Good News- I sold my 944, so I can proceed with my RX8 purchase.

Bad News- I am extremely busy with my job right now (Realtor). I basically don't have time to devote 4 hours of negotiation time any day soon. So I tried using the Mazda dealer contact thingy through Edmunds, where I have an email sent to the 5 closest dealers, requesting pricing. Also, I directly contacted by leaving a message and emailing the salesman who was on my test drive. I told him I wanted the best he could do on a few trim levels, and to email me. He responded by email saying he'd be too busy this weekend to email me, but I could stop by if I had the time. I was suprised by this blow-off, as he seemed pretty astute when we first met. Perhaps he missed the fact that I was ready to buy today if I got a good price. I got an automated email from Wellesley Mazda, saying they sell all models for $250 under invoice.

How do you guys recommend I proceed? I just want to get someone to commit to a price without a hassle by remote, and then I will glady show up, check in hand, ready to sign and go. Is this method so unorthodox? I was figuring $500 under invoice for an '05 was a good target, based on what I have read here. Am I on the right track?

My ideal car would be Black sport package (actually, Pearl White Sport package would be ideal but as far as I know there isn't one for sale anywhere NEAR Boston). I am open to other combos too of course, not too picky.

Somebody straighten me out here!

 

I'd keep on trying. They shouldn't have a problem "selling" you one "electronically", then have you pick it up and check it out.. They probably don't realize how serious you are about getting one.

 

Many dealers may hate online buying just as much as they may love it. This has given the buyer more leverage. Best idea is to keep trying and demand an online no haggle price. Remember you have to be fair, because negoiating online exactly like you would in person won't work everywhere. It depends on price salesman is allowed to let it go at, and where you live. I'd look it up on edmunds, go 500 below invoice, and make offer. Good luck!!

 

You might want to try www.carsdirect.com. There are two options, the first is something similar to what you did, you have a request into their dealers to get price quotes. The second, which sounds like it is more for you, is that you actually have a Cars Direct rep. work for you to get the price you see on Cars Direct & pretty much do all the negotiation for you. My friend got his Toyota Sienna this way, & it was way less painful than how I got my Mazda (I did the 1st option & the dealer, Santa Monica mazda, wound up screwing me).

 

I have a few other suggestions. Though this is not how I bought my 8, it is how I purchased my wife’s NEW Mazda 2004 MPV ES last year. 1st use http://www.kbb.com/. Select New Car. Plug in the Make and Model. Then Year and Your Zip. Then Trim. Then click the Options Tab and select all the happy stuff you really want. By the time you are done selecting you will be at the bottom where you can solicit several dealers with your selected build, "Get a Quick Dealer Price Quote". The Emails will roll in. My experience was 2 of the 3 local dealers actually offered at least 2 vehicles with similar options , colors etc.. and listed there willing sell price.
Now if at all possible try to locate someone who can get you a FORD PIN# (A Plan, etc). Ford Motor owns like 50% of Mazda USA so if you can acquire a Ford Pin you will save like 1-3K right off the lowest price you negotiate. After my negotiation (Tax & Title too), PIN and 8K down I financed like 15.5K on a stickered 32K MPV.
Also I know you said you were busy, but consider purchasing it from the Deep South. Right now it is a buyers market down there (Where I purchased my Used 2004 RX-8 for 3K less than the lowest beat up I could get from anyone in my area). I know a good honest fella in Georgia if you are interested. I bet he could even work a way to have it freighted to your local dealer… The on that Blew you off too!!!

 

Mazda's S-Plan is Invoice pricing (within a hundred bucks or so anyhow). So if you can get invoice or below it without resorting to S-Plan there's no point is giving them your PIN. Plan purchases are not like 'coupons' that you redeem for XXXX off the price. Every vehicle has a set Plan price. And thesedays, more often than not, you can beat that price on your own. Plan pricing is only good on cars that you can't negotiate much on -- like the Mazda3 was last year.

Besides, it's against the rules to negotiate a deal before using your PIN, you are required to notify the dealer that you intend to use S-Plan before you begin negotiating on the price. So you can't sit there and try to get them below S-Plan then when they don't, whip out your pin number.

 

Dealers generally don't have any rules other Legal Regulations forced upon them and the rule to bilk the Sucker for as much as you can. Never heard of this rule and sure did not apply to my purchase. Besides, I just stated how I purchased the MPV and the low quote came from the dealers email so either way the PIN was not a blind-side, it was part of the negation to achieve a lower price.
Just offering options and ideas to the fella.
Respectfully

 

Well the overall point was that using a S-Plan PIN is not going to save you $1-3K off the lowest price you can negotiate. It's not a rebate of some sort. It's just a set price. In fact, right now, the lowest price you can negotiate on an RX-8 is, more often than not, actually cheaper than S-Plan pricing. So it's not even worth it to go get the PIN.

Plan pricing is only good on cars you can't negotiate on due to demand or if you just hate negotiating. I'm eligible for Plan pricing on virtually ever make of car that ther eis (except Honda/Acura), but the only one that I would actually go through the trouble of getting a PIN for is Toyota/Lexus or perhaps a particular model for some makes (like my Mazda3 last year when I bought it). It's just too easy to get to invoice-pricing on almost every make and model out there thesedays.

 

Bypass all the BS and go through a fleet company. They can work with any car, any dealership, and can work in neighboring states to find exactly what you want. Tell them what you want, how much you'll spend, and let them do the rest of the work for you. No haggling. No nuthin. They'll arrange your loan, tag, and probably deliver your car to your door step.

That's how I bought my 99 miata, and how I bought my '04 RX8. Good luck

 

I got 5k off the price of my 8 with the S plan.

 

I was reading this and thinking "wow this sounds like what I went through" Then I realized you are in Boston like me so we probably dealt with the same dealers. I got really frustrated that I couldn't get a quote online. I kept getting the same blow off as you, "Oh I can't quote you now but come on down and I'll give you a quote" Seems like a lot of dealers are just using these car sites as an extended form of advertising to get you to come into the showroom where they can beat you down old school style.

I got a lot of trouble from Mazda Gallery in Norwood. I sent about 10 emails back and forth with them asking for a quote and everytime the were evasive and told me to come in. Even after I said I don't have a car so I can't just come in, I have to borrow a friends that's why I'm trying to get quotes online. But it was like talking to a robot they kept replying "Come in and I'll give you a price". I got frustrated and said "I'm not comming unless I get a quote first" Their response? "You can find out the market value of the car from edmunds.com" Gee thanks for the help. ********. I then went as far as to tell them my car is in the shop so I can't come in, please give me a quote as I'm planning on buying a new car within the next week. Their response and this is whole thing "When can you bring in your car so we can talk trade in" rolleyes: Like talking to a wall.

In the meantime I got an email from Wellesley Mazda with a very nice quote in the first email with no bullshit. I went in there to talk with them expecting them to deny the internet quote but they actually gave me a new quote which was even lower. I ended up buying my 04 from them this past January for about $7K under MSRP, free oil changes for life and a free extended warranty to 100K miles or 4 years. It was a very pleasant experience and the service department there has been very good. I would recommend talking to them.

To be fair I did get another quote online from Ira Mazda but I think the place was up in Danvers and the quote was higher than what I got from Wellsley. I shot them an email back with the Wellsley quote and they never responded so I'm guessing they couldn't do better. :

 

Where is wellsley? Just out of curiousity?

 

Heres the GUARANTEED way to get the best price possible without talking to a salesman at all. I used this method and got my 8 for $600 under invoice. Use mycar.com. It costs 19.95 and works like an ebay auction. You can pick any car you want (in your case an 8) and the 10 Mazda dealers nearest your zip code will have one week to bid against each other to give you the lowest price possible. Bidding is based on the dealer invoice price, so the bids will be an amount over, at, or under invoice. When the auction ends, you can contact any dealer that placed a bid and finalize the deal, or if you change your mind, you are under no obligation to buy. I love this website. Kind of fun doing it this way, IMO. I've yet to find someone on here that gave this method a try.

 

Wellsley is just outside of Boston Massachusetts.