I know we don’t care how the dealer makes their money but it makes it hard I think for folks to compare discounts if mf varies.
Is it possible to output the discount off msrp if mf wasn’t increased? Good idea? Bad idea?
I don’t think it’s a bad idea, but does require the user to input proper pre-incentive discount, buy rate mf, and the marked up mf.
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Rule of thumb on 36mo leases.
1pt or 40bps markup is approximately equal to 2%
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I guess here is how I would implement it. In the same way that we show discount or markup for msrp, why not have the same for mf. That way the user provides the base mf (or the calculator provides it) and then another field asks if there’s a markup or what the dealer charged just like we do for msrp.
Then in the output a calculation could back into showing what discount would have been at base mf.
This would require the user to get accurate MF data from Edmunds (which more often than not does not happen) and get the accurate MF from the dealer for their deal (which is much more difficult to do than it sounds).
That is the whole point of the calculator to understand these numbers isn’t it? If you cannot get that then how can it work?
And if we don’t know the discounts people are getting because it’s at different mf then it’s harder to compare. Every time someone new comes on here we tell them to go to edmunds - for a while we had that awesome feature in the calc to search for it too. Anyway that’s just my thoughts.
Well, I would personally argue that the calculator is best used for establishing your target deals based on the current programs and that there is no use of it for trying to dissect a dealer quote because if you’re asking the dealer how much they want you to pay, you’ve already lost.
But yes, when deals are shared, I agree it’s important to either normalize the selling price for buy rate and/or record the mf vs buy rate.
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The difference is that there is no set “lowest price” for a vehicle, but there is a base MF. A target deal should always account for discounts based on other’s deals and base MF. Dealers can adjust accordingly, which is why markups exist. It could be a good idea for a comparison, but could end more being more confusing to the novice leasee.
To compare the effects of a markup on payment, people can note the numbers they get at base MF and then see the change with a markup.
That’s not to say I disagree with what you’re suggesting, just trying to look at some of the complexities of making it happen.
That last line is the hard part, and I noticed it because I myself had a markup on my mf and then another guy had a markup on his bmw. All the while people in a 530e thread were discussing msrp discounts at different mf markups. Right now data is difficult to find because comps are infrequent so when they do appear it would just be nice to see it somewhat standardized. I know it’s easier said than done but I still offer this as a suggestion. If the calculator collected zip code also you could then start getting msrp discounts by zip per model which would be quite nice.
I guess I’ve got a weird fetish because I’m still here looking at other peoples deals haha and I just get drawn to the idea of comps because I spent so many years trying to do that in my first job.
I think the big issue with trying to collect inputs into the calculator is validating the data. People put wrong information into the calculator more often than not it seems.
I try whenever I respond to a new shared deal thread to extract the normalized, pre-incentive discount for future comparison purposes.
Folks can submit screenshot of dealer quote? Only trusted members can submit? Or maybe dealers/brokers on here are able to provide it only? There’s a few tricks I’m sure one can do to get it to work at the start and then see how clean the data is before letting everyone do it.
Dealer quotes aren’t particularly good datapoints… we want to know what stuff actually sells for. Signed contracts would be much more useful. You run into the logistical issue of every one needing to be manually verified though and even then, your sample size is fairly low.
I recognize and share your enthusiasm for this issue. I’ve spent the better part of the last year on this site bookmarking and accounting all deals that have been posted with accompanying screenshots of dealer contracts…this is the only way to verify deals and do the sort of analysis you are looking for. It’s been exhausting work to say the least lol. Without AI/picture reading technology, it all has to be done manually.
The trouble is, the volume of verifiable deals is so low that months pass and programs change, rendering the comparisons that you want to make useless. It’s good data nonetheless but we need more of it (I.e., people posting their contracts).
If you can convince people to do that please be my guest.
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Here’s how you do it - everyone that submits, gets 36 month access to the comp sheet.
A lot of folks who do industry surveys, like salary data, do just that.
But I think the mods on this site are doing this for fun and I don’t think people are going to jump on this when they have other things in life going on.
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