So, I'm deciding between buying an off he lot cooper, or ordeing.

i) How long did it take for your cabrio to come to the US, from moment of ordering to delivery in your hands.

ii) Did the dealer provide transport (rental car/loaner car) while yours was ordered? I'm currently renting a car as I sold my old one, and dont want to rent for the 3? to 8? weeks the cooper would take to arrive

iii) When you ordered it, did they try and tack onany extra fees over and above dealer prep/document fees - particularly in southern california.




--
Also, for either ordering off-the-lot or custom, I'd like know your experience for dealer fees in southern california.

 

as far as #2 goes. they wont loan you a car. So yeah youll have to figure something out for up to 8 weeks. I had a buddies truck for like 6 weeks when my car sold in about 1

I only ordered because the ones on the lot were 08s and they were no cheaper than a new ordered 09... I think at that time they were actually trying to mark up the ones on the lot..

 

I bought mine off the lot because of C4C requirements. Love the car, but already looking forward to ordering another in a few years built just for me.
Once you get into it you will discover that MINI's are so personable that any lot car will never be what you would have ordered. Mine has a few more things on it than I might have ordered and I probably would have gotten a different color (my mandatory item was a manual trans and the dealer only had two manual Cabrio's in stock, both the same color.)
If you can get by until it comes in, my vote is to order. I did this years ago with a 5.0 liter Mustang and it drove the dealer nuts, but I really loved that car as it was "perfect".

 

You might look northward, I just bought a Clubman in Portland, they didn't budge on the price but they implied that they could be flexible on a convertible as they have quite a few in stock. Flights are cheap, especially if you're saving a grand or two, plus rental fees. Could check Sacramento and the Bay Area too.

Or buy a GM vehicle, and take advantage of their 60-day return policy while you wait for your mini to be built!

 

could potentially be genious lol. Im sure they have clauses and crap to make it very difficult to actually give it back

 

I bought my Mini from a SoCal dealership (San Diego) and they did not tack on any dealership fees. I can't remember the exact figure now, but it was reasonable. (Apparently there are laws in CA preventing dealers from adding huge fees). I even got a refund cheque from the dealer as DMV fees turned out to be less than they had expected.

However, the particular dealership I went to does add LoJack, some sort of coatings, perma plates etc to all the cars on their lot, and while speaking with them they did not seem to want to back down on the prices of those items. I ended up not buying from the lot (I bought a car that they located was on the boat on its way to the port) - so I don't know how flexible they would have been if I actually committed to a car on the lot.

Also, if it is of any help, I did get about 1200$ off the MSRP without much haggling, but this was three months ago.

 

(1) I ordered my Cabrio based on my spec, and here is the detail summary of how long each stage took. I'm on the West Coast (San Francisco area) so this summary takes into considering the time to get to the West Coast.

Feb 6th - Finalized Order, and got a Week 10 Production Number.
Feb 20th - Booked on the Topeka Vessel.
Feb 24th - Build process started.
March 4th - Build process completed.
March 6th - Arrived at the terminal/port.
March 13th - Loaded on the Topeka.
March 14th - Departed South Hampton for NY City.
March 15th - WW site updated to show all the above information by entering my VIN as the Cargo ID.
March 23rd - Arrived in NY City, and then Departed for Panama.
March 28th - Arrived in Panama, and then Departed for Port Hueneme.
April 8th - Arrived at Port Hueneme and then transported to the VPC/VDC in Southern California.
April 10th - Discharged from the VPC/VDC and on the car carrier to East Bay Mini.
April 14th - Arrived at East Bay Mini, JCW options to be installed starting the 14th.
April 16th - Pickup my baby from East Bay Mini.

(2) No transportion was provided, but I didn't need anything. I don't know of any dealer that provide temporary transportation while a vehicle is on order, but I could be wrong

(3) No extra feeds. I got $300 below MSRP for my 09 Cabrio on order. I'm from Northern California, and my dealer would have normally charge a $2000 markup, but in this economy they couldn't do that I guess.