Hey guys, my fiance and I are in the final stages of picking out our fully loaded mini countryman. We are having it ordered and will be doing a lease. After talking with my father he feels that I should be able to talk the dealer down from around 36,000 to around 32-33.

Is this realistic, or is my father stuck in 1990 when he purchased his last car?

How much did you guys talk your dealer down?

 

The winner of any negotiation is the one who can walk away. If you can walk away without the car, then ask for $33k!

 

4000 off MSRP is pretty rare for any Mini, unless it was last year's model. Some super aggressive negotiators will tell you it can be done, but the average has been around 2000 off. It also depends on if the car is on their lot, vs. an order or dealer swap.

 

If you can play 2 dealers off eachother that is the best way to do it.

 

Thats what I was thinking of doing, seeing what the mini dealer near me feels that my business is worth and then going down to philly.

 

If you are ordering the best you'll probably get is about $1k. They'll point out that they used one of their allocations for your car and if you don't take it they'll just sell it to someone else.
Also when it comes in you do not have to buy it, you can always walk away. Getting your deposit back in a timely manner is another thing.
On my custom order I was able to get $500 off with free mud flaps (highly reccommended) and some other free stuff (not the stuff Mini sends you after purchase).

Good luck and enjoy once you get it.

 

sounds like you're in jersey, i was treated very well at morristown on my initial purchase.

 

I think possibly taking some time and searching around the east coast for the car that we like, instead of ordering one might save me some money

 

You can still negotiate quite a bit on some brands, but $4k off an ordered MINI is highly unlikely.

 

See what they have in the pipeline as well: at the port, on the ship, at Bremerhaven, etc. as it's quicker than ordering if you find what you want. This is how I just found my ALL4 (picking up tomorrow!) It was sitting at the NJ port and slated to go to another dealer. My guy brought it in with no trucking charge.

Also, USAAs Car Buying service is offering extra incentives through the end of the year on 2014's (if you are a USAA member only). I was able to get a little over $2,300 off MSRP (not heavily optioned) which I was happy with.

 

Not a lot of margins on Minis compared to other makes.

We built our CM, so there was no money off MSRP after going to 3 different dealers.

our hardtop R56 was on the lot 6 hours away. I was able to get $1400 off from the dealer and another $500 loyalty credit and felt that was a pretty good deal. Not a lot of JCW's left....

 

Approx 9% mark up on a countryman which isn't a lot. Around $2k off is about as good as it can get.

 

oh the art of haggling.


Trust me... I like to do this. Must be the Slovak side of me.
I was lucky to get just $2,000 off. Also since they give a discount to Apple employees...showed my badge that I work for another large tech company and they matched it.


On the other hand, got $16,000 off of my old Nissan Titan 4x4.


But yea, not much haggle room on these.
My dad gets roasted every time he buys a BMW.


Better deals on Chevrolet, Nissan, Ford, and Dodge.


Not so much on Mini, BMW, Toyota, and Audi.


A friend of mine pit 2 dealers against each other for his Hyundai Genesis Coupe and got a heck of a deal.
His exact words were email sent, now "Go Fight!"

 

Sometimes the Euros will deal too. My mom just bought a 14 ml 500 and got 14% off sticker. It can be done

 

Really the only time you will be able to talk them down is like said above... If you can walk away but more heavily depending on the vehicle. It's slow to move it, they'll work with you. If there selling quickly though they can hold it and wait till tomorrow when someone will come in and pay full price.

If I want a deal I walk around the lot and look for older models, or vehicles optioned unusually that people would not want, or vehicles that have been on the lot for a while. You can usually tell, but Mini seems to move their cars around more and make this hard to spot.

I have not gotten any deals on any Mini's. They give good trade in on an old one towards new ones, however if there is a waiting list for cars... Good luck! On the other hand I got a brand new 5 miles on odometer from moving around lot for a year $36k last years body style Chevy 2500 WT crew cab long bed 4x4 gas truck for only $19. But they had a whole lot full of new $55k diesels and $50k 1500's with every option you could imagine. When I showed interest no haggling was needed. We went in and he gave me every deal possible. They just wanted it gone.

 

We used truecar.com quite successfully. We were able to get $2150 off MSRP, but keep in mind we ordered a car with a lot of options...msrp almost $38k. Also we agreed to pay the dealer's doc fee of $199, which is just another term for dealer profit. Also, we have several dealers in our area that don't have common ownership, so there was competition. The dealer closest to our house would not do better than $1000 off. The dealer we bought the car from was an hour away, but it was easy. We did everything over the internet/phone, and the only time we went there was to take delivery of the car. When we needed warranty service, we took it to the closest dealer, and they seemed to have no concern about where we purchased it.

 

We also used TrueCar and were able to get $2600 off an ordered car by not going to the closest dealer. The dealer we bought from knew they had to give us a strong discount to justify the 40 mile distance. Like Shark715, we bought a heavily optioned car, so the dealer had more total profit $ to play with.

Definitely suggest you check it out as the service is free and there's no obligation.

One of the other posters mentioned "allocations", but that infers that there is some limit on the quantity a dealer can get, which could not be further from the truth. If you can't find a car equipped the way you want it, it will be in production at the assembly plant in Graz, Austria not long after the dealer places the order. If there was any sort of shortage on these cars, BMW would certainly not be offering the incentives that they are.

 

I bought my first two minis and negotiated $2500 off MSRP each minimum a year apart. I just negotiated for a 2014 CM and got $3600 off!!