So you want to buy a Tacoma?

Long time lurker, first time poster.

Love this process and am about to spam the Seattle area dealers. Question - which packages are under the dealer control to add or remove vs. being shipped that way? I'm looking at a shrinking inventory of Manual Off-Road Double Cabs and want to be able to combat the, "Well, that one just comes with that option." line. I honestly just want the above with the Premium and Tech package and the rest (mudguards, cover, exhaust tip) I could care less about.

Any input would be appreciated.

 

@TacoCat This is that thread I was telling you about.

 

Thanks man ill read up on it. Might already have a vehicle snagged though

 

Ohhhh boy. I want deets once you get it finalized.

 

i was planning to wait another 5 years but now i want to start shopping for a new truck right now!

 

Just started this for SoCal area for a 4runner

 

First of all I want to thank OP for taking the time to write up this info and post it on this forum for everyone! As easy and apparent as it may seem after reading it, it's something I had never thought of myself.

I recently bought my new '17 Tacoma and used this method for the most part and honestly, I was amazed at how well it worked. I will use this method everytime I buy a car in the future and am sore that I didn't use it for previous purchases. I wanted to add to this in some way so I took some notes along my journey and committed to posting them up as my personal tips and comments for anyone else who may seek to use this process in the future.

Here we go...

I agree that you must be fairly certain in what you want, but I disagree that you need to know exactly what you want. Essentially, I knew I wanted a '17 TRD OR DCSB Premium package with JBL in BBP or QS, and I was certain I didn't want any accessories because IMO you pay a premium for these things from the dealer and could add them on yourself with greater flexibility and less money later on. That being said, keep in mind that the best deal does not necessarily always mean the cheapest price. This is where I think the flexibility in knowing what you want is. Had I been looking specifically for x truck with x accessories I would have been very limited in my options, which in-turn would have limited me on price. I'll touch on this more later...

Like OP, I used a spreadsheet to keep track of things because shit does get crazy. I started by finding every dealer within x distance I was willing to travel to. I noted the dealer name, city, state, and phone number. I also added a column for whether or not the dealer had visible stock that met my criteria (did the website inventory have any truck that matched what I was looking for?). It was during this time looking at inventory that I also added a column for advertised price (meaning the lowest price I could find for that truck from that dealer). This ended up being important because as I was making my email template I used a link to the lowest priced truck as my example - starting the bidding process as low as possible. I noticed that when starting to receive responses, I got a lot of "...and I'll match that dealer's price that you sent in the email". So I think this worked out well.

Just like instructed, I emailed using whatever Internet sales link I could find on the dealer's site and when required used the dealer's phone number as my phone number so they wouldn't be able to call me. I still to this day wonder how many of them called themselves before realizing it was their dealership's number. I also used a throw away email that I created just for this purpose. I did get some pushback here and there about talking on the phone/stopping by, but I politely and respectfully kept the conversation limited to email only.

My list of dealers was not as big as I live in Colorado Springs and within 6 hours is about as far as I was going to deal with. I think I had 20 dealers on the list. I opted not to do the high school football championship bracket. Instead, I just solicited the lowest price to all the others. As I started to get responses back it was pretty clear from the beginning which dealers were of high enough volume to really compete, although there were some one-offs that stayed in the fight for a while. I'd say that stayed fairly true throughout. This probably varies based on your geographical area but Denver was my nearest major metro and it was pretty quick to see that there were maybe 4 or 5 dealers in Denver that were nipping at each other's heels and a lot of the surrounding cities just couldn't compete. As I moved along, some fell off pretty much entirely: They were way high, didn't like the email format, didn't have the truck on the lot, or just couldn't keep up with the rest - survival of the fittest I suppose, the weak just dropped off.

Since I was open to trucks with more accessories as to not limit my stock, I needed a way to keep track of what accessories the truck had, as those obviously added to the MSRP. NOTE: I'm talking about factory accessories here, not dealer add-ons. I noticed a couple of the dealers provided me a build sheet which wasn't a full blown window sticker but still listed the model, VIN, packages, prices, accessories, and MSRP. This was essential and if I could do it again, it would be the first thing I would request from each dealer that put in a bid - "...please provide me a build sheet for the truck you are offering". I actually started asking exactly that and it seemed to be synonymous with all the dealers, they gave me the same sheet formatted the same way sort of like a mortgage estimate, all nice and standardized. This enabled me to add an additional column to my spreadsheet for options, in here I listed the accessories and their individual prices for each dealer. I then added an option cost column that listed the total of all the accessories for that dealer. I also added a column for MSRP, sale price, MSRP/Price Delta, and MSRP/Price Delta %. Maybe you can see where I was going with that. Essentially I used formulas to take the MSRP and compare it to the dealer's current selling price and then calculate the total I was saving off of MSRP for that vehicle. I could then calculate what that savings was as a percentage, and sort the list by % off of MSRP. That's why I was saying, the cheapest price isn't necessarily the best deal. I was getting bids on trucks that had $x more accessories for the same price as trucks that didn't. So, if I sorted the list by purchase price, I might be getting 9% off of MSRP for a truck with carpet floor mats versus sorting by % off of MSRP and getting 12% off of MSRP for a truck with tube steps, mudguards, tonneau cover, etc. So you have to decide what's more important to you, paying as little as possible or saving the most off of MSRP. For example, one of my runner ups was a truck with a lot of accessories and it was the one I was going to buy simply because it was only $200 more than the lowest priced truck for $1000 worth of accessories (close to 14% off of MSRP even including the dealer fee) but some last minute action dropped two others down in price and then those extra accessories would have cost me what they actually cost and I wasn't interested in paying for the accessories I didn't really want even though it was the better deal, so I opted to pay the least price. That's why I mention it's important to consider and contrast the lowest priced truck versus the most savings off of MSRP. Had I only paid attention to the lowest priced truck and that truck wouldn't of dropped in price more, I would have paid nearly the same price for a truck with no accessories as I could have paid for the same truck with accessories, which IMO would have been stupid.

I was scooting along well, and then realized that dealer fees were varying tremendously. I had dealers with a dealer fee of $0 to $900. So I added a column for dealer fee, and noted it for each dealer. I then incorporated the dealer fee into the formula for the delta % savings. As crazy as it sounds, once you get down to only a handful of dealers, price drops start to dwindle down to a few hundred bucks at a time. So this dealer fee was very important to include as to remain accurate in what the true cost was. When you first start out, the trucks are widely varying in price and then they quickly get into formation around the lowest cost truck you have a bid on. So shaving off thousands of dollars to start and then tightening up to hundreds as the dealers are competing with each others lowest price to get your business. I started out with an example truck that was advertised at $36k compared to some others who were starting out at $39K - it didn't take long for them to get to $36k because they obviously had to in order to have any chance to earn my business.

I was amazed at how much pricing info I was able to get via email only. I imagined that they would never get into pricing without a phone call or visiting in person. This really does work.

The difference I saw in this method versus traditional negotiating is that all your leverage comes from a lower price versus traditional negotiation in which I guess your leverage is walking out the door. Using this process, once you run out of lower prices, you run out of leverage. This where allowing some trucks with accessories to stay in the list actually worked to my advantage. They wanted to earn my business even though their truck had a higher MSRP than the others they were competing against, so for whatever reason, they continued to compete and that helped because then I could go back to the others and say, "this place is gonna sell me a truck for this price and it comes with additional accessories that your truck doesn't, so now what are you gonna do?". Maybe if I was more of a jerk and had more time, I could have combined this strategy with the traditional a bit: Once I got my lowest offer I could have gone in and then threatened to walk out had they not agreed to shave off even more. But as slimy as dealers can be, I'm a man of my word and if they hold up on their end, I'm going to hold up on mine. In fact, through this experience, I found the best dealership I've ever worked with. I was honestly dreading the purchase because I was sure that I'd show up to the dealership and they'd pull some crap about the price isn't right, added on accessories, or just plain make my life miserable while I wait 12+ hours to purchase the vehicle because "they are busy and short handed today". Much to my surprise I got none of that. It was a great experience. I purchased at Mountain States Toyota in Denver BTW, which was pretty much the lowest price from the get-go and barely needed any hassling to beat the others. All-in-all I ended up at about 12% off of MSRP with no dealer fee and no accessories except for carpet floor mats = $35,289 purchase price (before taxes, etc).

I am absolutely certain that more time would have yielded a better price. I am thrilled with my price even though it's not the best I've heard of but it could have been better. I was just glad to feel like I saved way more than a lot of dealers were willing to meet and I did so without ever having to step a foot in a dealer's door or talk with my voice until the last minute just to close the deal. Give yourself time if you want the best reward. That being said, once you start getting dealers bowing out because they just can't go any lower, you're probably about at your limit, especially if they have kept up the whole time. Don't get discouraged by what others may have saved, it really all depends on location, timing, etc. The lowest you can get them down is the lowest you can get them down. Like I said, no lower price, no leverage. Once one dealer is only matching the price of another and not beating them by anything, there's not much you can do. I had just bought a house, had the money in savings, and needed to move things/haul stuff for renovations so I opted to give in at 12%. I think upwards of 15% would have been possible. I bought in November as the 2018s were just starting to be listed as coming soon to dealerships and the build tool wasn't even available on Toyota's site yet for 2018s. Had I waited until this month, I would have totally saved more - but you gotta do what works for you.

That's all I got. Thanks again to ramonortiz55 for authoring the original post and inspiring me to buy a vehicle a different way. Thanks to TacomaWorld for hosting it. If not for this forum I would have maybe not gotten my Tacoma, and that would be a damn shame because I fucking love it. Many thanks to everyone who contributes because let's face it, a blank Tacoma forum wouldn't do anybody any good. Lastly, thanks in advance for all the advice and help I will get from this community in the future.

I saw someone ask for the spreadsheet OP used earlier in this thread and I think it went unanswered. I would post mine up somewhere but I don't want to be responsible for keeping it alive so instead I'll post a pic of a few rows of mine with the formulas I used underneath their corresponding columns. It's a pretty simple sheet to make and this way it can live forever and not just turn into a dead link:



Edit: Updated pic with proper formulas.

 

I want to thank you for all this information, I've done some of the homework you talk about in your post willing to go to another state and you're right I get those emails back this is invoice price , Or this is our cost so that's what confuses me is MSRP versus invoice cost, also what gets me is looking at Carmax website they have the No haggling price but their prices do seem cheaper than other new dealerships when I see a 40 K price and yet they show their pastors being $3000 less that makes me wonder what is a reasonable offer for a TRD off-road long bed four-door basically equipped

 

As a new owner, I wanted to jump into this thread and say thank you! This process worked without a hitch and saved me several thousand off what I would of paid for the DCSB TRDOR I ordered.

 

I'm also in Texas and planning on buying a 2018 DCSB TRDS in December. This will be my first new truck and I was already getting kinda kinda cagey about the process. Feelin much better about it now. Thanks for the post ramonortiz55 and everyone else that added their experiences!

 

Well it worked!! Thanks for the post! My co-worker said he got a "killer" deal and then I told him about this method I read on here about. After getting by the length of the process, I finally opted to do it. Walking away tomorrow with a 2019 TRD Sport 4x4 Cement color for $8,000 OTD with my trade. From almost $38k MSRP down to $32,043. Next question, should I get the extended warranty as I'll be keeping it for 10+ years. If I did it will probably be the fully protected as it covers 100% rims/tires when I buy them too - scratches on rims, they replace them, no deductible. Also it INCLUDES all maintenance for that period as well.......Thoughts?

 

It's strictly up to you but most of the time extended warranties are a waste of money.

 

I can't read the price in your post on this tablet I'm using. What is the cost of the extended warranty?

 

Ok I looked at your post on a laptop. If I am correct, the warranty highlighted is 36 payments of $364.27. That totals $13,131.72. Think about that for a minute.

 

I believe that price is what his monthly payments would be with warranty. On the right he owes a balance of 8k. So the warranty is an additional $5,100.

 

That sounds a bit more reasonable. Still very expensive. I have heard these warranties are negotiable in price when you buy a new vehicle.

 

@pabstsmeared this thread is a good read. It's not your exact situation because you're buying used, but some helpful info nonetheless.

 

Wow, just saved me thousands of dollars! The plan is working exactly to detailed instructions. Also see @rightsideout post about adding dealer fees to total. @ramonortiz55 PM me your paypal so I can send you a coffee.

 

@BravesTaco read this