How do salesman afford to drive the cars they're selling?

Employee leasing! Big brand names at times give their sales people demos for a fee a month or weekly out of their pay. I work for a big brand dealer. And we have employee leasing instead of demos. So we pay monthly for a vehicle with a large discount. No credit needed. 1 year or 15k miles. and we can switch if we hit 8k miles on our vehicles. This helps big time with our Used Car Dep

Are you saying that people who operate in a 30 day window, have ups and downs?

I’ve often wondered about the guys who work 7 days but still drive a beater.

Are you working hard or hardly workin’?

I played softball w/ a guy who worked for BMW, and he told me that all employees get a company benefit of a low-end, 3xx series as part of their employment. They also have option to buy up and get a better car, by taking on a monthly payment (which my be $150 more for a higher level 3, and more for 4-7 series etc).

It was funny because he said they stopped allowing employees to get a break on the motorcycles since too many were hurting or killing themselves.

This info is dated, probably from 10yrs ago, but that’s how they used to do it then.

Don’t feel bad, I’m on my 4th in 18 months. It is an addiction. I think my current solution of leasing 2 vehicles where I am still liable if I transfer (and that wont net me any money if I sell them out) will slow down progress. Although, once my 2005 Expedition finally grenades, it might be time to search for an econobox…

Agreed. When I did a deal with a relatively new BMW salesperson, they mentioned they got the new 5 series because of an employee discount. Another person I know who’s father works at a BMW dealership as a mechanic also gets a sizable discount on leases so the whole family has one.

Same as spending 1-2 hours on LH lol

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Why wait? This is a great time to sell a full size SUV

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I feel like I’m bucking the trend by always buying compact cars! Despite being 6’5”… haha

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You are just buying your cars wrong. You should never depend on any salesman to be on your side. If you aren’t comparing prices with other dealers you are likely leaving money on the table.

Its not even that. They waste so much time just giving you a quote. Some screw up the trim and they have zero motivation to meet a quota. Their function became purely clerical.

I believe that sales man was lying unless that happened a long time ago. Cheapest M3 lease I’ve ever seen was $569/mo with like $1k or $1500 due at signing + MSD’s.

(I used to work at BMW)

Fun Fact: BMW Corporate has a program called CEL (Center Employee Lease). Basically, all the dealerships employees get huge discounts off of cars and BMW foots the bill, not the dealership. You have to work at a dealership for 90 days to qualify, although I have seen dealerships bend this rule. You can be part time or full time. What CEL does is the dealership sells the car for invoice and you get a certain amount of money on top depending on model and trim. That means you get the car for under invoice. Now, this usually doesn’t much on normal models because it’s only a few grand and you can usually get $2k below invoice as an outsider anyway on a 3 series.

My last month there, June of 2016, the programs were interesting. The reason more BMW salesmen have M3’s versus a normal 3 series is because by the time you load up a 3 series, it’s gonna be $50k. But, no matter the sticker, on a 340i xdrive, BMW would only give you like $2X00. (Don’t remember the exact amount, maybe $2300 or 2700 or something like that. However, on an M3, it was $6300. That’s $6,300 below invoice. That’s how those mid $500-700/mo deals exist on M3’s with basically nothing down other than MSD’s. For a $63k+ car. Anyways, so a M3 ended up being about $40/mo more than a 340. That’s why most would get an M3.

On the 750, it was $11,000 below invoice at the time. i8’s were $15,500 below invoice.

Now, before you jump and say shit, I want a job at Lexus to get the new LC, BMW is the only brand I know of that offers such good employee lease deals. Most other brands don’t offer employees anything at all. (Mazda, Toyota, Honda, Kia, Hyundai, Ford, CJDR, etc.). The only brand that I know does offer GOOD/Special employee deals is Jaguar Land Rover. For Infiniti, I believe the deal is the same as someone who has VPP, or slightly higher, but the fact that the discount isn’t as good as someone with VPP who can shop around cancels it out.

Mercedes might have good lease deals as well, not sure about them. VAG does not though, not even Audi. Volvo might have something as well.

Most other brands really do just pay what consumers pay. For Ford, they have D Plan for example, but it’s basically worth it as you can get a better price as a customer except for like on a GT350 or Raptor or something that just came out.

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Turned in after CEL in May. $575 a month, tax included. First payment only due at signing (no MSDs). If memory serves it was $5750 below invoice. I sold the most M cars is the nation for 6 years, so for me it was a ///Must-have.


First f80 Daytona Violet M3 produced.

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Are these leases usually available to us non employees if the employee lease transfers it to us?

Yes. However, most employees will ask for a Down Payment on transfers to make some money off of it, so the savings aren’t as great.

You should because if I told you the payment on any single one of the five cars that I have and I’m only 25 years old and he would probably never buy a car comfortably again because you think you’re getting ripped off

The lease assumption with a CEL may or may not be possible due to BMW FS changing from time to time whether or not a CEL can be assumed. It’s best to check with BMW FS with the account # or last 7 of the VIN.

Hyundai has a Z-plan for employees, got 7,300 off my 19 Santa Fe. Not sure about KIA. Now that is from the manufacturer. My actual company policy is 100 dollars over invoice on new car if I went got another vehicle from another brand within company.

A better deal at many dealerships is to get that very clean trade-in at $200 over what the dealership paid for it.

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If dealers are offering 100 dollars over invoice then I’m guessing the folks that come in and get a car below invoice are few and far inbetween… at least, I only ever buy at or below invoice. Hate to think I always get a better deal than the employees.

Same store policy for us. $100 over invoice for employees and yet I can sell it to customer for $2k under.

Employee pricing on TRD PRO is $5k over msrp