05 Tundra Dealer Experience Rant

I don't have this particular experience, but I have had some experience in negotiating with car dealers so if I may be so bold as to offer some advice:

1) Find out how much the alarm costs (actual retail value and manufactured/wholesale cost if you can). Dealers and automakers tend to buy those types of things in huge lots, so they get a price the average consumer or after market reseller would drool at. If you can't talk them into giving it to you free - which with the cost of the vehicle you may be able to - you should at least be able to get a near-wholesale cost. At the very least, you can at least get them to match the cost of the alarm from the honda dealer. If you are dead set against the alarm totally, if you harangue them enough, they will be able to find a truck without it already installed. It sounds to me from your story that it is something the dealer puts in on their lot, so they should be able to produce a vehicle without it installed as well if not immediately, then within their next couple of shipments.

2) Fog lights, your looking at $300 MINIMUM to get them from the dealer. I would expect closer to $400-$500. If you want them, goto Napa or CarQuest (or another such place as they are everywhere) and get them there. I gaurentee that if they don't have them on the shelf they can get them within a week or two. And paying about a quarter the price will be well worth the wait. As for installing them, if the foglights don't come with a "how-to" sheet, you can either get a Chilton's Guide or most aftermarket shops will do installs of that stuff for reasonable prices and maybe even included in the price.

And FYI, I don't think you were being unreasonable. Afterall, they aren't doing you a favor by letting you buy their product, you are doing them a favor by buying it! And since your going to be dropping $25k or a lot more on the damn thing, the least you can get is the truck the way you want it!

-Raksashan

.... Comments? I have thick skin, so if I was being unrealistic, etc., I

As hard as it is to walk away, I think you did the right thing. Though this could have been an honest mistake, it sounds like the typical sleazy BS that many dealers pull to dishonestly take your money. If nothing else, I think you were right to walk out on principle because negotiating with them about this only encourages this kind of tactic. I would also consider complaining to your local BBB and state atty general office about this. One way you can avoid this is to warn them nicely at the point you think you've reached an agreement that you've been burned by dealers who have added things to the final price at the last minute and that you want them to show you in writing what your walkout price will be and that if they add any unauthorized or undisclosed charges, you will literally walk out.

Thanks for the feedback.

I did the Consumer Reports pricing sheet too. It was a little confusing because the manufacturing code for my truck is 7728 and there is asterisks next to the included items, yet when you build and price on the Toyota website the Package A is the default package (and cannot be unselected). I tried to pull the data together from 2 separate formats (Toyota and CR) and I was satisfied with his offer (before the alarm drama). And sadly I liked the guy. He was a little older than me, said he'd been selling cars for 30 years and he's their Internet sales guy (I'm kinda geeky anyway), so it wasn't going to get much better (I thought). Not as easy as buying a Saturn, but that's apples and oranges (and I digress)...

1. I'm going to ask this next car guy for a truck without an alarm - in fact I'll insist on it now.
2. Napa - that's right, they sell OEM replacement stuff. Good idea. I've done (bought and installed) aftermarket driving, fog and off road lights for years with cars and trucks, but I want that clean, factory look on my Tundra.

Thanks again.

Excellent advice - thank you.

In fact in my research on car buying they said to get the number written down just as you say. This guy sort of did this as he was loading up the form on his computer screen, which he swiveled around to show me. However the whole side conversation about the alarm cost was no where on the online form on his computer screen. So he was basically 'dancing' with the truth; the screen being honest and legal vs. conversation (conveniently not documented, notated or auditable) was on the side. Yeah, BS sums it up nicely. (grin)

The next car guy (broker) I'm meeting with next week said to give him the price I got on the last offer and he'll beat that. Of course in my research it says never to do that and just ask for the price he will sell it for. This new guy also mentioned Lojack for cost, and he could get me extended warranties, Teflon coating and interior protectorate too (which is also a red flag to run-like-hell according the research I've done).

I always try to get a good deal, not necessarily the best deal. But there's this whole layer of crap with buying a car (houses too) where I just don't get the warm and fuzzies about. Sales people work hard for their money and they deserve a good wage just like I feel I do for my job, so why the BS... Then again, why ask why.

Thanks again.

Where are you located? Toyota is stuck with two regional wholesale distributors from the old days...Gulf States Toyota in five Gulf states and Southeast Toyota in five Southeastern states. These distributors sometimes add stuff that the dealerships have no say about, and it is not genuine Toyota stuff. They call these "port installed options," but, of course, there is no port involved in shipping a Tundra from Indiana.

You were correct to walk out. You might return to that dealership and look for yourself if they have any trucks without the alarm. Or, ask if they'll now sell you the truck you want with the alarm priced fairly.

Edmunds.com shows the fog lamps priced at $110 retail and $88 invoice cost when installed at the factory. The wiring is already installed, so you'd need to buy a switch, relay, and two lights for much more than that--about $400 + labor.

Ken

comfortable.

Call Costco, get someone in the Home Office who is in charge of the car buying referral service, and tell them what happened. They don't want dealers playing games like that - it reflects badly on them. And adding a "pack" like the alarm and then having to 'remove' it if you don't bite is certainly a "game" in my book.

Either the dealer will get the message & clean up his act and you can give him another chance, or that dealer won't be on the referral list anymore.

On any add-ons like that, including extended warranties, realize that they're at least 50% profit for the dealer, if not more. (If they didn't make a killing on them, they wouldn't try.) Haggle.

And on extended warranties, NEVER buy it if it is not manufacturer backed (in this case, directly from Toyota Corporate

) - Toyota will honorthe contract because they want you back as a customer. Where the aftermarket warranty companies are usually a brazen premeditiated rip-off of the highest order. When they start getting hit with claims they can't deny or duck anymore, that corporate shell goes BK, and the owners start right back up under a new corporation and name the next week. (They had it all ready to go...)

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Thank you for the info.

I"m in San Diego - maybe I should fly out to Indiana and buy it there, and drive it home. (smile)

...I hadn't thought about how the dealers got their inventory and am just amazed about this "port installed options" process.

Foglamp info is good too - thanks...

Thanks for the help. I had thought about contacting Costco. And at least telling them that my expectation is that the guy at the dealer was only going to fill/build the order for what I wanted, and then show me the out the door price. This guy was more of a generic sales person and that is the experience I wanted to avoid by using Costco. Also I was only given one dealer to work with, when usually they offer 3. If fact, when we bought the Honda in the summer, 3 dealers contacted us. Not to get too far off topic, the first dealer was a bust (and a story for another day), and the 2nd dealer was okay (until we got in the finance office and they were trying to sell some interim insurance to cover the difference of the value of the car and what we wrote the check for that included tax and license in case the car was totaled - or so this is how I understood how it was explained).

I had heard the same about extended warrantees too. I bought one on another vehicle before the factory warranty ran out when I thought it was headed for some expensive repairs. That time it worked out in my benefit, however on a Toyota I think it would be a waste of my money. All cars break, but this brand seems better rated than a few others.

"Jonnie Santos" wrote in news:Laved.106406$Lo6.72931@fed1read03:

Not sure about the 05's but at least the 04 AC's have the alarm system built-in to the wiring harness - activating it is a matter of removing a jumper and hooking up the indicator light - slightly simplified but you get the idea.

$700? Hah...I'm in the wrong line of work.

Post back here with a munged but easily-deciphered email addy and I'll post ya a pdf with the info.

Regards,

Me

Really? ...sounds cool and yes I'd like to take a look at it. Swap Yahoo for Hotmail and that's my real addy - the Hotmail account is real too, but I use for signing up for newsletters, etc. Sort of a cyber honey pot I guess...

Thanks for the feedback and info.

That's why you bargain hard for an extended warranty, because they don't have to pay off on claims very often - and only accept the Toyota backed extended warranty. And do your homework on actual costs before trying this...

They say $1,000, you counter-offer with $400. They act shocked that you would try to go that low, you say 'That's about what it costs you (the dealer) for the contract wholesale, now let's agree on a realistic price - where you make some money but I'm not paying for your {Dodgers*} Season Tickets all by myself...' ;-)

{* - Insert appropriate sports team name here - if you're in Boston and see a whole bunch of Red Sox stuff in their office...}

Toyota's are very reliable, but they're also complicated beasties - and getting more complex every year as they stuff in more options and squeeze out more fuel mileage with less emissions.

One transmission pukes, one power steering rack or pump, one anything, and the extended warranty is paid for and then some. In my case, the only thing that went wrong after the factory warranty ended was an alternator, which still made the extended warranty a wash.

Of course, I could have just taken it apart and changed the brushes, but let /them/ deal with the R&R scut-work labor.

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See my earlier post and insert {Chargers} or {Padres} where appropriate. ;-P

No way! Stay right where you are, California deals directly with Toyota Motor Sales USA, and they don't play those games with 'Port Installed Options' - they're just 'Packs' installed at the distributor level that everyone gets stuck paying for.

If I lived in a state where the dealers were stuck buying through Gulf States or Southeast, I'd buy over the Net and travel to the next state over - go to a dealer that didn't have to put up with that BS.

If you want a Net Dealer referral that isn't too far from you, try talking to (or E-mailing) Dianne Whitmire at Carson Toyota.

I bought my '88 Cruiser from her with a Fax machine when she was running Fleet Sales for a little one-horse two-Salesdroid :-) Toyota dealer in Novato (Northern California) and it was a breeze. Now she's got a bigger pond to fish in.

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Obviously my ISP is EARTHLINK. I noticed that some messages didn't have their ISP next to "organization" on the heading. How do I hide my ISP information next to "organization" on the heading of my messages?

Thank you very much > "Jonnie Santos" wrote in

Why not just attach the PDF and post it here? That way you only have to send it to everyone once :-)

Thanks for both of your posts.

What's still a little hard to understand is pricing the options. On the Toyota website when you build and price it defaults to Package A (about $1,600 more) and includes the tow package, limited slip, etc. And in today's paper another dealer is advertising 5 units of the V8-SR-5 Access Cab 4x2 for about $1,200 LESS than the deal I walked away from on Friday through Costco. The only extra that looked familiar in the newspaper add is the Tow Package (with the bigger alt and cooler), of which is standard in Package A.

I have the print-out from Consumers which shows what the dealer pays and the current dealer holdback amount is. However, this is referencing the basic unit #7728 and I'm assuming I need to add on the Package A value to that. Whatever, I'm down to closing in on about a $2,000 window of muddy data. So I'm close.

I'm really not a penny pinching cheapskate - I just like to make a decision with valid data and compare apples to apples, and there in fact is the quagmire, i.e. some of the data is strewn all over the place. It's not that I'm not capable, but geesch, my mission is not to become a vehicle buying expert... Of course I never imagined a 6 page phone bill at my house for a $25 bill - guess it's just the times.

All right, time to go do some yard work before this weather changes and give this headache a rest.

Thanks again.

The Toyota OEM alarm kit goes about $100 on EBay. Check Tundrasolutions.com for installation direction. As for the fog lamps, I also wanted to fill the round holes so I bought them from a online dealer in Mich (toyotaparts.com). The stock lights for my 2004, relay, and signal switch replacement all ran me about $375 (I think) for something the local dealer wanted over $500. I also bought a temp/compass/auto-dimming mirror that Toyota is very proud of ($280) from another dealer for a little over $150. There are a few out there who discount a little. Check out the tundrasolutions.com web site; an amazing source of info that is well worth the $10 a year. Good luck.

I've heard many good things about Dianne at Carson Toyota. You're close enough. Give her a telephone call. I understand that she and her helpers are busy, so be businesslike.

I do not know if this is up to date: (you might have to cut & paste the long URL) http://69.93.188.20/~tundraso/fleet/showroom.php?action=vehicles&data[model_id]=24&PHPSESSID=5cc54856238c22c25cac1436ed147fbb snipped-for-privacy@carsontoyota.com snipped-for-privacy@earthlink.net

Ken

I'm saving your post, thanks. I've seen tundrasolutions, will have to go back and spend some more time...

I sent her an email yesterday and got a call from Linda this morning with a significant improvement on the deal. If my broker here can't match, I'm driving up to Carson. Life is good.

Thanks. ----- Original Message -----

http://69.93.188.20/~tundraso/fleet/showroom.php?action=vehicles&data[model_id]=24&PHPSESSID=5cc54856238c22c25cac1436ed147fbb> snipped-for-privacy@carsontoyota.com snipped-for-privacy@earthlink.net