Begining my first lease process using the remote negotiations strategy. Always just did it in person at dealerships before. Wondering how people go about this.
Do you ask for dealerships numbers first or do you take the lead saying I want the car for this price, buyrate MF of .xxxx and 12/36. You could also ask for a % discount on MSRP.
For reference, I am working on 2018 Accord 1.5 Touring in DC. This is a slow selling car and dealers have tons of them in stock with the 2019s coming soon. Despite this, the first dealer I talked to via email pushed back hard on a dealer discount of more than 5%. This isn’t an Accord leasing badly issue, even KBBs fair purchase price is 10% off MSRP.
Search around, accords are leasing terribly now and have been for a few months. Good leases are low MF and higher residual value, if you’re looking for a sedan similar to an accord try Infiniti.
You are fortunate that you live so close to so many dealerships. As others will tell you, Honda’s don’t typically lease well for a couple of reasons. But you’re asking about how to get the sell price down, regardless.
I helped a relative with a Honda CR-V purchase in the DC area a month ago. Here is a list of the 15 dealerships he contacted. I like to start out with going to each dealerships website, finding a suitable vehicle, and click the “ePrice” or “Get your price” button and filling out contact info (never give your phone number, unless it’s a Google Voice Number you’re using temporarily for car lease/purchase purposes). The spread on a 2018 Honda CR-V was over $2,000. Also, find a comparable vehicle on cargurus.com and use the price analysis.
That’s the default answer around here but I wasn’t impressed with the Q50. Old tech and much smaller back seat. I need a bigger car for child’s car seat that doesn’t make front seat passenger uncomfortable. Q50 has five inches less rear legroom than Accord. That is a deal breaker for me.
Also MPG difference is significant. I mostly drive in city. 23mpg on premium vs 30mpg on regular. Doing the math, that is easily 40 bucks a month difference.
Regardless, I’m not hung up on Accord. This is a general question. Same would apply for a Q50
Accord 1.5T Touring is an excellent choice with current discounts. I have the 2.0T and average low 30’s mpg. The 1.5T’s that I test drove indicated mid 40’s during highway cruising. Pretty impressive given the size of the vehicle. It is bigger inside than my 2011 TL that sucked down premium at the rate of ~22mpg.
Accords don’t lease well generally but I thought I’d throw some feelers out on 1.5 Tourings based on some reported sale prices listed on the Drive Accord forum. These cars just aren’t moving. Huge inventories remain late in model year so some dealers are clearly trying to move them out. If you can get 22% off MSRP it’s a 1% deal and there is a 1k October incentive plus dealer flex cash to help get there. On the right day, the Accord forum makes it seem like 22% off MSRP is possible. And I’m in no rush so if it doesn’t work no skin off my back.
I think if you make contact with as many dealers as possible, you’ll get one to budge. If not now then by the end of the month. Let us know
FYI I paid $27,500 for my 2.0T Sport and the initial offer from that dealer was at MSRP. The dealer had a sales manager who was willing to make deal and use their flex cash to do so. I have rewarded them by exclusively servicing my car there as I said I would.
Difference between CRV and Accord is that a lot of people actually want to buy CRVs. I can see why Accord sales are down 10%-20% YoY over beginning of 2018. If I needed a car ASAP I would have already moved on. Don’t really get how dealers think they can hold gross on this huge slow selling bunch of cars at the end of model year. Not sure what end game is. I will lose patience and move on at some point.
Like the Accord the best but certainly am not going to pay 400 bucks a month for it. Will look at other three with a mild preference for the Camry before any test drives.
I have no real time constraint, just need something bigger than my Civic in next 3-6 months. Hacking the Accord was always going to be a huge challenge. Who knows where I will end up. At a minimum it will be a good introduction to internet negotiations.
Definitely the hardest hack but Passat and Sonata are objectively inferior mainly due to their age. Camry is a decent alternative although it’s tech is lacking especially in top trims. I’ll keep at it until I get real busy at work. When that happens I will give up.
They do seem to be a good dealership, they only have 9 of the 1.5 Tourings left. Didn’t make the mistake of getting something stuck with 20-35 of them with the 2019s ready to start rolling off the assembly line.
