Car Salesman Tricks

Top ten annoying car dealer tricks. We saw all of these, some of them several times, in the process of shopping around.

10.) Pushing leasing as a way of "getting a car for cheaper" because the monthly payment would be lower in the first years, even though you pay more in the long run.

9.) Slamming other car brands when you say that you are shopping around. It says something when you have to put down other products to lift yours up.

8.) Wanting you to drive the car and inspect every inch of it BEFORE discussing the price.


7.) Telling you one sales price in person... and having another, cheaper price for that vehicle online.


6.) Listening to exactly what you are looking for, showing you a bunch of cars that are NOT what you are looking for and then concluding, after wasting an hour and a half, that they do not have what you are looking for.

5.) Saying that a car gets X miles to the gallon... when the EPA estimates are right there on the window and they are lower than that.

4.) Refusing to discuss money in terms of price of the car, but rather focusing on monthly payments.

3.) Commending the car's resale value, insisting that a few years down the road, we will want to trade it in for a minivan. Even though we kept telling them that we want to keep the vehicle for its lifetime.

2. )Making you wait. Forever. While they "talk to their manager" or "check inventory". Seriously, you work here- shouldn't you already be familiar with the inventory? And surely it doesn't take your manager 30 minutes to tell you whether you can sell a car at the price I am asking. They want to wear down your patience so you just give in and agree to whatever deal so that it can be done. It made us furious and actually resulted in us walking away in the middle of filling out paperwork to buy a car at one dealership. If we had gotten down to it an hour earlier, we probably would have left with the car. But I was so annoyed, we just left.

1.) In negotiating the price, making you sign a note that says "I will buy this car today for X". This practice a) makes you decide if you actually want to drive away with the car so that if they can't get that price you feel too attached to the car to just say no and leave or b) allows the dealer to have you agree to a minimum price when in reality they could have gone much lower.

Best thing about car dealerships?

The bathrooms. I used at least 3 different dealerships' bathrooms and they were way posh. Made me feel like I was at a fancy hotel.

So far, we still feel good with the Elantra, which is a very good thing. Micah continues to drive manual better and better and I continue to be rough but functional.