I bought a new truck in 1990 with cash. The salesman just about shit when we got to the "How do you want to finance this" part and I told him it wasn't necessary.....I just needed his best price to close the deal. He and the new truck manager didn't seem to know what to do but when I said it was ok........I would just shop around a few more places they got it ironed out pretty quick, even threw in a bed liner installed.

Only fun I've ever had buying a car..........

 
Not if you don't sign a credit application.


The dealership is not allowed to run your credit without a signed credit app, by law.


If you put your social security number on a credit application and sign it without telling them not to run your credit, they'll run it.

 
Are you also pissed off when a waitress asks if you want dessert at the end of your meal?




It's part of the finance guy's job to offer those things to every single customer, no matter what.  A lot of dealerships video tape the transaction and if the finance guy doesn't go through the whole spiel with every customer, they can be fired.  I was chewed out a few times at my last dealership because I didn't go through the 15 minute product presentation for cash buyers who told me flat out "I don't want anything, do not try to sell me anything, let's just sign paperwork."  The flip side is you'd be surprised how many of those people actually buy aftermarket products after starting out completely against the idea.  The people who told me up front "I don't want to hear about it" were basically telling me "Don't try to sell me anything because I don't trust myself to not fall for it."

Not true for me. They asked me for my Tax ID and/or ssn to report the transaction. Much like a bank reports cash deposits or withdrawals of $9,999.00+.
As my earlier post reflects, this is a fact.
If they are running your credit for a cash purchase then they need to be questioned.

Absolutely and F&I will hate you.

I had a real POS F&I manager that would not run cash deals near/past closing because he wouldn't be making hardly anything on the deal.

 
Where people screw up is they don't pay attention to what they're signing when the sales guy throws a credit app in front of them.  It seems like common sense but pay close attention to everything you're filling out because the sales guy is focused on one thing only: "OMFG!  I MAY HAVE A SALE!" and they usually won't slow down to explain what they need and why.


Once you sign that credit app and the salesman takes it to his manager, you're going to get a hard pull.

 
I've WANTED to do that plenty of times...




It's the salesman's job to expedite the process if it's near closing or already past.  In one of the dealerships I worked for, Indian dudes would deliberately come in right before we closed because they knew that everyone just wanted to go home and would end up agreeing to whatever stupid price the guy wanted.  




There's nothing worse than sitting there 3 hours after you're supposed to have gone home because a salesman can't close a fucking deal.  My M.O. was always the same "let them take the car home tonight and come back tomorrow to finish up this shit show."


 

Funny. The local Toyota dealer is a close friend and as a joke he had an FI in training guy come in and give me a pitch on GAP insurance. Poor kid couldn't figure out why we were laughing so hard.

I paid $3-4 of my car in cash. It wasn't a problem.
I also paid for about $4-5k of my house in cash. That WAS a problem. The bank insisted on checks or credit card for everything because, and this is an exact quote "We don't know if this is drug money or if you've been smuggling surface to air missiles to Libya." I have banked there for a decade and a half and I was not amused.

 
Poor newb.  I had a few people who were putting down over 40% of the purchase price ask me about GAP.  I just politely explained what GAP insurance covers and some still didn't get it.


 

Yep. Why give someone a car for 20k today when they could charge them $400 a month for 60 months? A 20 percent return is a good one.

So are you best setting up financing, and then paying off that financing immediately?

 

I buy all my vehicles cash (cashier's check, not a sack full of hundos) and no one cares one bit if I don't finance.

I have only bought 2 cars and financed both. Paid them both off in under half the time down to $100. Let it sit on my credit report so I have years worth of I time payments. Right now my credit score is in the low 800's

Why not? I've paid for two new vehicles with cash over years and they never batted an eye. Matter a fact one of them I got for 5 grand less than they were asking because I walked in with 35K and they were asking 40K.

J-

 
If you really really want to have a title in your hand for a depreciating vehicle, sure.


It depends on how low your interest rate is, what the rest of your debt situation looks like, where you can better spend the cash, etc.


Unless you like getting a shitty deal, never pay cash at the dealership.

They would be stupid, not to take it.

Aloha, Mark

 
That had nothing to do with the fact that you paid cash, I assure you.

I really should write an instruction manual on how to buy a car.

Even people who have done it several times are deluded, missing important info, or simply making huge mistakes every time because they don't know what's going on behind the scenes.

Did I just read that right? A car salesperson actually did something to help a customer? Can't be. I thought we were all scumbags intent on taking over the world. Who would have thought.

To answer the OPs question of course you can pay with cash. Like some have said here if you walk in with over 10k there is the IRS form that has to be filled out. No way around that. Also, many times you can get a better deal financing the car short term and then pay it off.

For the people saying screw the finance guy please understand that it is now law that if we as a dealership are going to offer any kind of warranty/service plan we have to offer it to EVERYBODY. No exclusions. If we don't offer it it can be called discrimination and we can be fined. I know it sounds dumb but that's the law.

In the time I have been here I have had multiple people want to either pay the whole car off cash or put 25k to 30k down on something. If the person can qualify for a decent rate I always ask them if they want to finance the car anyways. My thought is that what happens if you put that money down on this car and have a sudden medical issue? What if you have a furnace explode and need $8000 to replace it. The best cars on the planet are a depreciating item. Your cash is your cash. Once we have agreed on a price I really don't care if you finance it or not. I want you to have as much of Ford's money as you can get and I want you to keep as much of your cash as you can.

Why not?  I believe the writing on each bill says "legal tender for all debts, public and private".

Please do. I'd be interested to read it and I'm sure almost everyone could benefit.

Last car my Dad bought he paid cash money for.

Of course

I paid for my last vehicle in cash.

/thread

This. I'll take a tip from anyone, anywhere if it saves me money.

Counterfeiting.  Every one of those bills would have to be checked.  Banks have machines that do it.  I doubt car dealers do.

Why wouldn't they? Money is money. Fed lae says that if $10k in cash is used THEY must report it.
Expect a look see into your finances from your favorite uncle Sam.

I bought a used car from the dealership last Monday, paid in $100s and $20s. Told them what I wanted to pay, they offered a car just above my price. Told them it would be cash money, suddenly it was exactly the price I wanted to pay. Funny that.

Mind you, it wasn't a brand new car prices, but wanted a nice Honda Accord for my 69 year old Mom as an early birthday gift. I have some clients who pay in cash, so sometimes we end up with a decent amount of cash that I keep in the safe for such things.

This is a shitty thing to do.  The finance manager gets paid commission on the loan, but he can be charged back of the loan is paid off within 90 days. You get your finance incentive, and the finance manager gets $ yanked out of his paycheck.    If you're going to do this, at least wait more than 90 days.

Yes. And they will also notify the IRS and DHS that you did.

I have bought cars for cash before.

Not a single problem was had.  

They're making a profit regardless of your payment option... believe that.   It's just less paperwork for them to take cash (other than getting an armored truck to come get the money).

Moron in my gun club once paid for a Cadillac with a big box of silver certificates.  He could have sold them for twice the face value.

I paid about $18,000 for a car a few years ago in $100 bills.  It was a pain in the ass.  Shoulda written a check.

They weren't done negotiating until you let them win.

I remember buying a new car without showing DL.
Try that today.

Probably, I grew up in and around the horse business. Horse trading is supposed to be in my genetic makeup, but I hate haggling. If something seems fair to me I'll do it, whereas my father lived to bargain for a damn hour back and forth for a hundred bucks.

 

I'm usually an easy mark for sales people, but I'm also really tight, so I usually set a spending limit on myself.  It kinda works out in the long run. My best friend makes a rusty hinge noise whenever I pull out my wallet whenever he goes with me to buy something over a couple hundred dollars.

The place where I worked wouldn't bat an eyelash. At most, they would call the owner and tell him that someone would have to take the money to the bank. This would be met with a little frustration because they had eleven franchises and the corporate officers tended to be very busy, but somebody high up would take care of it.

They certainly would not leave it around the store.

What if you were stopped by a cop on the way there and they took your money?

Real question.

I have no answer, other than Welcome to the New America.

 

Yup.   So save the cash, finance as much as needed to get the lowest possible price, then pay it all the next month.

i know there is a shit load of wiggle room on car pricing but could they not have told me "to piss up a rope, the price is 40K."?

J-

I've bought a new truck with cash. The dealership couldn't understand why anyone would ever do that instead of financing, but they did take my cash in the end and I drove off with my new truck.

I paid cash for a new 5th wheel in February of 2014.  Didn't have my credit report run.  Other than a bunch of eye rolling and waiting while the finance guy ran a counterfeit pen over every single hundred dollar bill I had no problems.  I have no doubt they reported it to the IRS.

Yep

 
Had a fair amount of people buy motorcycles and ATVs for cash at the dealership I worked . it's a PITA as you have to report it to the IRS if over 10k and you have to send a member of management offbthe sales floor to handle and deposit the cash


Took personal checks all the time let um leave with the vehicle .

If the check bounces they don't get a title and it gets reported stolen unless they get it taken care of Ricky tick

so should one negotiate a cash price to begin with, and then subsequently negotiate a financing price?

You are forgetting MARKETSHARE,  and quota numbers from the manufacturer, and the inevitable rising expectation of MOAR, MOAR MOAR. From management.

They still wanted to sell the car and at $35k, they were making a profit.  If they gave in to your $35k offer easily, they still got one over on you.




Anytime a dealership isn't putting up a big fight or they're being especially nice to you, they're making big money on the sale.

 
I wouldn't mention cash at all.




I would tell them that my primary concerns are my APR and my "total amount financed."  Make sure you use that term specifically because the total amount financed is the TRUE amount that you're "paying" for the car after tax, title, fees, etc.




That's why I keep saying you shouldn't even try hard to negotiate until you're talking to the finance guy because he is the one who'll be able to give you those actual numbers.  The sales manager is pulling numbers out of his ass the majority of the time and his job is to get you to agree to the highest possible APR and purchase price so that A) he already has plenty of front-end profit and B) it leaves room for the finance guy to add on to the deal.




Example:  You sign an agreement for a purchase price of $35,000 with 2.4% APR.  The sales manager is making $1500 on the car.




The reality is, if you play enough hard ball with the finance guy, he can get the sales manager to give up his front-end profit with a promise of making it on the back-end (aftermarket products or "reserve" paid from the bank).




So in this case, the smart thing to do would be to sign whatever horseshit offer you get from the sales desk and once you get in the finance manager's office, you say "ok, I want to know what you can do for me with the APR and I plan to get a warranty and some other aftermarket stuff from you so let's put together a deal here..."  The finance manager will usually balk and say "well you already agreed to this APR and this price with the sales desk..."  At that point, you inflate his ego by saying "yeah but I know you're the real deal maker."




If you really want to get a good deal and you ARE planning on paying it off very quickly, you could totally fuck the dealership by agreeing to every single item you're offered in the finance office: service plan, maintenance, tires, paint, etc.  If you start buying a bunch of back-end product, the finance department will talk the sales desk into cutting the price of the car down as far as possible so they don't go over the loan-to-value amount.  Everyone will start being VERY nice to you because they see dollar signs.  Pay close attention to what you're paying for the actual car... all that will be broken down on the contract.  Let them cannibalize the selling price of the car to fit more aftermarket shit on there.





The real trick to getting a crazy deal is to make the dealership feel like they're winning even though you know you're going to cancel all the items that are padding their profit.  If you put up a hard fight on the purchase price, they'll stick to their guns and remember... they do that shit multiple times every single day.  You are not a better negotiator than they are.  You're never really negotiating with the salesman, you're negotiating with the sales manager and those guys typically make decent six figure salaries for a reason.





 

Most states have some rule about property purchases and cash. I found that out when I was buying my land. Told the closing attorney to expect cash at closing. He said nope. Anything over $5000 had to be wire transferred by state law. Had to discuss the wire transfer with the Vice President of my bank because the tellers had no clue what to do...

Very eye opening experience all the way around.