Just had an amazingly good experience shopping/ordering a new truck. Did my homework, called around, gave up on finding something in stock so knew I needed to order. On the phone, got an offer from another dealer of straight invoice pricing plus any Ford rebates. Decided to call Tommie Vaughn right down the street (Houston), a friend's bought hundreds of vehicles from them for his company. The salesman on the phone initially offered me $200 over invoice. I explained the other dealer's offer, and that I knew he still had about $1,100 in the truck at invoice with the 3% holdback. He asked me what I wanted, I suggested $300 below invoice. He asked to call me back.

Got a call the next morning, he asked me if I'd take $250 below invoice (plus Ford rebates). Done!

Took my wife with me to the dealer to let her help pick out color, interior, etc. First salesman was at the rodeo, so the X-plan sales manager helped us. Threw us keys to a truck to test drive, and left us alone. My wife couldn't believe he didn't want to copy our driver's license, check insurance, nothing. We spent about 45 minutes driving it, then I dropped her off at home.

I've been insulted so many times by trade-in offers that I'd already decided to just sell my Ranger on eBay. The salesman had been so easy to work with that, against my better judgement, asked him to 'what the hell', give me an offer on it. He came back from the inspection with a smile & a piece of paper clutched to his chest, and asked me what number I was thinking of. I explained to him that I've learned to be really pessimistic on these trade-in offers, and yet every time I'm not pessimistic enough, and that I still wind up being insulted. Told him I've seen '98 rangers advertised starting at $4k, so figured he was going to offer me $2k. He looked confused/disappointed, and showed me the value: $5,000! It was my turn to be confused. That was just bizarre. We went back to his office, I sat down, was still just gobsmacked. He kind of laughed at me, said the last guy in his office just went through the same thing - he was almost too befuddled at what an easy process it had been to believe it & sign off on his purchase.

Needless to say, I have a new truck on order now. I almost wish I needed another vehicle just so I could go back to this dealership & go through this buying experience again!

 

Congrats on your new purchase. It's great when you don't have to deal with a pushy sales person. It makes the buying alot easier. Good luck with the new truck. what kind Of truck did you buy?

 

Thanks, this was beyond easy - it was actually pleasant!

It's an F250 crewcab, XLT shortbed diesel, grey, all the (functional) toys - tow command, power pedals (for the wife), backup sensor (for the wife), etc. It's going to be the daily driver (when the wife doesn't beat me to the keys) and for towing racecars.

 

Always great to get the positive dealer experience. Now it's all in the folowup! Service, service, service!

 

What kind of racecars?

 

A spec racer ford, SCCA/COMMA/NASA races in Tx. What about you?

 

Sounds like fun
I race a T-Bird Pro-stock stock car on a 3/8 mile banked, paved track.

 

Another salesman who attended the Jeff Clark School of Car Sales. If dealers would just realize they will sell more vehicles by being honest instead of trying to sc*ew customers.

Sales managers have too much "What will this deal do for me right now" mentality. Then again service managers have exhibited a "You did good yesterday. What will you do for me today?" mentality to their techs.

 

Happy to say that when I picked up the truck last weekend, there were no surprises. Everything went as smoothly as the initial ordering process.

It was so unlike the norm it was almost an out of body experience. Twilight Zone.

Oh, and for anyone interested Tommie Vaughn has a Red/white Ford GT sitting in their showroom right now. They just got it in about a week ago.