Dealer Pricing - Negotiable?

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Ah, but, it can probably be "pre-sold", before actual delivery, then when it arrives, the buyer flys in, and signs and meet me at the stealership to sign the paper work, and we arrange for shipping to CA (most likely it will be a CA buyer). I would try to never take possesion of the car, as then you lose the $2500 Federal credit as well. It might not be possible... if it isn't, then I agree, no one is going to want to give up the $2500 credit, pay the MA sales tax (%6.25), and in addition to that, the shipping to CA ($1000-$1500), would costs at least $5K more with all of that lost, for a net zero gain. I'm on the pre-order list, and this would be comming out of the "MA" allocation, so it would just be a way to get more cars to CA, but its probably not feasable. I want to buy both the PiP and the Leaf, having trouble with that... I did find out my 2010 Model V was worth about $23K trade in, so not like the base model PiP would cost me that much.

 

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Well, it can't hurt to ask my dealer, see what they say, I doubt they will care one way or another, to them it's still a sale.

If they don't want to do it, nothing I can really do about it, I have only personally bought 3 Prii from them, and a Camry for my mother, so it's not like I am an unknown buyer off the street. They can still say no, and then they have an Orphan on their hands. I'm not sure its going to work the way you think though, I think they can sell it to anyone they want, it's their car at the point of the buyer refusing it.

 

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well, people are NOT lining up to buy the PiP here, or the Leaf for that matter.

The East coast is much more conservative, and has much worse environmental conditions for these vehicles as well, so there is not massive line here. Also, my state has zero incentives for Plug in vehicles now, not even HOV lane access or no sales tax, no state credit, nada, just the Federal incentives only.

The PiP was designed to fill a niche market in CA, for the rest of the country, it holds no magic, its just an overpriced Prius. If you want an EV, get a real EV.

 

Mitch, after reading through your posts to this discussion, were it not for the fact that you claim to own a Prius, I would scream "TROLL!" And you say, "If you want an EV, get a real EV." The PHEV is an improvement on what you're driving, but if you don't want it, quit knocking it, and get on with your life!

 

I more than "claim" to own a Prius, I'm on my third one, having owned all 3 generations, I bought my first one in 2001, been driving them for more than 10 years now, how about you? I'm willing to bet my carbon footprint is lower than most on this forum for the last 10 years.

If I do buy a PiP, it will solely be to resell to someone who can use the 3 years of HOV lane access in CA, I myself am buying a Leaf for my use. The only reason for me to even consider the PiP now is I get more for my Gen 3 trade in from the Toyota dealer, than I will from the Nissan dealer, and I can make a tidy profit on the PiP, perhaps. Also, the PiP will cost me very little cash, as my G3 Model 5 trade in is worth about $23K, add $9K to that and I have a base model PiP for sale to a happy CA future owner, it should be far easier to sell a 2012 PiP than a 2010 Model 5

The PiP is a disapointment all around to me, and no, it isn't much better than what I have now, its puny EV range is laugable, and was clearly designed to qualify it for the CA HOV lane access. My current G3 Prius actually has more features and gadgets (IPA, DRCC) than the base model PiP, and real leather seats, not that any of that matters.

 

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OK, for starters, I'm on my second Prius, having put 70K+ miles on an '04, purchased in Oct. '03, and 54K to date on my '06. And you won't be selling to anyone in California who will get "3 years of HOV lane access" because the law as it is written allows PHEV access only until Jan 1, 2015. By the time anyone here takes delivery, and then waits a couple of months for license plates, and then another few weeks for the permit to come through, they will be lucky to have about 18 months of HOV use. Deduct from that whatever extra time it takes from the time you take delivery, if you can even get your hands on one, to get it to Califoria and start the process.
From your previous post about your state having no incentives now, here is an interesting site showing Mass. is in the process of offering both sales tax exemption and HOV lane access. http://www.pluginamerica.org/incentives
Finally, I doubt very much that the PHEV Prius designers had any knowledge or concern about the HOV lane access in California. This is a vehicle designed for sale in many parts of the world.
It seems to me that the thing for you to do, since you have no desire to own or drive a plug in Prius, is simply not participate in the online ordering, and give someone else a chance.

 

MA has no intention of offering HOV access, or no sales tax, do you believe everything you read on Plug in America? Like every other state, MA is searching for additional revenue, not looking to give any up. The 1 HOV lane we have in this state is for 2 or more drivers only, efforts to change that have failed for the last 20 years, this is the Southeast Expressway leading to downtown Boston, from the South, a road I drive on everyday.

Do you not realize Toyota is Japanese? They excell at following rules, of course they where fully aware if the requirements of CARB for HOV lane access, and went about designing the PiP for that specific market. The Chevy Volt is also availble in CA (and has more pure EV range as well) but guess what? It doesn't meet the CARB requirements for HOV lane access, so GM is in the process of refreshing the design, so it will. Make no mistake about it, HOV lane access in CA is worth a lot of money, as it saves time, and you can't buy more of that.

BTW, I had a $500 deposit with my Toyota dealer since mid 2007 for the PiP, by January of 2010 I was sick of waiting for it, and my 04 was showing it's age, so I traded it in for the 2010.

 

If people aren't anxious to buy it in your area, exactly how do you think you will be able to sell it yourself, and at a profit no less? There's nothing preventing a California buyer (or anybody else - you'd probably be better off aiming it at a state that isn't getting them yet) from signing up to get one from a MA dealer, if that's what they want - and they won't have to give you a share of the profit, if there's an excess in MA, as you seem to think.

I'm not taking an opinion here - just food for thought, since your ideas seem to be inconsistent with themselves. (Though my opinion is that you probably could sell it at a profit, and quite possibly to a local buyer, or at least more local than CA.)

 

Here's what happened with the Volt. People bought one which made them eligible for the 7.5K tax credit from the Fed. Then they resold it at whatever they paid for it leaving 7.5K as profit. The buyer probably didn't know that the used Volt wasn't elible for the tax credit so really ended up paying through the nose.

This was not only done by individuals but also dealerships. Some used them as demo cars to try and get pre-orders and walkins to whom they sold a Cruise Eco and others did it just to reap a profit. We will probably see a little of this in the PIP roll out but hopefully not as much.

 

Spending less than 2 hours on this, I can give you my "un-official" results.

Typical Sales People are useless, especially on this.

General Sales Managers who do bother to call you back (a VERY low percent) do not understand they are not in control of this situation and generally think they can get MSRP or MSRP+. They fail to realize the customer is in control of the allocation with this vehicle and they are NOT.

General Managers get it (No surprise - its why they have that title). They are willing to talk turkey as they realize some money for a car that otherwise will NOT show up at their Dealership for another customer is better than NO money at all.

CAVEAT - As no one knows the Dealer Cost, Clawbacks or anything else besides MSRP, you need to get creative and think how to structure it it to get a great deal. As this is a strange situation for Dealers to be in (Not being in control - not being able to get a car through normal Allocation channels) they haven't thought about how to do it.

It actually quite simple - though you might have to figure out the deal and present it to them.