I thought all new cars were this nice!

agreed, tough to go back to a straight gasser.

try the hycam. smooth as silk, quiet, comfortable, and 50mpg

 

The Camry V6 is Infinitely smoother than the Camry 4. The 4 cyl Camry always felt like it’s straining the V6 doesn’t.

 

If that was during the purchase negotiations.......you misunderstand who is in control of a sale.
YOU are......or should be.
Getting UP out of the chair and actually walking toward the front door is very effective at getting "crammed" items removed from the purchase invoice.
"They would not allow me" should not be in your vocabulary.

 

You have to ask yourself have you ever really stained your interior where you couldn't clean it yourself and have you ever ripped it? They love selling these because 99% of people will never need to use it and just paid for nothing.

 

It will not be money completely wasted IF........you learned anything from this experience.

When I bought my Ford, there was an item on the invoice for "additional routine maintenance" for which I was to pay $600.
It turns out that is just pre-paid maintenance visits; four of them. Four oil changes and tire rotations.......for $600.
They also said: "We can't take that off."......until I was half way to the front door and they magically found a way.
The lady doing all of the accounting paperwork didn't seem too happy with me after that.
Too bad.

 

Live and learn.

However, a not so great review on their google/yelp/other page might be in order. I bet their other potential customers would like to know about their skeezy add-ons. I certainly would.

 

All car dealers make you run the gauntlet on all manner of items that maximize their profit. I accompanied my daughter on her last new car purchase. There were various items like trade-in value, option packages, extended warranty, coatings etc. as you described. These negotiations didn't make our salesman too happy but once we arrived at a price, he transferred us over to their finance person.

We questioned some of the charges added to the contract and she explained them and reluctantly removed one of them but she was determined to have my daughter finance through the dealer.

I asked about their interest rate and then explained that she was pre-approved through our credit union at a lower interest rate than they offered. She offered us a lower interest rate but it was still not as low as our credit union. She kept going on about how much easier the transaction would be if we let them finance it and how much longer the paperwork would take especially if we went through a credit union. I don't know why a credit union would be harder to deal with than a bank. When I mentioned that she didn't have to buy the car that day she finally relented. My daughter drove the car off the lot that day so the delays in paperwork were not going to stop the sale but make them do a little extra work and delay their getting paid by a few days.

 

Well, yeah, she was indeed sincerely unhappy. She gets paid only on commission. No unneeded overpriced extras, no commission, no pay. Ditto for the excessive interest rate on the financing.

The point Sam made above is important. The dealers NEED to sell cars. We WANT to buy cars. Needs trump wants. The most powerful tool a buyer has is that exit door.

 

I agree with another poster that your impression of the Camry's performance would have been very different if it was the hybrid Camry. I had a 2012 hybrid for many years and it drove much better than my 17 Prime. The Camry was smooth as silk. It's not even close. I've toyed with switching back to the Camry Hybrid after I'm done with the Prime, but I'll probably switch to a Tesla Model 3.

 

I was in the same situation, but I did all the paperwork and got preapproved through my credit union before going to the dealership. I was willing to entertain an offer from the dealership, but when I told the finance manager the credit rate I was getting through the credit union, he basically said no way he'd be able to match it.

YMMV, but the credit union paperwork wasn't onerous and was actually less than all the ones I had to review and sign just to buy the car from the dealership without financing. I would always recommend getting financing setup beforehand through your bank, credit union, or one of those online auto lenders. At the very least, you get a rough idea of what rate you can get.

 

I've done the same thing a couple of times. If you go in with a lower interest rate, the finance person won't give you too much grief. One time, the finance person managed to beat the credit union rate though. A win-win for both of us.

 

Maybe.
Most of the time when the dealership comes up with a really low interest rate, that is tied to ZERO dollars in discounts off the list price.
That means that you are paying the "interest" up front with the higher sale price.

 

I had a dealer tried to load one of those "protection" packages to a sale. I was willing to consider it, so I asked to see the terms of the contract that covered it. If you can get them to cough up the separate contract that covers terms and exclusions it turns out that in practice you can't collect on it unless they feel like it.

Things the seller is proud of, they print up posters and four-color pamphlets to explain them to you loudly and repeatedly. If they can't come up with the conditions in writing , you need to ask yourself "what are they hiding?"

 

This is why I despise dealerships. I bought my prime off the internet, agreed on the price, and when I went in I refused anything else. Period. Non negotiable. I had to threaten to walk out twice.

Here's the thing, though. I shouldn't have had to do that. The Dealership should have been making sure that I was 100% happy. When I got my Leaf (before the Prime) that was what they did. There was ZERO bullshit. Had the same dealership had the Prime I would have bought it from them no questions asked. Would have even paid more.