The Expert Podcast

Okay, we all know by now that getting a deal on a new car is darn near impossible. Car dealerships don't have too much inventory on their lots, and the ones they do have are many times marked up over sticker. How can you get around this? How can you get a car and find out which models might be discounted? Here's a trick that you can probably use for almost any brand of car that you're looking for. We're going to use as an example a Chrysler Pacifica, which is a minivan, and we're going to use the Chrysler Search tool to help us point towards vehicles that might be able to get a deal.

We selected a model, which is a Chrysler Pacifica all-wheel drive (AWD), and we put in a zip code—this one happens to be north of Dallas. We put in a range of 250 miles. Anytime you're going to the factory website to search for inventory, select the largest range of miles that they will allow you to select. In this case, 250 miles is the most you can go. At first, select “on dealer lot.” You can see this section here; it'll have a little box for what's in inventory right now. You notice there are also options for “in transit” and “being built.” Let's leave those off for now.

If you notice, there is only one exact match. That's because in this search, a color was put in, and there's only one of that color in that model. But there are 57 near matches, and these might be a little different. For example, for this one, we put in the limited model, and it shows you a Pinnacle model and a Touring model. So, it's going to show you all the ones in stock. If you notice, most of them are Pinnacle and Touring. The Pinnacle model is the high-line version, and the Touring model is the low-line version. Look at the price difference—58,000 to 42,000.

First, get a lay of the land to see what's out there for cars right now. If there's a lot of a certain model, like in this case, the Pinnacle (the higher-line model), then maybe that's one that dealers will discount. You'll find if you click on the particular cars, you'll see some dealers may have some of these at a discount. But now, select “in transit” and get rid of “on dealer's lot.” Now, you're starting to see some limited models. Here's a limited, and you also see what else is incoming. It looks like there's a lot more Touring and Pinnacle models incoming.

So, what that means is that the dealers see this. They know what's coming into inventory, and they know what's in the pipeline. It looks like there's a lot of Touring and a lot of Pinnacle models, meaning that the limited model is going to be less of an inventory allocation. There's only one. And on the original “on dealer lot,” there was also only one. So that tells you right there that this limited model is probably not going to be discounted. There was a very serious backlog of vehicle manufacturing for the last year and a half or two years because of the pandemic, then chips, and a bunch of other issues. Now that the factories are starting to crank up, you'll see more inventory arriving.

Being ahead of the curve on knowing what the dealers are going to see on their lot will give you an insight into the future. If you don't need a car right this second, you'll know what's coming, and you can tell whether it's worth waiting. In a month or a month and a half, they'll be flooded with these cars. Or in this case, if you're looking for a limited, you'll know in a month or month and a half there won't be any more of those. There's only going to be the other models, and you can play around with this with any of the details you want.

The most important thing is to get an idea of what the dealers kind of see in the future because that could be a negotiating point. Look, the days of taking $5,000 off a new car are long gone. However, there are many dealers that have posted discounts on certain cars on their lot already because they're trying to move them. Let’s take it a step further. Let's take a look at the “being built” selection. You see this box for “being built.” What’s being built? Same thing—Pinnacles and Tourings. They're building the high-end and the low-end models, but not so much the middle model.

By looking at the pipeline, you can get a sense for what might be coming available in the future. Even if you don’t buy one of these particular cars, you now know what the dealers are going to have to deal with. Are they going to have too many of one model and not enough of another? In this case, the middle model is missing, so that’s where there’s going to be demand. If you can accept a lower model because you don’t need all the options, you might be in the driver’s seat. If you're willing to buy a higher model because you can afford it, maybe you can get more of a discount, and the price will be closer to the limited.

That’s a good example of how much we’re talking about as a difference here. The Limited is $56,057, and the Pinnacle is $58,435. What if the dealer with the Pinnacle discounts it by $1,500? Well, now you're at, let’s say, $57,000 compared to $56,000 for a limited. You're within $1,000, and you can get your car right away and get an upgraded model. So, by kind of doing arbitrage on some of these models and what’s incoming, you can get a sense for what the dealer is looking at. You’re not dealing from a position of weakness. You’re not flying blind. You know as much as a dealer does about the pipeline of inventory, and this can help you have valid conversations.

Worst-case scenario, you don’t get a markup over sticker. Best-case scenario, you can find some discounts. I went through many, many of these Pacificas. I'm not going to bore you with it right now, but there are plenty of them. If you click on the ad, let’s take a look at this one. On dealer lot, this one is in Plano, Texas. Let’s just see what they say. Well, it's not coming up directly on their ad, but many of these vehicles are discounted when you click on the actual ad. It will show you a discounted price.

This one shows you some rebates you can get, but either way, you can use this knowledge and intelligence to help navigate the very difficult car-buying landscape that exists right now because of the pandemic, chips, and all the other problems that created this shortage.