I am located in Texas, and I have been reading deals where people are 18% or 20% off MSRP or I see the same in TrueCar when the great price is at 9%+ off MSRP for some models
I have two questions.
Is that % off MSRP includes dealer discount, rebates, and incentives, or is the % off MSRP from a just a dealer discount before rebates.
is it recommended to start negotiating a dealer discount of 15% off MSRP before rebates/incentives are accounted for?
I know many suggest researching first what a fair dealer discount is, but when I contacted several BMW dealers and told them what my price is and what discounts I qualify for, they send me their quotes that were higher from my initial research price, so I thought that starting at 15% will avoid this issue
Also, starting excessively high doesn’t generally mean you’re leaving lots of room for negotiation. What it means is your email is going straight in the recycle bin.
On Truecar, that includes incentives. Truecar is nonsense and you shouldn’t pay any attention to it. When you negotiate, it’s always off the MSRP before rebates. There are pretty much no 18-20% off deals, save for cars like an M8 or a 740 with flagship. Volume bonuses were gone for months, inventory is still low, and it’s not an easy market.
Have you been asking for 15% off on new cars? Whoa; sorry, but especially in Texas, not going to happen. What BMW are you trying to get? You also have to be careful because you can end up not getting a response if you ask numerous dealerships for completely unattainable numbers and then they won’t work with you, unfortunately.
Generally, on this site, we try to talk in terms of pre-incentive discount (although trunk money usually gets included), but it’s hard to say exactly. On a BMW, for example, the only way you’re getting to 18% off pre-incentive is on a high mileage loaner generally.