Whats generally Dealer's margin?

Broglie

planning to buy a car from the dealer. How much does the dealer negotiate? Does their margin depend on the value of the car? i am looking at a car advertised for £17995 and wanted to haggle but not sure how much to haggle for.

motorguy

Broglie wrote: »

planning to buy a car from the dealer. How much does the dealer negotiate? Does their margin depend on the value of the car? i am looking at a car advertised for £17995 and wanted to haggle but not sure how much to haggle for.

How much is the car relative to others?

I'd rather have £100 off a car at £17995, than £1,000 off the same car being sold by another dealer for £18995.

1DayAAT

As a rule of thumb, £1000 on most mid-range value cars.

JonathanA

New or used? Brand? It also depends where you are buying from. Car supermarkets generally have lower margins than franchised dealers, though that can depend on the car and how long it has been in stock. There is no general rule of thumb as there are lots of factors to take into account.

oscarward

depends if it's new or not.


A main dealer friend of mine once told me he could sell me a car for £0 and still make a profit as it may be the one which took him over the manufacturer target which then generated retrospective discounts on all the previous months deals.


He wouldn't do it on principle but gave me an idea of the potential discounts that could be achieved with a bit of knowledge. i.e. What level the dealer had achieved in sales target and how long to target period end.


Interestingly since then I have been inundated with deals where the garage were offering the car at cost price to them plus £1 . Yeah right......


Also interestingly I bought an ex demo car which the dealer wanted me to complete in February. As I was waiting for a settlement cheque from my previous car write off they suggested I buy on my credit cards and they would waive the CC fee's as it would allow them to meet their group car sales figure for that month. I agreed as they were offering a good deal already which I had signed for so no skin off my nose to get the car a couple of weeks early.

InsideInsurance

Secondhand cars - totally dependent on their strategy and ability to source cars

Brand new - is much more complex as commissions are often tiered so how much they get depends on what else they've sold in that period and there can even be both monthly and quarterly accumulations.

Cant say I got my car for free but the deal was a lot cheaper than anyone else at all with the explanation that though there was almost no profit in that one sale it pushed up the commission on all their others and so was very worth while for them to do and they wanted to win my business rather than lose it for the sake of an extra small bit on this one car.

It went as far as agreeing a price, much lower than anyone else had offered. They then phoned me back the next day saying they'd managed to knock another amount off it after doing their sums with their sales director (even though Id agreed the higher price)

colino

What do you really mean by margin? The difference between a similar private sale and one properly presented with back-up, warranty and credibility?

harveybobbles

Depends how well it is priced compared to similar ones.

There is a garage near me who will knock off £1000 just for asking. Yet their cars are well over priced.

People like the fuzzy, warm feeling of getting £1000 "off" yet don't look at the actual cost.