I've seen this written about a few times in various comments, so I wanted to start a separate thread and see what the consensus is.
We're in the market for a new (to us) car, and we're looking at mid-range things from the boring but reliable makers like Honda and Toyota. We could pay cash, but I've read a few posts here that say the way to get the lowest possible price for a dealer is to say you need to finance, use that to get a lower price on the car itself (which of course gets much higher in the end with interest factored in), and then just come back a week later and pay the whole thing off. Is this really the way I have to go? Are there major savings to be had that way, or is that a lot of haggling for what may only be a couple hundred bucks off? Will I get completely fleeced if I'm straightforward with them and say "I'd like to put a cashier's check in your hand for X amount, can you make that happen"?
Yes, I understand if I go the financing route that I have to be 1,000% sure that the contract allows for early payments and that there are no penalties / fees associated with paying extra / paying off the loan early.
And if your advice is "don't buy from a dealer if you want the best price", that's not going to help in this situation. No private sellers within a hundred miles of me have anything in the range I'm looking at (and time is a factor; our car is barely getting by), and the last time I bought private I ended up with a lemon.
original posted by CatDadMilhouse to r/personalfinance on Thu, 18 Apr 2024 12:17:54 GMT.