Cash is No Good No More!

[kmk1012]

I finally got back home with my new truck from the dealer. I wanted to (and did) pay cash for it. You would not believe how hard the stealerships push financing. I may wear slightly worn clothes but not ragged by any means but maybe they just didn't believe that I could do it. Any ways, rant over.

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[TTSX]

I would wonder if financing would have worked in your favor. My parents recently bought a new car and for whatever reason, by financing and making at least two payments they got a few thousand off. Then paid in full once the discount applied. I don't fully understand how that worked but I'm not a finance guy

 

[kmk1012]

I would wonder if financing would have worked in your favor. My parents recently bought a new car and for whatever reason, by financing and making at least two payments they got a few thousand off. Then paid in full once the discount applied. I don't fully understand how that worked but I'm not a finance guy

The incentive for financing was a minimum of six months pmts, and only for a grand reduction in price. I calculated that the six pmts of interest came to more than the grand I would "save".

 

[TOVO]

Cash will always be king. Congrats. I lived through the earthquake in so cal wen all the banking system went down. We had cash and still pay for what we needed. But that was 25 plus years ago also.

 

[ZigZagZeke]

The dealer gets something like $1000-$2000 for every loan they deliver to the finance company. They hate cash.

 

[Oregonhunter5]

When I was in high school I worked at Lexus of Portland.
A quiet man walked in with $40,000 in cash to buy a new Lexus.
Well,,, I believe then you couldn't pay in cash with more than $15,000 for a car.
Well things got a little weird.
He was a drug dealer from Boise...
Cuffed and stuffed

 

[Alexx1401]

Dealer's get a commission for every contract they write. This is why they push the finance route. We just bought a new car since my move made the commute a lot further. wanted something with high MPG. The financing was for less than the money makes for us where it is. I asked about cash, the offer from them would have made it cost me more so I took the financing. After a short time I can pay it off if I wish with no penalty so I figured I had nothing to lose.

 

[notazombie]

Walking in with a duffle bag full of rolled up 20s will typically raise a flag or two. Writing a check, not so much.

 

[ZigZagZeke]

When I was in high school I worked at Lexus of Portland.
A quiet man walked in with $40,000 in cash to buy a new Lexus.
Well,,, I believe then you couldn't pay in cash with more than $15,000 for a car.
Well things got a little weird.
He was a drug dealer from Boise...
Cuffed and stuffed

When my aunt was in her 40's she dated an Italian asparagus farmer in central CA. He walked around most days in bib overalls, a thermal underwear top in cold weather, or a wife beater tank top in the summer time, a pair of 20 year old Wellington boots, and a Toscanelli cigar in the corner of his mouth. The boots usually had cow manure all over them. Every June or so, after the asparagus harvest, he would go into the local Lincoln dealership and buy a new Lincoln Continental car for cash. One particular day, there was nobody on the sales floor but a rookie salesman who didn't know who "Mr. Leonardini" was. Leonardini poked around the show room for a few minutes while the rookie ignored the "bum" in dirty overalls. Finally, one of the older salesmen came onto the floor and the rookie made some comment about bums wasting his time. The veteran salesman immediately recognized Leonardini and about broke a leg getting to him before he went out the door. Long story short, Leonardini eventually settled on a car and pulled out a roll of $100 bills to pay for the car. Truly, I tell you, don't judge a book by its cover.

 

[Ramjet12]

I finally got back home with my new truck from the dealer. I wanted to (and did) pay cash for it. You would not believe how hard the stealerships push financing. I may wear slightly worn clothes but not ragged by any means but maybe they just didn't believe that I could do it. Any ways, rant over.

You're shopping at the wrong dealer. I bought a car with cash and the dealer gladly took my money.
Easiest sale they ever made.

 

[kmk1012]

You're shopping at the wrong dealer. I bought a car with cash and the dealer gladly took my money.
Easiest sale they ever made.

Third dealer really was a charm! I finally was able to buy my new Silverado from an out of town dealer. Every dealership has this configuration but no one wanted my 45k.

 

[The Heretic]

When I was in high school I worked at Lexus of Portland.
A quiet man walked in with $40,000 in cash to buy a new Lexus.
Well,,, I believe then you couldn't pay in cash with more than $15,000 for a car.
Well things got a little weird.
He was a drug dealer from Boise...
Cuffed and stuffed

If you pay $10K+ for anything anywhere with check or cash, the retailer by law has to report it to the feds. They need to fill out a bit of paperwork. If you walk in with thousands in paper money, then it gets a bit more complicated. As you note, this is a common way of laundering money - then there is the whole thing about counterfeit money.

The last two cars I have bought, one for $26K, the other for $14K, I paid for with a bank check and the dealer didn't have a problem with that. The one for $26K though was on a Saturday and I couldn't get a check until Monday - the dealer did a credit check and had me fill out a lot of paperwork, but let me drive it off the lot with nothing more than my signature. Of course they hold the title - indeed, dealerships rarely have the title on hand, it is usually held by a bank and they submit the paperwork and a month or two later you get the title.

The dealerships never said a word about financing - but they often do make more money offering it.

 

[The Heretic]

The down side of financing is that you need to have full coverage insurance for the car, even if it is only worth $500.

 

[v0lcom13sn0w]

dealerships make more money off of financing. i work at a dealership in town as a technician. i will ONLY deal with management when buying a vehicle. i wont deal with salesmen.

 

[cigars]

Walking in with a duffle bag full of rolled up 20s will typically raise a flag or two. Writing a check, not so much.

I drove up to a GM dealership in Auburn several years ago to buy a lightly used SUV. When I turned down their financing and extended warranty BS and said I would write them a check, they started slow walking everything. It took them over three hours to complete the transaction.

 

[L84Cabo]

i will ONLY deal with management when buying a vehicle. i wont deal with salesmen.

+1. If you use AAA's pricing service you usually get to deal with the Fleet Manager instead of the regular sales monkeys. MUCH nicer!

 

[The Heretic]

Could it be that they wanted more than $45K?

 

[CoastRange57]

I have nothing to offer here. Over the last 12 years or so I have bought one used Ranger pickup from a dealer and probably 7 or 8 other vehicles from private parties. New vehicles work for some people, but the way I run the numbers slightly used is much better.

I bought a Explorer from a guy in Bend last May. Went to the bank on a Friday morning and wanted 10K in cash. They about sh*t. They barely had enough cash on hand, payday Friday and all. Told them I don't care, I just need my 10K. They did it, but suggested next time I give them 3 days notice on the cash thing.

I used to sell commercial turf and excavation equipment. The manufacturers want you to use the financing, because they make more on the paper than they do on the actual margin, and they can screw the dealer at bit more too. That worked for a while until I crunched the numbers down pretty hard and saw that it was screwing the client a bit, but most of them did not care as long as they could make the payment.

 

[The Heretic]

I have nothing to offer here. Over the last 12 years or so I have bought one used Ranger pickup from a dealer and probably 7 or 8 other vehicles from private parties. New vehicles work for some people, but the way I run the numbers slightly used is much better.

Yes - I have never bought a new car - the day you drive it off the lot you lose quite a bit of $$$$. I try to buy the low mileage newer used cars - preferably less than 30K miles, but my X1 had 38K on it and it had all the features I wanted, plus the miles were mostly long distance miles instead of city miles. I like to buy used lease cars too - bought one that had only 6K miles on it.

Last year, bought a car for my daughter - she was in love with this one, even though it had 80K+ on it. Big mistake, but we lucked out in the end (I hope). Come to find out that Audis (and VWs) with the 2.0T engine have had problems with the engine since inception - especially 2009-2011 models. Fortunately we bought from a large dealer and it came with a one month warranty. Oil consumption due to piston/ring design flaw - it used almost 4 quarts of oil in less than a thousand miles - but we couldn't see it in the exhaust. The dealer fixed it and the 3rd party warranty co. paid for the fix - almost $5K in repairs - if we hadn't had the warranty we wouldn't have been stuck big time.

I bought a Explorer from a guy in Bend last May. Went to the bank on a Friday morning and wanted 10K in cash. They about sh*t. They barely had enough cash on hand, payday Friday and all. Told them I don't care, I just need my 10K. They did it, but suggested next time I give them 3 days notice on the cash thing.

My CU won't give out more than a couple thousand via the teller, but now they have a video teller machine and I not sure how much I can get in cash - but it gives out hundreds. I usually have them cut a check instead, but once I was buying a pickup from a private party for $6K - had to take the check to a bank and have the bank cash it, since it was a bank check they had no problem with that.

I used to sell commercial turf and excavation equipment. The manufacturers want you to use the financing, because they make more on the paper than they do on the actual margin, and they can screw the dealer at bit more too. That worked for a while until I crunched the numbers down pretty hard and saw that it was screwing the client a bit, but most of them did not care as long as they could make the payment.

About the only time financing works is with the 0-1% interest rate and rebates/etc., and even then cash usually gets you a better price. Haven't tried that though because it is almost always only on new cars. I have several times done the 0% offers on credit cards for 90 days or something like that. But I always paid them off before the time was up. After a couple of times doing that they quite sending me the offers. Now I just pay for almost everything with my CC and then pay it off in the 30 day grace period - I get use of the money free for 30 days and 1-5% Amazon credits on the purchases, so I use those to buy small things on sale at Amazon - the CC gets they cut too.

Big items from small local retailers - like when I bought a new motorcycle - I bring them a check so they don't have to pay the CC their cut.

 

[notazombie]

Went to my local bank a few months ago to grab $4k to buy a motorcycle. They were emptying teller drawers just to get it together for me "just this once" and told me they need 2 days notice for anything over $2k in the future. That was a Friday morning. Ridiculous.
Just another reason to keep some cash on hand.