in lieu of the dealership fixing a couple of minor items. The retail on the FSM was about $300 at the time.
We went in to sign the papers, and met the finance manager, who was already grumpy because we weren't financing the van.
He grumbled about the boss agreeing to include the FSM, said he would have knocked $15 off the price so I could buy a Haynes manual. I replied that the Haynes manual only covered model years '89 through '95, and that I needed the FSM. He said the '97 was the same as the earlier model years, and I asked then why the '96+ had been touted as such an upgrade. (In fairness, if the '89 through '95 MPVs were Gen 1.0, then the '96 through '98s were Gen 1.5, not Gen 2.0. But I knew the '97 was OBD 2, and had a revised intake manifold, just for starters.). And so the unpleasant conversation went.
So then Mr Finance pushed over the papers for me to sign, and, lo and behold, the negotiated $13,100 had been changed to $14,995.
I made him change the price to $13,100 before I would sign.
We did get the van, and it served us very well. We drove it another 250,000 km, and it was in the family for over 17 years. So other than dealing with Grumpy Weasel Finance Man, I didn't regret the purchase.
We drove the van a couple of days later, and took it to an Indy garage for a mechanical inspection. I negotiated in a factory service manual in lieu of the dealership fixing a couple of minor items. The retail on the FSM was about $300 at the time.
We went in to sign the papers, and met the finance manager, who was already grumpy because we weren't financing the van.
He grumbled about the boss agreeing to include the FSM, said he would have knocked $15 off the price so I could buy a Haynes manual. I replied that the Haynes manual only covered model years '89 through '95, and that I needed the FSM. He said the '97 was the same as the earlier model years, and I asked then why the '96+ had been touted as such an upgrade. (In fairness, if the '89 through '95 MPVs were Gen 1.0, then the '96 through '98s were Gen 1.5, not Gen 2.0. But I knew the '97 was OBD 2, and had a revised intake manifold, just for starters.). And so the unpleasant conversation went.
So then Mr Finance pushed over the papers for me to sign, and, lo and behold, the negotiated $13,100 had been changed to $14,995.
I made him change the price to $13,100 before I would sign.
We did get the van, and it served us very well. We drove it another 250,000 km, and it was in the family for over 17 years. So other than dealing with Grumpy Weasel Finance Man, I didn't regret the purchase.
I deal with one dealership in town, I'm also the vehicle purchaser for our company. I don't negotiate, I get quotes from 3 dealers on identical trucks and buy from the cheapest one, no haggling, give me your best price or try harder next time, jerk me around and I find someone else to deal with. Bought close to $300k in vehicles from him in 2 years
GF wanted a new car and started looking, she found what she was looking for at the main dealership I buy from so I went and talked to them, scheduled a test drive, she wanted the car. I went in and did the negotiating with the GM for her while she was at work and had everything worked out including trade in value and a few other things, the last thing I warned the GM about was to tell the finance manager that he wasn't to get too pushy with anything or I'd find another dealer, we wanted to be in and out quick but we would entertain him. Our experience with the F&I guy was entertaining, he was sweating bullets dealing with her, anytime he brought up an "upsell" he'd glance at me and quickly move on. She had already secured financing that was significantly better than anything they could offer and she wasn't having any of "upgrades". For a first time car buyer she didn't expect things to go so smoothly.
GF wanted a new car and started looking, she found what she was looking for at the main dealership I buy from so I went and talked to them, scheduled a test drive, she wanted the car. I went in and did the negotiating with the GM for her while she was at work and had everything worked out including trade in value and a few other things, the last thing I warned the GM about was to tell the finance manager that he wasn't to get too pushy with anything or I'd find another dealer, we wanted to be in and out quick but we would entertain him. Our experience with the F&I guy was entertaining, he was sweating bullets dealing with her, anytime he brought up an "upsell" he'd glance at me and quickly move on. She had already secured financing that was significantly better than anything they could offer and she wasn't having any of "upgrades". For a first time car buyer she didn't expect things to go so smoothly.
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