That is brazen, but par for the course when dealing with most dealerships. As I described in my post, I had this negotiation going between VA and MD when the MD salesman said he was tapped out and that there was "no more juice in the lemon." The VA GM gave me what I thought was a good deal (11% discount plus whatever incentives at delivery) so I told the MD salesman I was taking the VA deal. I got an email from the MD GM saying there was always more juice in the lemon and he would squeeze it one more time. I had given my word to the VA GM so I didn't pursue the matter, but I learned is that there is always more juice in a lemon than there appears. Doc fees, electronic fees, processing fees merely represent lemons needing squeezing.

 

I just commented about my 2013 CPO in another thread. You definitely can't depend on the CPO inspection to uncover and properly fix all appearance issues. My car had one owner in FLA and there were a number of issues with the car that I attribute to its time in FLA. Etched in water spots on the paint - probably from being parked in a lot with sprinklers nearby and sitting in the sun. Pitted headlights and windshield - probably from sand. When I changed the engine air filters there was a handful of sand in each air box.

 

Florida is a hot spot for the enthusiast car market, but I would NEVER buy a car from there. The heat & humidity are not friendly to vehicles. The sun comes out, it’s a beautiful day and then it rains for five minutes and then the sun comes out again, searing all of those rain drops into the paint. There are many cars down there that have been under water—literally! Of course, this is just my opinion and these are extreme instances, but why take the chance? There is a reason that the term “California Car” is found often in ads for collector cars, but I don’t think anyone would advertise a high dollar car as a “Florida Car.” YMMV.

 

My SL was a Florida lease car. Must have been garaged as the paint is perfect with one exception. The front bumper had PPF and it had yellowed. The selling dealer removed it at my request and some of the paint was damaged in the process. They repainted the entire front end but the color is not a perfect match. Other than that the entire car is like new. New tires, brakes, filters and fluids and new wheel center caps. Perfect glass all around. Complete detail interior and exterior.

 

Overlooking the sand in the air box is uncool and sloppy but if the air filters were in excellent condition or replaced, that passes. The other items you referred to have nothing to do with the CPO process. CPO or not, you are buying a used car and it is priced accordingly.

 

Most (if not all) "collector cars" in FL are not subject to the above described (correctly so for any daily driven car) "abuse". My FL SL is almost five years old and is in identical (or very close to) condition when it was new (yes not daily driven, nor ever left under the elements).

 

I also bought a cpo SL and considering how it was equipped, I felt it was a great price. Consequently, I was willing to take a bit of a beating on my trade, a really beautiful Corvette with fairly low mileage for its age. Generally a cpo will cost an extra $3K over a non cpo car from what I could gather. My mental calculation regarding the SL loaded as it was and being a cpo was that it was underpriced. Turns out, when I checked later using the Kelley Blue book value, the cpo SL400 was priced at BB value so it was not a bargain, merely fairly priced. I could not say the same for the trade in value they allowed on my Corvette. But at least the dealer did not try to take me for a bunch of add-ons, although I did pay an $85 doc fee which is arguably not required as part of a car purchase.

 

The last time I traded in a car to a dealer I took it to CarMax first. The two dealers I was negotiating with both offered $5000 less in trade, but when I showed them the CarMax offer they immediately matched it.

 

The dealer beat CarMax offer by $1000 and saved me $2700 in sales tax. It was last June before this damn pandemic. Trade was a 2016 Stingray Coupe.

 

Thanks, Next time hopefully I will take my time and take care of myself better. If you get screwed by the dealer, shame on him, but if you get screwed a second time, shame on you!

 

Hi Ron - the dealers were Calabasas and Thousand Oaks. All in all I was treated very well at Calabasas and bought from them.

 

Ten years ago, we bought our new E350 from Thousand Oaks, our closest dealer. We thought the salesman was a schmuck, but we liked the service department rep that took care of us, Kevin Schwartz. I found our cpo SL400 at the Glendale dealer. They had the right car so we bought it there, but will use Kevin in Thousand Oaks for any dealer servicing we may need.

 

I was about to get a 2016 Z06 last year, but the dealer added on a $2,000 doc fee ... I said no deal with the doc fee, but they wouldn't take it off. I moved on to an SL63 - that dealer had a $299 doc fee.

 

When I was looking at getting a first gen Audi A4 when they were just coming to the states (96?) they were a hot commodity. Salesdroid gives me the quote, and there was a line item for "ADP: $1500". I asked him what that was, and he said "Additional Dealer Profit". Points for being honest at least.

 

$85? You got off cheap. The car I ended up buying had a $500 doc fee. I figured at least it was less than the $800 the FL dealer was charging.

 

We have consumer protection laws here, and $85 may be all that they are allowed to charge in CA, even though they should not be allowed to charge anything. Imagine me telling the dealer that there will be an $85 fee charged to them for my time, since they are requiring me to sit for an hour to sign all of their documents! Dealers here, like everywhere else, have other fees and charges they can add on to make up for this one though. For instance, when I bought my new Stinger, some dealers would advertise a price, but if you tried to buy the car you discovered they had installed window tint for $600, or a theft deterrent system for $1200 or some other add-on that you did not want. And if you did, you could get them later for a fraction of their price. Of course, they told me these things were already installed and cannot be removed so there is nothing they can do about it, but you will be most pleased to have purchased these options which will pay for themselves over the long run. You have to wonder if these extras come with a jar of Vaseline!

When I bought my new Stinger in January, I did it right. There were no trade ins or financing and I approached the deal from the perspective of the OTD price. I told them ahead of time I expected no add-ons and the dealer was straight with me, other than trying to sell me an extended warranty and a maintenance contract which I declined. On other cars I have purchased, I was not always as smart. When I bought my Corvette, I paid a $500 dealer fee which I knew was padding for the dealer and not a legit fee, but they flew me to AZ and paid the taxi to the dealer and I was uncomfortable calling them on it and threatening to walk . Hey, when you and your wife are in Scottsdale and live in SoCal, and you have no planned way home other than driving the Corvette you came to buy, you do not feel you are in a strong position to walk away. Had I negotiated an OTD price rather than a purchase price, I could have dealt with this prior to taking the trip out there.