Need help with buying 2016 Prius

You should get a much better price than this. First of all Toyota WAS offering a $2000 rebate until Sept 1. I'm sure that you should at least get that. It might be more than that now. Additionally, you can get a steep discount if you are a Costco member. Get a Costco card. I got over $4600 off my trim level Four with ATP and PCP.

Toyota has already announced pricing and available options on the 2017 models. I have heard they are taking orders for them. So... it seems the 2017's are pretty much here. All they have to do is to clear some inventory before they roll them out. This is the best time to get a 2016 model if you want the best price.

 

Consult kelly blue book or Edmund's to see what others are paying.

If you can buy off the lot then call other dealers before you buy. The call goes something like this. Hey my wife is buying a car today and I want a sanity check. Do you have any model x? What's your best price? Yes, we're getting ready right now. No I won't tell you what the other dealer is asking. Sure I'll hold a minute she's still getting ready.

You're a live fish and the dealer is going to have to work to real you in.

 

I cannot respond to your questions .... but the price you cited seems WAY out of line. Read other threads .... in fact there is one on how much was paid. They are considerably lower than your quote.

 

I like TrueCar.com to get an idea of what others are paying. Punching in what you gave me and a Bellevue WA zip I got an average paid of $30k for that car but 4 "lows" of $28,800 - $28,900. I would be aiming to end up at $26k with 0% for 72 mo.

Some here will probably say it's not possible and to be fair I don't know your market. But it appears to me that the Prius is not selling. Some people hate the design and I'm sure that plays into it. But IMO the bigger factor is low gas prices that are expected to stay low coupled with everyone offering decent economical traditional ICE powered or hybrid powered cars. You no longer have to buy the Prius which comes with so much baggage in order to get good milage. Cars like the Honda Civic are better driving cars, some would say that they look better, they're a better price and at current gas prices you will never make up the premium you pay for a Prius at sticker price. The good news is you've already knocked out one of the bigger tricks to getting a deal on a car, buying the car that no one wants. Just be sure you don't fall in love with it.

Now you got to pick your dealer. In my experience you tend to get the best deals at high volume dealerships. That means if you have an AutoNation in your area you should be contacting them. Find two or three others and look online at the cars they have available. What you're looking for is that all of the dealers have the same vehicle in inventory. I prefer to drive to each lot, find a sales guy and look the car over, get the feel for the dealership. Let them know I'm cross shopping these dealers (I name names) and looking for the best price. Get that then head to the next. A buddy of mine swears the best thing that works for him is to email each one of the dealerships at the same time, all on the same email so they can all clearly see "internetsales@autonation" and "internetsales@groovetoyota" in the email header. Then it's just a very generic "hey I want to buy this car (make, model, color, trim, options) on Tuesday (always a Tuesday, but never in the rain). Please reply back with your best available price on this car and I will be in to work with you then." He swears this works and points out how often people use the reply all button rather than reply on an email. Before you know if it you have your own little personal price war.

While they're doing that, you go to Carmax and you get an offer for your car. Keep this in your pocket because you're going to need it later.

However you do it, you now have your dealer with the "lowest possible price." Compare that to TrueCar, in this case if it's $26k that's a pretty good price and you're not going to get much farther on it. But go in, drive it, treat it like it's your first time looking at one. When you're back inside the salesman is going to draw his four squares. KNOW THIS GAME, Google it if you don't know it already. They're going to try to distract you with a crazy low offer on your trade, and some crazy high down payment, to get a monthly payment which is what they want to focus on. They'll try to avoid talking about the 4th square, the price of the car. They will even fold the paper to hide it from you. When he starts this game you know what the value of your car is, you already got that from carmax, so don't worry about it, don't talk down payment, only talk car price. Assuming their "best" price they already gave you is $28k (truecar lowest) I'd start with something like a $25.5k offer. They'll keep asking you about payment, but don't answer that, if they push say the payment will be whatever 0% for 72 months of the sale price will be. It's a negotiation, you'll hopefully end up under $28k. Things to keep in mind are that the salesman is not going to get paid hardly anything for selling a loaded Prius under $28k. Instead he's going to be counting on a volume bonus. So if he mentions selling another car earlier that day, ask him how many. If you're his fourth sell of the day he's in the money and is easier to work with. Depending on the dealer he might also get paid by you giving him very high scores on a customer satisfaction survey so mention that you will fill out his survey if they send you one. But if he hasn't sold anything he is going to fight you for every cent. For this reason I usually aim for a mid-day arrival time.

If they keep pestering you with low ball offers on your trade, just tell them "I have a Carmax quote to buy it for blah." Carmax is normally pretty good on prices compared to trade ins so mentioning them usually stops that entire issue dead in its tracks.

Be prepared to spend time, and a lot of it. Not counting previous test drives, I spent 9 continuous hours in the dealership buying my Prius. I don't know how many times we circled the same questions and I must've told him 4 times or more how I don't care about saving the planet I'm there to save money so he has to beat the price on the Honda civic next door. But I'm also the donkey who took the Prius on the test drive through the Honda lot to "look at it next to a civic."

IMO the important thing walking into a car dealership is don't fall in love, don't get tired or worn down or feeling bad for taking up someone's time. Only talk price of the car. Do your research. Carmax gives you the value of your trade, you know the interest rate is 0%, get an insurance quote from your agent and be sure to GET A QUOTE ON GAP INSURANCE. Never buy anything in Finance except maybe Gap coverage, but be sure you're comparing their total price (should be $500 or less, $6.95/mo for 72 mo at 0%) to your insurance quote. If getting it through your insurance company you'll probably want gap coverage for about 3 years. and lastly.... never be afraid to be a bit of an donkey. If your salesman pisses you off, ask for a new one, easily done by just asking to talk directly to the sales manager. "bob and I aren't clicking but I really want to do business with Glenn's A1 Cars. Is there another salesman who is free right now?" Or if they really piss you off, or it's just at a dead end and not going to work out, there's nothing wrong with leaving. I don't use it as a negotiating tactic but sometimes you just hit a roadblock and there's no point in continuing. If the numbers don't work, fine, say so, shake hands then leave. The only thing about leaving is one time they played "hide the trade-in's key." I now take both my keys with me, one in a separate pocket and I keep track of where my trade in is at so I can't be held there. "okay when you find it just call me and I'll come pick it up..."

As for the 0%.... it'll be back, if it ever goes away. I saw someplace that the 2017 is going to have the TSS package as standard across the board, not sure how much that will raise prices. But that's the only thing I have heard that will change. With gas prices staying low and the Prius image problem not going away anytime soon, standard TSS is not enough to boost sales of this car. Let's be honest, most people who like a Prius already own one. Those who don't own a Prius most likely do not want the image a Prius brings with it. Judging by this board most of those who already own the previous generations can't accept that their car is the ugly one so they are in no rush to buy a 2016/2017 and the car is too well built to force their hand. I see nothing on the horizon that would lead me to believe sales will increase for the Prius anytime soon. Unless you're desperate for a car right now, don't be afraid to keep waiting it out if you don't get the deal you want. My dealer still had 2015's on the lot when I bought my 2016 in May.

EDIT: Just for grins, have you considered a Volt? I imagine Chevy is desperate to move those. For every Volt they sell they get some .gov credits they can use to offset the penalties they pay for things like their big high profit SUVs. Might have some good prices on top of heavy state and federal tax credits.

 

Bobusa, copy & paste Mr. Mischief's reply into a Word document to keep for all time and review when appropriate. Very few cars in the USA command MSRP. A Prius isn't one of them.

 

There are very few vehicles in the US that command sticker price or more. The only high selling vehicle I can think off of the top of my head that you are going to pay sticker for is a Jeep Wrangler 4 door, the two door you might be able to work a deal on but not the 4 door. Everything else that comes to mind are things like the Ford GT or VW Golf R or Hellcat twins or a 911 or a Tesla.....

 

If you have (had?) a code from a Tesla owner it's worth $1000 off a Model S or Model X. If the second promotional period expired there will be a third...someday, and probably soon.

FCA was supposed to manufacture 4000 Hellcats in 2015 and 8000 Hellcats for 2016. The Golf R is probably between those figures.