Please bear in mind that I understand these questions and statements are very often an appeal for help in your transaction, or just a defense mechanism to keep the wolves at bay. Unfortunately, most often they come across quite the opposite to a salesperson that has heard each one of them about a gazillion times. Now lets take a look at them one at a time so you can understand why they are dumb things to say to a car salesman. These, by the way, are just the tip of the iceberg. If I wanted to I could have come up with a lot more. Also, there is absolutely no significance to the order they are listed so don’t try to analyze them too much.

"WHO WANTS TO SELL A CAR?"

This or one of the many variations of this question such as: "doesn’t anybody around here want to sell a car?", "who’s up?", etc.

In 20 years in the car business not only have I never sold a person a car that said that, I don’t even know anyone that has! The person that asks this question almost always seems to have a chip on their shoulder about the size of Rhode Island. On first glance it is an invisible chip masked by a big friendly smile. You usually can’t see it until you have spent considerable time helping them find the right car, taking them for a demo ride, and going thought the write-up. That is when you find out that no matter what you do they only want to pay half-price, get at least twice what the old trade-in is worth, have to have someone else help them make a decision, wait another two months for their money to come in by pack mule from the Yukon, or still have to compare it to the nine other models they are considering! If you are ever on the showroom floor when someone comes in and asks this question (it’s always in a loud voice so everyone within a mile can hear), stop what you are doing and look around and you’ll notice everyone trying to scatter. It will really crack you up! This is the one phase that gives any salesperson with more than 15 minutes experience the heebie-jeebies. No one on sales force wants to help this person because they NEVER buy a car!

This or one of several other cute remarks regarding the popularity level of car salesmen and suicide bombers (just to name a couple) are always an interesting form of advance in your quest for a great car deal. If you think this statement makes any salesperson except the least experienced "green pea" the least bit nervous, intimidated or heartbroken you are sadly mistaken and quite out of your element. You should go home NOW. It will not make them be any nicer to you, give you a better deal, or let you leave any faster. Quite the opposite, they will use the combined selling and closing experience, good or bad, of the entire management staff do whatever it takes to sell you a car...RIGHT NOW! They will work you for every dime they can in every area they can because if you leave you’re never coming back anyway so why not see if there is a deal now? They would really like to have some fun and sell you something you had no intention of buying when you walked in. People do not last more than a month or two in the car business if they are not thick skinned. If you think about it for a moment, making a statement like this is only a defense mechanism to hide the fact that you are out of your element and it makes YOU nervous. Any halfway decent salesperson has already made deals with lots of people that said the exact same thing long before you ever went into his or her dealership, not to mention the infamous "closer" who knows exactly how to turn that little phrase around on you and get you to pay MORE MONEY for the car so...DON’T SAY IT!

This one is a real beauty! You see, a salesperson always seems to hear this one while he or she is trying to find out what really IS important to the transaction. All the salesperson is trying to do is make sure they have all the information necessary so they are not wasting the shopper’s time or their own, and when they ask an important question the shopper looks over with a condescending look on their face and says, "That’s not important!"

Well, guess what? I don’t know, it must be old Mr. Murphy’s law or something, but it always seems that when it finally gets down to it, after an hour or two of "lot drill," a couple of demo-rides, and half way through the worksheet that little point that was "not important" is the "deal breaker," and if the salesperson had known up front they could have let the shopper know immediately and no one would have hard feelings. I know, I know... you just naturally don’t want to give a car salesman too much information because it might come back to haunt you in a couple of hours, but some of the questions you are asked (like, "what price range do you have in mind?", "what kind of payment do you feel comfortable with?", along with, "what kind of down payment do you want?") are very legitimate questions that any salesperson should know the answer to in order to help find the right car for you and not get you drooling over a loaded luxury sedan that's going to be $300 a month more than you can afford.

I love this one because, of course, it is one hundred percent correct...and then again, no it isn’t. The problem with this little remark is that its usually the last gasp of the truly hopeless. It seems the only time a salesperson hears this phrase is when someone comes into the dealership, makes a ridiculous offer with all sorts of stipulations and conditions no one in their right mind could possibly agree to and after hearing the salesperson say "I’m sorry, I can’t do that" for the umpteenth time become totally frustrated and R-E-A-L-L-Y angry. The "negotiating tricks" they read in the "how-to" book are not working! About then they usually get a pretty red in the face and give you a REALLY strange look with crazy eyes and scream "WHAT EVER HAPPENED TO THE SAYING THE CUSTOMER IS ALWAYS RIGHT?" Now, come on, think back to the last time you heard someone say this regardless of where it was...uh-huh, I’m right, huh? The biggest problem with this excellent business statement is the people that love to throw it in your face usually aren’t even close to right (I know I wasn’t when I said it!!). Besides, when does a shopper become a customer? Its when they purchase something isn’t it? Most reputable dealerships are quite willing to bend over backwards to make sure their customers are happy with the car and service they receive from the store AFTER they buy a car, but a lot of salespeople will do anything possible to avoid selling this person a car because once the deal is done the nightmare will begin for them.

If I were listing all of these "dumbisms" in order this one would have to be very near the top, if not at the top! Making a statement like this to a salesperson is about a smart as taking a knife to a gunfight because what you have just done is given the salesperson PERMISSION to tell you whatever price he or she thinks you won’t be able to beat and you will have to come back. When you do you will find it can’t be bought here for that price either, but by this time, hopefully, you have had enough of the "shopping around" game and liked the salesperson and the way they treated the first time you were in and are now ready to buy a car. Yeah, I know what you are thinking, "I’d just turn around and leave," but let me tell you, I’ve seen quite a few salespeople over the years that were real good at selling these people cars...AFTER they lied to them! This little tactic is called "putting them on a lowball" and can be done quite easily in several ways. The salesperson can use the price of the car, down payment, monthly payment, trade-in, factory rebate, annual percentage rate or a few others using one or in combinations. Needless to say I don’t recommend trying to use this one on any salesperson because you might get just what you asked for, the "best" price possible. The one no one else can match, not even them!

This is one of those remarks salespeople constantly hear from fairly intelligent people that somehow still believe that no one ever lies about the deal they got on THEIR car, and then no matter what you do to prove it, don’t believe it and think you are the one lying. Over the years this one has been used on me so many times I can’t begin to count them all. It never ceases to amaze me, being the Fleet Manager (and no one in the dealership sells cars for less than me), that I still run into this one at least twice a month with customers that have done their homework and have volumes of notes on invoice pricing from some of the top sources in the bookstores and on the internet. Even some that were referred to me by someone understating the price THEY paid to ME! In fact, it started happening with such regularity that I tell all my customers when they take delivery of their car that anyone they refer to me will be treated properly and get a great deal. I will not embarrass them. I explain to them the best compliment they can give me is to send a friend or relative to buy a car from me. BUT... if they lie about the price I WILL bring out all the paperwork so THEIR friend can see I’m not the one lying. So if your friend gets you all hot to buy the same car they have why not just tell them you know they are much better at that negotiating thing than you are and ask to see their copy of the contract. If they won’t show it to you...THERE IS A REASON!

There are literally hundreds of places to get information about the purchase of an automobile. How-to-buy-a-car books, price guides from about a million magazines and books, the internet, your bank or credit union, and on and on. To put it simply not one of them is THE BIBLE on how to buy a car or price one out, not even this small effort you are reading now. If you check ten of them you will get at least four contradictory pricing guidelines or purchasing plans from the "experts." From the pricing standpoint always check the publish date. When new car pricing is announced by the manufacturers it is published by the price guide companies, however, almost every manufacturer selling cars in the United States raises its prices between two and five times per year. That’s their little way of not scaring you half to death with the new model prices in September. As far as the "how-to" book people I often wonder if they have ever really talked to a prospective automobile buyer with some of the garbage they tell you. The bottom line is they made their money when you purchased their book so they don’t really are if YOU get thrown out of a dealership or two. Its okay to purchase the books and do the research just use your good judgment on how you use the information.

This one causes almost as many headaches and heartaches for shoppers as the old, "I only paid...for mine." I think the primary reason is when you go into your bank or credit union they try to be helpful and show you what the low and high "Bluebook" value of your old car is. This is what usually causes all the problems with trade-ins. As soon as they compute the book value (usually wrong) that becomes the "appraised value" of the old car. I have people coming in all the time and when I ask about the trade-in they say, (for example) "The high book is $16,500 and the low book is $12,700." In response to a statement like that I’ve gotta ask what they were hoping to get for it and without a blink they will shoot back, $15000." It never fails. Now THAT will cause a problem with your transaction! You see dealers buy cars on trade-in based on the wholesale market in their area. That means they can afford to pay for your old car what they would have to pay for it through one of their local wholesale (dealer only) auto auctions. The way cars are bought and sold through a wholesale auction is "in relation to the guide." This means either + or - a certain dollar amount for market conditions LESS reconditioning, which no one ever seems to think about. Some of the things that effect that plus or minus of local market conditions are: 1) Make; 2) Year; 3) Model; 4) Equipment; 5) Color (yes, color); 6) Miles; 7) Condition; and 8) Availability (very important). The more popular a car on the new car market the more available on the used car market a few years later so a dealer can buy them for a lower price because there are so many available. I know I know, "But the bluebook says"... and that's the problem, the bluebook is a GUIDE. On the cover it has two things that are disclaimers if you think about it. They are "market report," and "official guide." Okay, so whose "market report" and "official guide" of what? Theirs, who do you think? If this is not enough there are three pages of declaimers and instructions inside that no one ever reads (honest, a few months ago I had to show it to an appraiser with many years experience that didn’t know how to calculate a cd changer). If that's not enough, on all even numbered pages at the bottom it says "deduct for reconditioning." While I’m at this trade-in value thing just let me mention the phone mistake. Don’t ever ask a salesperson to give you the value of the old car by phone sight unseen because you are just asking for trouble (see "GIVE ME YOUR BEST PRICE..."). The reality is no one can give you a REAL trade-in value without having it appraised and you can’t do that by phone. When the appraisal comes in all you have to do if you don’t really like it, and no one ever does (even me), is ask how they arrived at that value and what the book is on the car. Any reputable dealer will be willing to go through it and show you. I do it all the time. I can also almost guarantee the trade-in value won’t be as much as you were told by someone not in the car business. In a nutshell, the only way to know what your trade-in is worth is to have it appraised by the dealer you are buying from and if you are not happy with the amount they will pay...DON’T TRADE IT IN! So, don’t say, "I was told..."

I hate to burst your bubble, but it is ALWAYS all cash to the dealer whether you finance, lease, get your own financing, write a check or "lay a mausoleum of dead presidents" (green money) on the table...and this just telegraphs to them that someone is financing this for you! Maybe they can "PUT" you on payments and make even more! Or maybe they have a better finance rate...I see that all the time! Some of the sources out there these days are not all that great when you really look at them. You see, when you finance, the bank sends a check to the dealership for the amount financed. In fact, if you finance its even more cash to the dealership because the banks pay them "reserve" to arrange the financing, sometimes thousands of dollars if the write the contract at an increased rate.

"MY ODOMETER STOPPED WORKING ON THE WAY DOWN HERE!"

It must be a car business thing, I guess, but it sure is amazing how many odometers work perfectly for seven or eight years then suddenly stop working on the way to the dealership to trade it in. Who says automobiles have no feelings? Maybe the old trade-in is so nervous about having to go to a new home it just makes the odometer stop working right then! It has happened on to me on deals at least 5-10 times over the years. Seriously though, there are only three ways the odometer mileage can be reported: 1) actual mileage; 2) mileage in excess of mechanical limits; 3) Not the actual mileage. There are no ifs, ands or buts about it and it doesn’t matter when it stopped working just that the odometer is not working NOW, so please don’t say it. This is one statement that is used way too much.