There's no right answer to this question brother, it's price negotiation at a car dealer, anything can happen...Hi Ya'll !
What's considered a reasonable offer under the MSRP when a Ford customer does "build and price"?
Abe
There's no right answer to this question brother, it's price negotiation at a car dealer, anything can happen...
Just some of the unknowns to think about...
Are you trying to get them to custom order one that they have zero money invested in up to that point in time or are you negotiating on one that's been sitting on their lot for months?
How many Raptors are sitting on their lot? How long have they been sitting there? How many Raptors are sitting on dealer lots around them?
Is it month's end and they only need one more sale to make the monthly quota or is it the start of the month and they're not yet worried about that quota?
Is the salesman your working with brand new to the dealership or is he a veteran with some pull on the sales manager.
Does the salesman value a sale more that day than just the biggest possible commission on a single sale?
Have you purchased vehicles from that dealership/salesman in the past or did you just walk in off the street?
For my part, back when the '17s were introduced, the BEST dealers were charging MSRP and couldn't keep a Raptor on the lot for more than a day. Shit dealers (I'm looking at most of them in CA here) were charging $15k over MSRP and getting it from idiots who think that 99 year interest only mortgages are an acceptable way of buying a house. People flew across the country to get MSRP and then enjoyed driving their new Raptor back home.
Last year, very few dealers were trying to charge over MSRP, but a lot of them still throw on lots of stupid dealer add-ons, like the edge protection package, or drop-in bed liners, which cost almost nothing and have multi-hundred percent markups. Tell me, who, in their right mind is going to spend $60-70k on a truck, and want a drop in bed liner? Any dealer that does this is simply showing that they don't know their own customer base or, much worse, their local customer base is really really stupid.
Back in '17, when we were able to get our hands on detailed FORD pricing documents, we knew EXACTLY what a truck cost the dealership, before sales quota bonuses, etc., and they carried about a 9% profit margin, depending on exactly how you configured the truck. Unfortunately, I've not been able to find that pricing information in the past few years. If the '17 pricing structure still holds, then you've got something on the order of 9% to work with in your negotiations.
For my part, if you go in knowing exactly what the truck MSRP is from the web, argue to get the truck out the door for THAT price, meaning you're fighting for at least a discount equal to your local vehicle sales tax (4% in my area) plus all of the B.S. fees that usually get tacked on (dealer prep, dock fee, tag, title, etc.) If you can get just that, you've probably scored a solid 5% off MSRP.
And my personal experience has been that if you're custom ordering a truck to be built from one of their allocations, then you'll likely get a better price than if you're negotiating on a truck that's been sitting in their lot for a month or two in which they now have money sunk.
Let us know how your negotiations go my friend. I'd love to hear that you do better than this.
First, and way more important than the truck, thank you for your service. Army Civilian here. Redstone Arsenal.Wow! Thanks for the candid and lucid response! I appreciate it very much.
I'm looking into an F-350 Platinum to haul a fith-wheel RV and for our ranch next year when I retire from military service. Doing a special order to build a 2021 model. I hear Ford Credit is offering 0% for military. The rep I'm working with is in Kuwait and being very helpful.
I'll let you all know how it goes. Thanks again!
All the best,
Abe