Very nice looking truck. I love what I call the "black out" look, but living in an area where the summer is 95+ degrees and it is not uncommon to have a week of 100+ degrees black is out of the question.

Do you want to accessorize your SD like this? If you do, have you built that into your budget?

 

Hi Chris, and welcome to the forum. I get it, and there's no fault in wanting something awesome. However, I'm in the camp that says wait.

Here's something to consider: suppose you work hard to pay off your current truck, get & stay out of debt, and find some way to become self employed.

As your income grows some day you find yourself in the 40% tax bracket, and your business has need of a truck.

1. Buying an $80,000 truck saves you $32,000 in taxes. If you do not buy the $80,000 truck, your tax bill will be $32,000 more than if you did buy the truck. (Reason = $80,000 x .4 = $32,000 in taxes). Businesses get to write off their expenses and currently you can write off the entire thing the year you buy it.

2. So if you DO buy the truck, you do NOT have to pay $32,000 in tax for that tax year. Here's the tricky part -- whether you buy the truck or not, you are going to spend the $32,000 (either on the truck, or on taxes) -- but given the choice which would you pick?

3. You have to keep the truck for 5 years, or you owe pro-rated owe tax back.

4. In 5 years, if you buy the truck right and take care of it, it could be worth about 50% of what you paid for it.

5. So your $80,000 truck costs about $40,000 to drive for 5 years.

6. While you did spend a very real $32,000 of your company's money on the truck, you might want to look at that as 'free' because if you didn't spend it on something that helps your company (and makes you very happy) you would simply write a check to the government and get nothing in return.

7. Make the mental leap at #6 above, and since the $32,000 was 'gone' anyway, you basically got the truck for $48,000 ($80,000 minus the $32,000 that was never going to be yours in the first place.)

8. If you sell the truck at 5 years for $40,000, your cost of driving the truck actually ends up being $8,000.

9. Now, if you finance the truck (and going back to your original question -- if you are this business owner in a 39.6% tax bracket the banks FIGHT for your business and outbid each other) at a very low rate, something magical happens!

10. You don't write a check to the government AND get to keep your $32,000 that would have otherwise gone to the government! At least for month 1. Then you make a payment and it comes out of the $32,000. In fact, it takes well over 2 years of payments before the $32,000 you would have been forced to send the government 'now' to be used up in payments. Or you can think about it like this: The first two+ years of payments are free -- because you are using the Government's money (legally) to make your payments.

11. During that >2 years, you get to keep and put your money to work for you, AND drive an awesome new truck.

12. And if you're running any kind of good business, you can make better than 3% return on that $32,000. The higher the return, the more sense it makes to finance the truck.

13. If you make really good money on your invested capital, buying AND financing the truck is the smartest thing you can do.

But here's the key to all of this: If you don't own and operate a successful business, these kinds of things will never be available to you. And your likelihood of owning and operating a successful business is zero if you max yourself out in consumer debt -- short of inheriting one or winning the lottery.


Disclaimer: I'm neither a CPA nor a lawyer. YMMV. Also, who knows what might change in the future...

 

yeah I'll prolly just throw a lift, wheels and tires on it if I got a SD. Keep stock lights and all. It'll cost 7k after I buy the SD to do all that I think but ima save up for that.

As as far as a downpayment goes - I figure the dealer would give me 38 or 37 for my truck. So that's 7 or 6 in equity I have in it. Plus 13k. 10k down 3k to cover taxes etc. would allow me to get a SD lariat ultimate at 715 a month. I consider a ultimate because I spent 900 dollars on lighting upgrades for my truck and don't wanna do that for the normal lariat that offers halogen bulbs.

I currently make 26.09 an hour and basing my income off my old pay rate of 23.72 because I have not added up the new rate. Take home every 2 weeks is 1409 on my old rate. After my 500 land payment and insurance and payment on left with 1550 extra a month and have been comfortable with that. (Not including gas etc. )
and if I went with 715 SD payment after all is said and done I'll have 1451 left a month not including gas etc.

thoughts?

 

Be very careful where and how you park your truck if you decide to go the parking lot route. Make sure the city doesn't have restrictions where and/or how long you can park a car for sale on commercial property other than car sales lots. If you park it overnight, which I don't recommend, make sure you have the landlord's permission or it could get towed.

We advertised our GMC on Facebook, Craigslist and put a for sale sign on it with it parked in our driveway. We got about equal inquiries from Facebook, Craigslist and the for sale sign. However, most of the Facebook and Craigslist inquiries were people making low ball offers without physically seeing it. We ended up selling it yesterday to a person that saw the for sale sign and knocked on our door. It took two weeks and a 6% price drop followed by a 4% price drop (starting price $5,000) to sell. It sold for 11% under our most recent asking price because the buyer proved to us that sometime between the last time we used the AC and now the clutch on the AC stopped engaging.

 

The operative word being honest. I love my dealer. I pass 2 closer dealers to get to it. The people are wonderful. However, I, and many other folks, have had head scratching moments where dealers add fees, or make funny numbers in order to sell something at the highest profit that they can. I mean no insult. I agree. Everyone should make and honest living. But quoting two different loans so thay they can make more money, or outright lying to customers to sell a truck isn't honest.

 

Do you work in an industry that has more openings that qualified applications? Did your industry have a lot of layoffs during the great recession? Is your industry dependent on federal/state government contracts and/or is regulated by the federal/state government? Does your industry serve only a few customers/clients.
If you answer no to the first question or yes to any of the other questions, you need to have a game plan for if you get laid off while you are spending close to 50% of your income on payments.

If you and your girlfriend breakup, do you plan still building the house after the land is paid off? If yes, you will likely will not qualify for a mortgage based on your total debt to income. With your income alone, you need to have very little to no debt to qualify for a mortgage.

 

Look at the advise in this thread. "get 3.2% and tell the dealer you got 3%"

That's the same thing! Customers do it to us nearly 100% of the time. It's negotiating. The funny thing is, dealers do have more information than consumers, so we know when you're lying, but we aren't allowed to tell you. You tell us all the time. Dealers are hustlers, but so are customers. The difference is dealers respect a hustling customer, customers call us "stealerships". It's the hypocrisy that's rather annoying.

 

My experience with dealerships (stealerships?) has been pretty terrible over the years. While I don't begrudge (actually encourage) any legitimate business to have good profitability, I don't think anybody would argue there's a lot of shady, shell-games that go on with car dealerships -- not the least of which is insisting on their own financing to get the agreed price.

I'm going to side with homeschool74 on this one. The kick-backs, hold-backs, games with trade-in's, sweating people in uncomfortable chairs while they play higher-authority games...telling you that you don't qualify to buy more than 'x' truck ("we only got you approved at $xyz") only to sweat you again at closing -- offering you thousands of dollars in worthless add-on's, fees, etc.) -- which somehow are automatically and magically 'approved.'

And it's gotten a lot better. Years ago they sold crap products, charged you to diagnose problems that should have never occurred, stuck you in horrible, rule of 78 interest loans, etc. Then, when you were horribly upside down in those loans, they were only too happy to finance the difference so they could stick it to you again.

Just my experience. YMMV.

 

Yes it has openings but they are for jobs in matienence.

no - no lay offs.

No no it's privately owned by Koch industries its called Georgia pacific we are unionized paper mills we produce fluff pulp and we go by seniority in departments to go up the ladder and all other positions within the mill are bid on internally.

 

What described here is why I tell people looking to buy a car to:

- always get pre-approved for a loan with a credit union or bank and take the pre-approval letter with them to the dealership.
- Get loan protection products (i.e. GAP) from your lender. It is always cheaper from your lender.
- Don't buy any add-ons.
- If you really want an extended warranty research what you want and find the best price you can. Take the research, including the price, with you to the dealership. Do not let them convince you to buy an extended warranty with different terms (time period, mileage, deductible) unless you have the research to prove they are offering you a better deal then what you can get someplace else.
- Don't finance extended warranties. Remember, extended warranties can purchased at the same price up until at least 12 months/12,000 miles, so after buying your vehicle you can save up for the extended warranty.
- If you are considering trading in your vehicle and its private party sale value is in a price range that people will be able to pay cash, don't trade it in. You will get more selling it yourself.
- Once you know what you want to buy, don't "cold" walk onto a dealer lot. Contact their internet department first.

 

Ill chime in with my two cents here.

It seems you and I are in the same boat so Ill tell you my story. I had just hired on with the railway as a conductor. Went from making 25k a year driving a tow truck to making 80k a year on the train. After a year at my job I stopped at a ford dealer, just to see the new trucks. Next thing I know I am the proud owner of a brand new 2010 f250 XL diesel 4x4. Paid 48k out of pocket and traded in my gas 2500 GMC that I owned outright, payment of 650/month for 60 months. Diesel fuel was damn near 5 dollars a gallon and I could drive the truck or make the payments, not both. So I had an old crown vic that I drove to work and I paid 650/ mont for a long time just to have a pretty truck sit in the driveway. So time goes in, meet a girl, fall in love, buy a house. In 2015 I got suspended because some idiot at the railway medical department said I was colorblind and unable to distinguish signals and couldn't work. Well no work equals no pay...that 650 a month truck payment was eating into the savings..and lets face it you cant live in a truck. Traded off the truck for 27k and it only had 15 thousand miles, less that 300 hours on it. Paid off my remaining loan and credit cards, left me with just enough to buy a 99 super duty in cash. Once the vision thing was straightened out I was put back to work..no compensation for time off even though it was their fault. I now have a 700 dollar mortgage payment and a 200/month payment on a taurus that will be paid off in another year...

If I could go back in time I would have just kept that GMC as it was a 2002 and I owned it outright..and it was in the same condition as my 99 superduty is now....

My dad told me I was crazy and did I listen...nope.

I totally get the itch but please dont be like me..save your money...taking kids to Disneyland or having to make a car payment is not a fun choice.

-Nick

 

[QUOTE=191124x7;16907559]My experience with dealerships (stealerships?) has been pretty terrible over the years. While I don't begrudge (actually encourage) any legitimate business to have good profitability, I don't think anybody would argue there's a lot of shady, shell-games that go on with car dealerships -- not the least of which is insisting on their own financing to get the agreed price.

While I agree to a certain extent, remember that it is a game of sorts, and as I mentioned earlier in this thread do your homework before you go to play, buyer will always be at a disadvantage,because just like Frantz says dealer knows more, JOHN Q PUBLIC will never know what the dealers true cost is. Since the early 90s when the internet became accessible to the average consumer, it was easy to get dealer invoice witch in IMHO was at that time real close to true cost or actual cost, the numbers they throw at you today as in dealer invoice is an inflated number that has nothing to do with actual cost. I base this Theory on information gathered and experience. Unless you are buying at sicker prices, salesman has to get sales manager's approval before the deal is approved, so the best way to not get Punk'd during the process is to be well informed, wouldn't go as far to call them stealerships, this only happens if you let it!!

 

SALES TAX WARNING: Chris if you have sales tax in your state you need to look into whether your state offsets the sales tax with a trade in. Here in WA state I get a sales tax credit for the value of my trade in IF I trade the vehicle in at the dealer. If my trade is worth $40k and the new vehicle cost $60k I only have to pay sales tax on the difference of $20k.

Here's what's sucks, if I sell my trade in myself I don't get the sales tax credit and have to pay sales tax on the entire $60k which is BS and often the difference between what I could get selling it myself and what the dealer will give me on the trade. So before you put a lot of effort into selling your GMC yourself check into this.

 

Frantz, firstly, I want you to understand that I'm not hating on you, or salesmen in general.

I disagree that it's negotiating. Negotiating is generally between two prices. Not going from one, up to another, then getting caught, and going back to what you originally said.

I'm simply providing my perspective. It is similar to many folks. The bottom line of ANY buisness is to make money. There are different ways to make money, and in my experience car dealerships tend to go to extremes to make more money off of me, which is why I use the colloquial term, "stealerships" when I refer to a dealership.

If dealerships were always 100% honest, then I would argue that customers would be more honest. That being said, I've never been dishonest when buying a vehicle. I have found that financing terms at dealerships are usually better than some banks. That being said, I absolutely hate when dealerships get you to where "you want your payment " vs where "you want the bottom line to be". I find that a dealership would rather you focus on your monthly payment rather than the bottom line, which usually ends in the customer paying more, and the dealer making more. The only thing I don't like about dealerships is the mentality that they are doing the customer a favor, while simultaneously trying to get as much money off of a sale as possble. Really, it's greed. You personally may not be guilty of this. I'm not attacking you. I'm simply explaining my position.

 

Buying Tip: I shop dealers in a 300 mile radius for the best deal vs just my local dealers. Fire up Google maps, search Ford Dealers and check each dealers local web site for deals on their inventory of SD's. When you find a dealer that's advertising good discounts off MSRP make a note of them. If you don't find the truck you want in inventory you can use the Ford web site to check inventory that dealer may have in transit that's not arrived at their dealer ship yet. Another source of potential deals.

It was slim pickings when I purchased my SD back in November, not much inventory on dealer lots yet. But I found a F350 Lariat 4x4 6.7 loaded that was in transit ETA 2 weeks to a small dealership out in farm country about 60 miles away that was optioned the way I wanted it. Turns out a customer had ordered it then changed their mind and bought something else. This dealer was worried about moving a $75k truck, their customers typically buy work trucks for farms.

While other dealers near me were not willing to deal on price much with such limited inventory this small dealer was. I got several thousand more for my trade than the other dealers were offering plus about 8% off MSRP which at the time was a smoking deal in my area. They had the truck sold the day it arrived and everyone was happy.

Not all dealers will negotiate, some are stubborn and they WILL let you walk away, that's fine just walk go find another dealer who wants to move their inventory.