Hmmm, well I followed all the STW tips from the other day – told him what I had to spend, what I wanted, treated him nicely etc etc but he absolutely wouldn’t budge on price. We must have spent an hour to-ing an fro-ing, him ‘popping off to see his manager’ at each stage and the most they would do on an £8k car was offer me free tax (£145) – no cash off the price and no servicing etc – only a promise to sort out the 12inch scratch on the wing and sort out all the chips on the rear bumper… (I’d expext that anyway from a VW dealer…)

I was under the impression it was a buyers market but he absolutely wasn’t budging. I walked in the end…

I had a meeting with one of VW’s Marketing Managers last October and they were slashing budgets all over the place because of the downturn, and looking a bit scared but I didn’t see any sign of that in the showroom today…

Anyone got any thoughts? Have they dropped prices so low already that they’ve no room for manoeuvre??

Go to another dealer, similar car and see if they’ll do a better deal. Return to this one and see if they’ll match or beat it.

I work for the largest fleet in Europe and my role involves the disposal of end of term cars to the trade.IMO dealers have seen a little bit of an upturn in footfall which is making them a little bolder than late and he may well have reached his lowest ! But as above def have a look around see what another dealer offers you and then compare.
Wish I could sell to you direct as weve got loads !
Shredder

what golf was it just out of interest??

like the rock says , find another more accomodating dealer!!!

bearing in my mind that the new golf is out now so that should drop the prices on other marks of golf.

I had the same with a local Seat garage, we were fighting over £300 on a £8K car, so I walked out!

There loss not mine.

Doesn’t bode well as was going to see an £8k Golf Plus tomorrow

Go back tell them how much you would pay and leave your number then walk. If a deal can be done at that price they should call you. Especially after a slow weekend when sales figures are not looking good.

or another option would be to think if you are going to need any exras – towbar, roof bars etc. They may be able to do a deal based on including these rather than cash off the price.

I had the same with a local Seat garage, we were fighting over £300 on a £8K car, so I walked out!

The price of the car is not relevant as £300 may be the actual amount of profit in the car ! So no where to move.
Shredder

If you want to be really bold – take the moeny with you in a bag, yes take CASH, all of it at least as much as YOU want to spend. Only a fool would turn down cold hard currency in the current climate…

Not saying it will work but car dealers & estate agents get a lot of chancers at the moment looking for deals they can’t afford and have no real intention of fullfilling, but if you got the money on the table they will find it hard to turndown.

What year & model of golf?

Renton 2005 1.6 FSI S – 18,000 on the clock which was good but not so much of an advantage on a Golf as it would be on something else…

Rochey – exactly – I spent an hour getting less than 2% off the price – sod that!

Geoff J – 2 dealers have my number and they know I’m talking to both of them. I can’t be &rsed going through it all again tmrw so we’ll see what happens in the week…

brooess have they by any chance told you who was the previous owner ?

cash is king, hang on to it, shop around and you’ll get a deal!

Shredder – some bloke who owned it on a motability contract…

As my Uncle says “Make them an offer they can’t refuse”.

I’d second Geoffj from my experience. Haggled over a focus a while back and he wouldn’t budge so I walked. He phoned the next day to accept but was I’d found something elsewhere. Felt a little smug.

Thought so as thats who I work for …….if you could get me a reg no I could tell you exactly how much the dealer was paying for it…but shhhhh 😉

just bought a golf

it was on the forecourt at a good £1500 below book (£8500)

we got a further 600 off the car and 200 off a 3 year warranty and £20 off an ipod connection

55 plate 2.0tdi GT by the way, highish mileage though

cash makes no difference in my experience, in fact a couple of dealers have told me they don’t like it as they have to keep it safe and then get it to the bank securely.

Motorpoint worth a look?

Motorpoint better as they buy in bulk hence get bigger discounts that your VW francised dealer. Hence may be able to pass that saving on.

Shredder – CW55 GOL… he told me he paid £7100 for it

Wait til the end of the month if you can.

They all have targets and they can be more ‘accommodating’ when they have to be!

Have a look here as well for alternatives. All ex-fleet I think. A couple of friends have bought passat estates from them and recomended them to me.

<http://www.autoquake.com/vehicle/inspid=8811&gt;

brooess if you can hang on till Mon evening I will give you the trade price for that car. Also where are you in the country ? As I am able to look at a system that lets me look at a load of Golf’s up and down the country. Why that particular model ? is it an insurance issue ? My reason for that question is that I have a 55 plate SE with 18476 mls on it which the dealer is paying the same for £7100 or how about 55 plate 2.0 D S which the dealer is paying £6075 for mileage 20377 tad more mile but not that makes any difference

Motorpoint check my account
Autoquake check my account 😉

Shredder – email me brucecairnsAThotmailDOTcom when you can – rather interested. I’m after 1.6 for cost/insurance/running costs but SE is ok above S…

I’m in London
ta

Will do the SE is currently residing @ Inchcape VW in Romford

YHM

a lot of the ex motability cars are the 2.0sdi engine which is TRULY APPALLING unless you want to run them on *ahem* alternative fuels

check your local pikey camp, it’ll be full of em

Brooes I’d expect to pay 8k for a TDI mkV Golf. Most certainly not for a 2005 1.6 FSI. BTW- why does it have to be a main dealer?! Where do you think they source their stock from? Its not trade-in, usually it can be ex-fleet or shock….auctions.

A main dealer should sort out scratches/chips anyway, as should any good indie dealer. Moreso the Main dealers as its in their blurb (100 checks-bollox).

Seriously, shop around. Where do you live roughly? (I’ll do a autotrader and dealer search!).

mrmichaelwright ditto the normally-aspired 1.4, 1.6 and 2.0 petrols (not FSI’s).

Don’t flame me for this but why dont you also look at the Octavia (NEW shape). I looked last week and you can pick up the new shape Octavia estate VRS (2.0Turbo) for under 10k with average miles! Tempting. They also have the same engine line up. I’m no fan of the mkV Golf (I owned a 3dr GT TDI) and the pain flaked on the roof and the interior plastics/fabric seemed to be made of chocolate/fabrics pulled/pilled easily.

I bought a Skoda just before Xmas, main dealer, parkers what car etc listed it at £9700, dealer wanted £8500. Wouldn’t haggle at all, but managed to get new tyres and discs.

Was the car already a bargain??

I went into a number of dealers about a fortnight ago to buy a new hatch. Nobody was interested at all…i was ready to buy either a fiesta, punto or 500 there and then…nobody was dropping a penny.

that’s because their advertised prices are already rock bottom to get people through the doors, second hand prices are still good, they just advertise lower prices instead of leaving room for negotiation.

If you put 2005/55 1.6 FSI into Parkers it comes up with a dealer price of £7735, and a trade in price of £5865. Parkers on Parkers the car would have 30k miles, but even so looks pretty expensive. I reckon lots of dealers do not think they are competing until you give them specific pricing on another car you have seen elsewhere – so go look online

As CaptainMainwaring says. In the current climate/at the very least you should be looking to pay indie dealer book for a main dealer car IMO. Buy it if you must have it however remember its true value will be far lower when you come to sell on…A main dealer asking for 2007 prices is abit rude. Imagine a Estate Agent saying their market is robust and keeping their prices high (cough Sale, Manchester cough)..

Stop bleating hora? ok ok. 🙂