Cool-Blue-Dad

The salesman who sold me my RX-8 called late last week. I was a bit surprised to get a follow-up call ~3 months after the sale, but maybe it's because I was too lazy to fill out the Mazda customer purchase satisfaction survey. I actually meant to send it in with good marks.

Anyway, this dealership was selling 4 brand-new 2004s for ~30% off MSRP. I bought one and I was curious about the others so I asked if he'd sold them all -

He has one left.

Now, this is likely *the* best price anyone can get on a brand new RX-8 - these 2004s are never-titled, full warrenty.

The dealership is Shaefer & Strohminger in Baltimore ( http://www.SandSauto.com ) and my sales consultant was Sean Dulany. He was a good no-nonsense, no b.s. fellow - no transparent or offensive sales tactics, just upfront 'here's the car, here's the price, all good? let's do paperwork'.

My car had a Total MSRP of $34,375, but with the 'Paint-Prep Lustre Coat, Custom Pin Striping and Door Edge Guards' as dealer-added equipment it drove the Total Sales Price to $35,365. I'd sent an inquiry about the car to their internet sales person and she called me and said, "we'll sell you this car for $25,995." I said, "sold." That was the extent of our price negotiations.

That's a 26.5% discount and it sounded like that's about the discount they were offering on all of their 2004s.

Overall I would rate the sales manager and Sean as 'good guys' and I had no complaints about their dealership at all. If you're shopping for a new car in the NE (or to have shipped anywhere) I'd say check them out.

Cool-Blue-Dad

I don't know the exact options configuration, but I recall all 4 were weird. Mine is a good example - Touring + every possible option except rotary accents and leather/heated seats. It's far more like a GT than T.

If I remember right they had Winning Blue, Velocity Red, Brilliant Black and Nordic Green. It might be the green which is left. Sean also said they had several used RX-8s on their lot.

Sean's a good guy - I really ought to write him up explicitly in the Good Guy forum.

I got a quote for $900 to ship a car from Arizona to New York (with insurance) so a $8,000+ discount off MSRP leaves plenty of savings to justify shipping anywhere in the country (I'd recommend getting an on-site person to trust to make a thorough vehicle inspection though).

Sean's office number is 410-661-9005 and his cell is 410-627-4773. For the phone-challenged his e-mail is SDULANY@SandSauto.COM

Cool-Blue-Dad

Hi Zephyr Words, glad to help.

Jeager76, MD sales tax won't matter to you if you do not live in MD. You need to find your exact sales tax rate for your state (some vary by county like here in NY). I recommend calling your favorite, local DMV office to get the exact rate and registration fees (might need the vehicle weight to get an accurate fee estimate).

S&S collected my sales tax as part of the complete sales transaction, then sent me a check in the mail made out to my DMV for the sales tax amount. I didn't like it, but that's how their finance office works. Also, S&S claimed MD state law required them to collect a fee for a 6-day MD temp-tag which they mounted in my rear licence plate frame. I was irritated to be fleeced ~$40 by the MD DMV, but I didn't let that diminish my happiness in still saving over $8,000 against the MSRP. It also meant I didn't have to rush right to the DMV the first day home with the car.

The finance guy made a moderate push for the extended warrenty. I made a moderate push for them to throw in the extended warrenty for no charge or deeply discounted. He declined and I declined. No harm, no foul.

Overall, no complaints. The finance guy was real nice and easy to work with.

Test-drive, vehicle inspection and paperwork took ~3 hours. I probably could have shaved ~1/2 hour off that if I were not trading in a car. There was far more paperwork for the car I gave them than for the car they sold me.

Cool-Blue-Dad

I think you mean wrong sub-forum. It's definitely the right thread - it's the thread I wrote. Seriously, I considered putting this under the ForSale sub-forum or the GoodGuy/BadGuy sub-forum. I chose this one because HermanRules and a few others have been having discussions like 'how good is the price on this car?' here for weeks and months. Just getting the info to it's target audience. I considered a cross-post to the other sub-forums, but HermanRules found it in less than two hours and this is the Purchasing, Financing & Insurance sub-forum.


If you don't like something about the post say what you don't like, but I think it's bad manners to throw a generic accusation out there. I think you ought to be quite sure before you make such a statement. It's not like it's really hard to bring up 'all posts by member'.

Cool-Blue-Dad

Jeager76, I bought for more than $4,000 under invoice for a brand new 2004 bought in Sept 2005. Sean sold me that car. Obviously, they had really special, specific dealer incentives direct from Mazda for those four 2004s. I can't imagine the exact same incentives for a 2005 (yet).

Sean treated me right - no b.s., all straight-forward. I took a day off work and drove my beater trade-in over ~350 miles. There was certainly big-time opportunity for the dealership to try a little bait-and-switch on me, but they did not. Everything was exactly as had been discussed over the phone.

Now, don't rush in there and forget rule #1: Let the buyer beware. Lots of people post about their bad experiences, I'm just sharing a good experience and a price-tip. That must be why it sounded fishy to scottmhr1.

In my thinking mileage = depreciation. Depreciation due to time sitting on the dealer's lot unsold affects the dealer's books, but doesn't put wear and tear on the car. The price was so good it felt like winning a free one at a casino. I hate to gloat, but I love to say, 'dude, I know where you can score a good deal'.

Groo, thanks for the kind word.

hemanrules, I've always read that as hermanrules until now. Always wondered why you're choose hermanrules if you weren't named Herman. My bad.