USAA Car Buying Service Questions

[Banjo33]

I did what Jarhead recommends, researching via Edmunds first. I had two local dealers competing against each other with the final price I was quoted on a truck listing MSRP as $45k down to $34k. Lo and behold, not 2 days before (last week actually) I was to go to the dealer to get my new '09 Sierra, I came across this '08 Sierra and bought it...ultimately saving myself $5k more!

 

[Pilot123]

My dad used it a year or so ago to buy a new CRV in Texas. The USAA dealer was about 2 hours away from him, so he took the print out to his local Honda dealer and showed it to them. They said they'd do the USAA price + $200

 

[Jim123]

So the dealer has always honored the price you find on USAA?

Well sort of... USAA partners with dealerships, and those dealerships are obligated to honor the pre-negotiated price you print out from the USAA website. That doesn't preclude other competing dealerships from matching or beating the price as others described in separate posts.

When I bought my last car there was a little disconnect when I arrived at the dealership. My salesman hadn't "got the memo" and started haggling with me, even after I showed him my printout from USAA.com. I think either he pretended not to understand or else he was an idiot. I got the USAA price and later on advised USAA about the problem... no worries.

I'd use the service again.

 

[Pags]

When I bought my last car there was a little disconnect when I arrived at the dealership. My salesman hadn't "got the memo" and started haggling with me, even after I showed him my printout from USAA.com. I think either he pretended not to understand or else he was an idiot. I got the USAA price and later on advised USAA about the problem... no worries.

This happened to me when I just showed up with the printout and didn't call ahead. Some random salesman showed up and started trying to haggle and saying that this price didn't need to honored, etc, etc. I left and went back a few weeks later after having called the PoC ahead of time. Much smoother. No haggling. I said "I want this truck. If you give me KBB for my trade in, we have a sale." When it came time to talk financing, since I was pre-approved, they had to beat USAA's offer, which they did.

 

[MasterBates]

The only things that have really kept me from pulling the trigger on a new truck are:

1- I don't know if I'm going to Japan or not, and won't know for months. Would suck to buy a new truck have the big depreciation hit/payment and not be able to drive it for 3+ years. (and I'm sure my family would be more than glad to "take care of it" and by that I mean beat the shit out of it pulling 25K pound trailers in the mountains and chain smoking marlboros in it)

2-The PumaPuller (99 F-250 Diesel) is paid for, runs OK (and by OK, I mean 400hp/750ft-lb and will go up any hill I point it at pulling a 18K load at 65mph), and I just put new tires, brakes, windshield and radio in it.

What's got me leaning towards replacing it is that it has hit the "big shit starting to break" age.. The AC took a crap this week and a redneck recharge lasted maybe 2 days. It's at the point where a new motor if it blows up (by that I mean blown crank/broke block not head gasket or turbo) is over half the value of the truck.

That, and it's starting to have major rust issues. Looks good from 20 feet away but when you get up next to it, you can see the cab corners are gone along with the bottoms of all 4 doors.

I just wish they would hurry the hell up and get us selected out of the RAG sooner than later.

 

[Lawman]

=

I did that & got my car at invoice ... the USAA service was $1000 more.

Thats really not as hard to do as it sounds. We'd sell new cars at invoice all day long (with a few exceptions on special vehicles like SRT's and Rubicons) because there is still money in the pot.

Also I know everybody raves about Kelly Blue Book, but just to let you all know nobody uses that to determine prices of vehicles. My dealership used a combination of NADA black book, which is where you find out the value of a used vehicle as far as the bank is concerned (IE they will only finance an 04 Jeep Liberty with leather and a sunroof for X), and we used the averages for Mannhiem Auto Auction which is a dealer license only auction service.

Also somebody said "Same as cash so the dealer can come down a little." Thats false, they want you to finance. Not the same way a buy here pay here lot wants you to finance (those guys are the sharks) but because the bank that wins the bid on you typically kicks the dealer a couple hundred dollars as a "thanks for letting us play" fee.

Heres the tips I can tell you as a former car salesmen that will help take the pain out of the car buying experiance.
1. Dont bring anything to the dealership as far as paperwork or a notebook or anything, it immediately sets you up as a defensive sell and the sales manager will actually attempt to hold back more initially because he knows your probably gonna walk and play the "if you can beat this price Ill buy from you" game.

2. Know exactly what you can afford before you walk into a dealership. Dont just roll up to a dealership with no payment in mind as to what your willing to bite into. Also dont hold that info back from the salesman because you think he's gonna screw you over with it. Give him a ball park, because it takes 10 grand to change a payment 100 dollars so really theres a lot of room to play with. To many damn times I have had people want to look at a 40K car when a 15K cars payment was all they could afford.

3. Along with that know what you have to have and what you only want on a vehicle. Then make it clear that you understand the difference between the two. Any good salesman isnt gonna try to get you to buy a cloth interior if your wife has to have leather and a sunroof.

4. Let them try their financing. I have never seen USAA beat the banks we had to go through. Ive seen Navy Fed beat it once but that was because the guys credit was crap and Im not sure how he got them to finance him anyway. Interest rates are interest rates, you have no loyalty to a bank.

 

[jus2mch]

Thats really not as hard to do as it sounds. We'd sell new cars at invoice all day long (with a few exceptions on special vehicles like SRT's and Rubicons) because there is still money in the pot.

Also I know everybody raves about Kelly Blue Book, but just to let you all know nobody uses that to determine prices of vehicles. My dealership used a combination of NADA black book, which is where you find out the value of a used vehicle as far as the bank is concerned (IE they will only finance an 04 Jeep Liberty with leather and a sunroof for X), and we used the averages for Mannhiem Auto Auction which is a dealer license only auction service.

Also somebody said "Same as cash so the dealer can come down a little." Thats false, they want you to finance. Not the same way a buy here pay here lot wants you to finance (those guys are the sharks) but because the bank that wins the bid on you typically kicks the dealer a couple hundred dollars as a "thanks for letting us play" fee.

Heres the tips I can tell you as a former car salesmen that will help take the pain out of the car buying experiance.
1. Dont bring anything to the dealership as far as paperwork or a notebook or anything, it immediately sets you up as a defensive sell and the sales manager will actually attempt to hold back more initially because he knows your probably gonna walk and play the "if you can beat this price Ill buy from you" game.

2. Know exactly what you can afford before you walk into a dealership. Dont just roll up to a dealership with no payment in mind as to what your willing to bite into. Also dont hold that info back from the salesman because you think he's gonna screw you over with it. Give him a ball park, because it takes 10 grand to change a payment 100 dollars so really theres a lot of room to play with. To many damn times I have had people want to look at a 40K car when a 15K cars payment was all they could afford.

3. Along with that know what you have to have and what you only want on a vehicle. Then make it clear that you understand the difference between the two. Any good salesman isnt gonna try to get you to buy a cloth interior if your wife has to have leather and a sunroof.

4. Let them try their financing. I have never seen USAA beat the banks we had to go through. Ive seen Navy Fed beat it once but that was because the guys credit was crap and Im not sure how he got them to finance him anyway. Interest rates are interest rates, you have no loyalty to a bank.

Good Gouge. Can you please offer some insight on trade ins? I was told to always negotiate the trade in separately from the purchase.

 

[Lawman]

Good Gouge. Can you please offer some insight on trade ins? I was told to always negotiate the trade in separately from the purchase.

Money is money. Yeah you can do that whole lie about your trade in and pull it out after you've negotiated the price of the new vehicle, but your not gonna change the end of the day dollar value and you may in some ways hurt yourself depending on your trade.

If your trying to trade in a 12 year old Ford Explorer with 150K on the clock, not to much is gonna change about the money on that vehicle. Its gonna go for what the boss thinks is a fair price based on auction numbers for that car. At the same time if you've got something that they can flip and they know it there may be some room to play with. 2-3 year old Minivans with all the bells and whistles, A good clean car that sat while you were on deployment and has less than 10K/year on milage, stuff like that. Trade vs payoff may also very well factor into what you can buy on the lot. You can only finance about 125% of a new vehicles value through most banks, and thats if you have good credit. Im not saying anything about anybody on this site in particular but there were plenty of times when we had to take people off a certain vehicle and show them something that we could bury their negative equity in because the other car wouldnt carry it. Thats where you earn your pay as a salesman, when you take them from a Minivan to a Jeep Commander because the Jeep has 4-6K worth of Rebates to help offset that negative equity and now you have to convince bubba's wife that she doesnt really need a sliding door since the kids arent in car seats and the 4x4 will be much safer on those winter drives to dance practice in Lake Effect Snow.

When the money goes on the sheet I can show you money wherever its important too you. Most car buying advice sites will tell you not to just look at payment. When really thats all that matters since thats what your worried about next month when your not at the dealership. All your gonna do by spreading out the paperwork over several numbers is risk pissing yourself off because he didnt write it in a way that gives you a warm fuzzy even though the payment is within where you wanted and its the new vehicle you want.

 

[jarhead]

Thats really not as hard to do as it sounds. We'd sell new cars at invoice all day long (with a few exceptions on special vehicles like SRT's and Rubicons) because there is still money in the pot.

just making the point that you might get a better deal e-mail'n several dealerships to get a qoute as well as using USAA vice just walking in and talking to the next sales dude who's "up" & having to haggle.

...for those who don't know about dealer "holdback", here's a LINK... so even if you buy a vehicle at invoice, the dealer still gets a small % from the manufacturer.

For those interested in GM products ... GM offers a military discount ... GM LINK ... the savings dont appear to be as much as what USAA would offer, nor are the prices at invoice.

Here's a pretty detailed car loan calculator in excel format.. Car Loan Calc

my 2¢

S/F

 

[FlyBoyd]

2. Know exactly what you can afford before you walk into a dealership. Dont just roll up to a dealership with no payment in mind as to what your willing to bite into. Also dont hold that info back from the salesman because you think he's gonna screw you over with it. Give him a ball park, because it takes 10 grand to change a payment 100 dollars so really theres a lot of room to play with. To many damn times I have had people want to look at a 40K car when a 15K cars payment was all they could afford.

When the money goes on the sheet I can show you money wherever its important too you. Most car buying advice sites will tell you not to just look at payment. When really thats all that matters since thats what your worried about next month when your not at the dealership. All your gonna do by spreading out the paperwork over several numbers is risk pissing yourself off because he didnt write it in a way that gives you a warm fuzzy even though the payment is within where you wanted and its the new vehicle you want.

My intent is not to get into it with you Lawman. I only wish to offer a different mindset on car purchases for the younger crowd.

I'll skip right over financing a depreciating asset and assume the decision has already been made and a car will be purchased.

What you pay for the car and your payment are detached.

The car is worth what the market will bear. Get the best price you can considering your needs vs wants. How you choose to pay that market price is up to you.

IMO, the interest you pay when financing is now tacked on to that market price (inflation aside). Did you just price yourself out of the market by choosing long repayment schedule? If the negotiated price was $35K would you pay $40K, $42K, $44K, $46K just to keep the payment "affordable?" The monthly payment is secondary to the price paid for the car. If you can't afford the car you never could afford the monthly payment in the first place.

DoD does a piss poor job of educating military members about financial management. Command Financial Counselors are in place to react to prior poor decision making. Rarely do they (or the command) really try to educate the masses.

Sorry about the rant but I see too many young Os and Es making decisions with a "monhtly payment" mindset. They have no idea the lasting effect a poor start has on their financial careers. One of the biggest poor decisions is the initial car purchase when commissioned.

 

[Lawman]

FlyBoyd, there are a crap load of other ways people can hem themselves up financially when buying a car and not even know it. Hell the reason I drive a Grand Cherokee and not an R/T Magnum was I simply couldn't walk away from $67 vice $208 for insurance on the same payment car. You see that a lot with people trying to trade their cars in way before the payoff is done (1-2 years). They bought some high end piece of shine and didnt realize that when the first brake job came due it was 2500 dollars, or they grabbed a big lifted 4x4 on rims and found out tires are 300 a piece and are driving on racing slicks because they live paycheck to paycheck.

And now we are slowly opening this thread up to explore the credit crisis in America... Dammit Im threadjacking myself.

 

[Godspeed]

This has been stated here on AW before, but I never miss a chance to say it again....

This is intended for those newly commissioned Ensigns, or those about to be:

I worked at a car dealership as a salesman for a brief period of time... The best thing I learned there was how poor an investment a new car actually is.... Getting a car even one year older can save you bookoo bucks.

Most new cars are worth less than half (usually between a half and 35%) of their value in 4-5 years.... Now we all know that a car is a depreciating asset, but this isn't slow depreciation.... I just don't know why so many fresh Ensigns go out and buy that $40,000 BMW, when it's going to be worth $14,000 5 years later....

The bigger shell shock is the shear hit they are taking the second they drive it off the lot.... The (true) saying was that it will lose 20% of it's value in it's first 20 minutes of ownership! That's $8,000 that ENS spent driving it off the showroom floor.

As far as I'm concerned, that's a lot for the new car smell. People convince themselves: Well, I only want new so I have a warranty or blah blah blah.

Do yourself a favor if you have your mind made up on a new car... Go look at certified preowned. Cars models are produced virtualy identical for a set number of years (3-5 years usually before the model changes). That means that the 2009 BMW you are looking at is identical to a 2004 model to the naked eye.

Now if you get certified preowned, the dealership will usually recondition the leather, fix any interior/exterior blemishes, throw some new tires on it, fix any knicks in the rims etc etc. They'll also usually service things like the power steering system, redo the brakes, filters, etc etc and do a several hundred point inspection. Some companies have higher standards as far as certified preowned status, but our dealership would spend anywhere from $1,000-$2,500 reconditioning a vehicle to certified preowned status... And a lot of times after they were done you couldn't tell the difference between that car and a new car.

On top of this, with a certified preowned, you get a warranty! So, in our BMW example, you get a 2006 BMW that is practically indistiguishable from the 2009 BMW sitting right next to it.. Difference? 30k on the odometer... Oh yeah, and about $25,000.

 

[Uncle Fester]

"I'm paying cash" doesn't buy you any favors with the dealer. Like Lawman said, they make money on financing.

Financing with NCFU or USAA is worth it. Their rate isn't always the very best, but it's close, and more importantly, they're a hell of a lot easier to deal with than 99% of the banks dealerships use. I financed a Jeep with Chartway FCU in Norfolk...fucking nightmare trying to get anything done, even routine stuff like transferring the title from VA to FL. USAA, nothing takes more than one phone call.

What I usually do is, get pre-approval from USAA, but keep it in my pocket, go haggle with the dealer for everything including the financing. Then pay off the dealer's bank in a week or two with your USAA approval. Best of all worlds. Actually helps your credit rating, too, since it counts as paying off a loan.

 

[DanMa1156]

For the record, I am pretty convinced I'll be buying a used car, probably nothing older than 2001. I am assuimg that I'll be moving quite a bit in the next couple years by selecting Naval Aviator or Naval Flight Officer, so I am really just looking for something reliable that I can put some miles on. I am leaning towards a 4D sedan or something, but I might get a small SUV - do you think between all the moves in the upcoming 5 years that it'd be worth it or will I be alright with a 4D Sedan?

 

[utak]

Nice . . .

I'm looking into getting a Nissan 370Z when I wing and go to the Rhino RAG, looks like USAA is the way to go.