How I finally bought mine... (very long)

[IDSmoker]

Not really a newbie, since I've used (and enjoyed) this board to help me research my new purchase, but I thought this would be the best place to post a message about my Magnum buying experience. In addition to this forum, I also made liberal use of several other forums out there to do my research in addition to the car buying resources sited at the end of this message.

For now, it seems that the Dodge dealers in the Pacific Northwest are HAVING a really difficult time getting RTs in. Most of the dealers are using this as an excuse to slap 'dealer adjustments' on the few RTs that are out there.

So, if you are rather particular about the color and options of the new car you are about to DROP a bundle of money on, and don't want to risk getting stuck in the "eternal BG/BX ORDER queue FROM hell" or get taken to the cleaners by an unethical dealer (sorry, but charging thousands over MSRP!?!?), how can you locate that hard-to-find vehicle and get a decent deal?

The key is to make liberal use of the "dealer inventory/locator" on the Dodge website.

One method is to find a part of the country where there are dealers with lots of possible vehicles, like Chicago. Negotiate a deal over the phone with one of those dealers, buy a one-way plane ticket, and drive your new car home. That was my "Plan B".

Fortunately, "Plan A" actually worked.

"Plan A" was a modified "Fax Attack" I learned FROM the Fighting Chance web site. I ended up trying to contact (by sending a fax to the fleet manager) about 70 different Dodge dealerships within a day’s drive of me.

Out of those 70 dealerships, fewer than half responded to my enquiries, and most of the responses were along the lines of:

"Hi, my fleet manager passed your fax along to me, so that I could call and let you know that even though we don't have any RTs in stock, we would certainly like to help you ORDER one through our dealership" spoken in an voice with obvious cues indicating a green pea salesman

After all of the responses were tallied, I discovered exactly one red Magnum RT with the Nav radio and UConnect on a dealers lot. Unfortunately, that dealer also wanted $3,000 over MSRP! I also found 2 dealers who were willing to reconfigure the unsold Magnums they had on ORDER in D and D1 status, but both of them wanted straight MSRP, and I would have to wait until the end of December and November (respectively), assuming that the change in the configuration didn't result in a change in status.

Then Rob Gregory FROM Frontier Motors (800/550-2700) in La Grande, Oregon, came to my rescue! His dealership had a Vanilla RT that they were willing to trade to another dealership in exchange for a Red one more to my liking, which they would sell to me for $500 over their cost! The only sticking point was finding my new Magnum. This took Rob the better part of a day and a half, with several false starts, but he finally managed to find one that had everything I was looking for, plus the Protection package and the Roof rack (originally I refused to consider any vehicle with the roof rack, but I finally gave in, and the look is definitely growing on me).

I started the "fax attack" process on Wednesday (10/27/04) morning and picked up my new Magnum RT at 11am Saturday, October 30, 2004. Of course, this doesn't include the prior 2 months of research I did! <grin>

Between the trailering fee and the advertising fees and what-not tacked on by the originating dealership (one of the Lithia chain that never bothered to respond to my fax) and Frontier's $500 profit, I ended up getting the car for $1,790 under MSRP (or $880 over invoice). Rob did mention taking some heat FROM his manager for originally quoting me the $500 over cost number, but the manager ultimately agreed to stand behind Rob's word.

I don't know if anyone else can get a deal like this FROM Frontier (especially since they don't have any more RTs at the moment to sell or trade), but if you get tired of dealing with all of the unethical dealerships, and just want to reaffirm that there are other types of dealers out there, then Rob at Frontier is definitely worth giving a call. Tell him Sam Pennington sent you! <grin>


In addition to the information I found on this and all of the other Dodge user forums, I found the following web sites to be especially helpful/educational in my car buying experience:

• Car Buying Tips (long article detailing all facets of how to buy a car including some of the scams being used by salesmen and dealers)
• Fighting Chance (for a nominal fee, they will send you an info packet targeted for a particular Manufacturer/Vehicle)
• Confessions of a Car Salesman (article on the Edmunds web site that should be read by anyone interested in buying a car)

[E8502]

Love the fine print!!

[IDSmoker]

Almost forgot the most important part of my post...

a picture of my new baby!!!

[speakerboy]

I got my Magnesium baby the same day I went looking. There is an awesome dealer just south of Boston that hooked me up with the exact car I wanted. Weber Dodge in Hingham Mass. is great. I went there on the advice of a co worker, and he was right. Besides paying $1300 UNDER msrp, I get free oil changes for life. CHECK out their website, you won't be disappointed.

[midnight_blue_rt]

Great job ID smoker.

I too am a fan of the Fax Attack. I only targeted ~ 20 dealers. Like you, the initial response was about 50%. The best I managed was $500 over invoice, but considering the current supply/allocation situation with this vehicle.

Bottom line - cars are commodities.. Period. There is NEVER any reason to pay MSRP or over.

[needasrt4]

We bought through Woodhouse Dodge in Nebraska who is a supporting vendor on one of the other sites we frequent. After transport of our car and our trade back to him, he still saved us $3k vs buying FROM our local dealership and it was his very first RT to arrive on the lot, the salesmen never even got to take a look at it.

Just wanted to add to the fact that there are good dealerships still out there.

PS. Our local dealership sold the exact car you wanted, Inferno Red RT fully loaded minus roof rack & smokers group, to a chick & they screwed her so bad on the payments it ended up on a used car lot 2 months later and sat there for another 3 months before they were able to sell it.

[IDSmoker]

Unfortunately, it seems like availability of the Magnum RT improves as you move East!?!?

At the time that I found 2 in the entire NW (including Seattle/Portland), there were a handful in Denver, CO, and "lots" among the dealerships in Chicago, IL.

Go figure....