OT: Best pricing on a new Ford

I bought a 3 year old Ford for my wife for 12k and 1.9% financing. It looks like the new models but was 1/3 the price. It had 60k miles but I had an auto shop put it on a house and inspect it first. Wife loved the car, it's safe and dependable and cheaper than a lease. Took about a month to find this deal.

USAA car buying service has always given me the best price.

Don't get a Found On Road Dead

While we're canvassing for car advice...

My lease is up in October on a Honda Civic. It's been my daily driver I took over from my wife when the kids were born. The catch is I've become a "super-commuter" in the last year, and I put 104 miles on my car, daily.

I think this makes leasing my next car out of the question, because of mileage overage fees - but in any event, the economical car you're initially happy to pay $200-250/month starts to feel less than cozy because you're paying mid-level / low-end lux prices for it. So I'm thinking something used, maybe a hybrid.

So my concern is choosing the right car at the right price. Has to be a car that can rack up 25-35,000 miles a year without falling apart, at a monthly price consistent with what we've been paying - or in the case of a hybrid, maybe a little more if the gas cost would off-set.

Any ideas? I've been looking at a 2011 Lexus CT 200h, and it's checking off most of my boxes; but my concern with that vehicle is how it'll respond to the mileage.

Thanks.

From a Flint Chevy guy... by a Prius.

what I do

 

1 - take all the rebates and get the out the door price as low as possible - don't worry about the finance interest rate

2 - when you make your first car payment, pay it off - I borrow against the fixed income portion of my 401K (much in stocks / mutual funds, some cash / income fund) and pay off the car loan and pay myself back to my 401K so all interest paid is to your 401K, usually at a higher rate than the income fund is making and lower than the dealer / finance interest rate

If you can afford to wait and accept on lot stock, the best is to wait for a dealer to need you.  Manufacturers will do deals along the lines of "If you sell 80 cars in a month, we'll give you a bonus of X dollars."  With X normally being in the tens of thousands. 

So what you do is go reigster a Google Voice number.  Then you go to a few different Ford dealerships, make it clear you can afford the vehicle and are interested, but don't necessarily buy.  Leave your contact info behind and let them blow up you GVoice, which sales folk do.

The last week or so of the month when someone starts really hitting you hard, that's the guy.  That is the dealership that is at two or three cars away from the number of cars they need to sell for the rebate and they really want that rebate.  These are the people that will potentially offer you under invoice pricing because if they're at 79 of 80, it's better to lose a few grand on the new car than lose that bonus.  At that point you go down to the lot and buy what they have on lot because obviously they need to seal the deal before the manufacturer deadline.

The big thing to protect yourself is make sure you can then go refinance the car with your credit union or such without a penalty.  Also when shopping, indicate you want a midlevel car and are somewhat picky on color.  Then when it's the end of the month and they only have a full loaded black one, you can take that one and demand to pay a price based on the midlevel options and a price break since it's not the ideal color.  

Last time I bought it took three months and having four dealerships blowing up my phone, but I got a Cadillac for 4k under invoice and a bunch of bonus options on it.  

 

I sell Ford's for a living in Florida. Rebates are based off your residence zip code if you are going new. The best advise I can give is go with a Certified pre-owned with low miles. You will have a better warranty than a brand new one (7 year 100k power train and 4/48k limited) and someone else already took the depreciation hit. If you don't drive very much, lease it, then you won't have to worry about depreciation

and go to a private seller. Dealerships are scumbags.

First, figure out which cars are you are interested in (make, model) and figure out a bit about it (especially whether the current design is at the begining, middle or end of the lifecycle). Then look up the invoice price on KBB and Edmonds. 

Invoice is technically supposed to be the price that dealers pay for a car, but really they pay less. For hot new models, you won't get the invoice price, whereas for models near the end of their lifespan, you can go under. 

Offer the invoice price and walk out unless they go where they rationally should for the specific model you are interested in (and/or throw in some free stuff). So if you're looking at, say, an Explorer or Escape (which are midway through the design lifecycle), you should be able to get to maybe $1k above the invoice price. At least in California--I realize the market is a bit different in Michigan.

Good luck! Shopping for cars is fun as hell. 

 

 

A-plan for a new vehicle.

Or look for a car that just came off it's first lease. The market is soon to have a record amount of lease returns available, it's going to really affect the market for vehicle prices.

Plan

Dealers lose money on new cars nowadays. The ads are crazy low. They may be able to go a bit deeper.

If they can sell the car at that price, then they can sell the car to you at that price.

Use a car broker. I just used one a few months ago and I'll never go thruough a dealer again. Just so painless. I gave mine the exact specs (make, model, color and every option I wanted) and he beat the dealer prices (including the "this deal expires when turn off the lights tomorrow) and dropped the car off at my house. No finance manager bullshit trying to upsell you on undercoating, overcoating and other bullshit. The final sale and contract signing took 3 minutes over the computer. . My final sales contract had the agreed-upon price, sales tax and that is it. No fluffing and bs fees.

I used the TrueCar service through USAA the last time I bought a car (Honda Odyssey) and got a really good deal (bought the car in June 2013). You don't have to be a USAA member to use it - www.truecar.com. You provide the exact specs of the car you want and various dealers will provide you with quotes for that car. 

As an alum, I can X plan a Ford, and as a USAA member, I can buy through participating dealers.  In my area (Northern Virginia), Koons Sterling Ford can and does offer better prices than I can get using X plan or USAA.  You might want to check the dealership's website.  It is in Sterling, Virginia, just about 25 miles outside of DC.

wait until 12/31. thank me later.

Have to echo the people who said end of model year is the ticket.  My last car purchase was accidently right at the end of the model year, and the dealer was practically BEGGING us to buy the car.  My wife and I were in Michgian from out of state and we were just looking around because we had some down time without the kids.  We literally walked out twice saying "thanks but we really just want to buy the car back home" and they kept making us better deals, finally even offering to truck the car cross-country for us.  They REALLY wanted to sell us that car.  

It helped that my wife was playing bad cop to my good cop.  She hates salespeople in general (sorry if that is your job!) and so while I was trying to be nice, she was being clear that she didn't want to buy the car.  That probably ended up helping, since I'm likely a sucker that they would have rolled for a much worse deal.  

 

There is but one solution, buy a used Super Duty, and have one of the many modifiers turn it into an Excursion. $60,000 later and at 10 MPG, you will own the road. 

I actually bought my wife a car a few months ago and thought I'd put the whole thing on my credit card and get my [3%?] cash back from my credit card.  Turns out you can only put $4,000 of a car on a credit card.   Not sure if that is a New York State law or a national thing.  

Are there other "cash back" strategies to save money from other sources?   Evidently you can't buy money orders with credit cards and get your cash back as it is considered a cash advance.

Lease! Seriously. If your wife doesn't drive a ton of miles, go with a $0 down lease. Plus, that gives you more flexibility as your family grows over time. Lower monthly payments is also a plus.