"Buying a New Car: The Power of Paper" Edmunds Daily

Buying a New Car: The Power of Paper

There's something convincing about hard copies. When something is printed out, it lends substantially more validity to a subject than just the spoken word. Nowhere is this more true than when you're in the heat of battle. That is, when you're at the dealership negotiating the price for your new set of wheels.

Rather than just tell the salesman (or sales manager) that Edmunds TMV for this little buggy is, for example, $26,393, show them a printout from when you priced out the car. That way, they know you're not just throwing out numbers. And let's face it, Edmunds is pretty well recognized so it's not like they won't know what you're referring to.

So to recap, after you've done your homework, decided on a vehicle and priced it out on Edmunds, don't forget to print out a copy of that TMV report before you hit the dealerships. That piece of paper will be a worthy ally when it's time to engage in negotiations.

In a similar vein, before you make a scheduled service appointment or take your car in for scheduled service, check the owner's manual to see exactly what, for example, the 15,000-mile service involves. Then state that that is what you want done -- nothing more, nothing less than what the carmaker itself recommends. When you go to the dealer's service department to drop off your car, have either the owner's manual or a printout of the appropriate page on hand. That way, you won't end up getting talked into pricey and extraneous (dealer) "Recommended Service".

John DiPietro, Automotive Editor