---
title: 'Save THOUSANDS at Car Dealership. How to negotiate a car deal in 2024. The most important tip.'
source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=LPqgW4AHK1I'
video_id: 'LPqgW4AHK1I'
date: 2026-07-01
duration_sec: 0
---

# Save THOUSANDS at Car Dealership. How to negotiate a car deal in 2024. The most important tip.

> Source: [Save THOUSANDS at Car Dealership. How to negotiate a car deal in 2024. The most important tip.](https://youtube.com/watch?v=LPqgW4AHK1I)

## Summary

This video explains a powerful negotiation strategy for buying a car from a dealer: working the price from the bottom up using the trade-in value. The creator demonstrates how to use Kelly Blue Book to estimate what the dealer likely paid, then anchor a low offer. Additional tips include checking reliability, getting an independent inspection, and negotiating via email.

### Key Points

- **Flip the Script** [00:18] — Work the price from the bottom up instead of the dealer's top-down approach.
- **Use Kelly Blue Book Trade-In Value** [00:50] — Look up the trade-in value of the car you want to buy to estimate what the dealer might have paid.
- **Dealer Markup Example** [01:53] — A 2015 Camry listed at $28,995 had a trade-in value of $16,886, showing a markup of over $6,000.
- **Call the Dealer to Gauge Trade-In** [03:00] — Pretend to trade in a similar car to get a ballpark offer from the dealer.
- **Anchor a Low Offer** [03:47] — Offer 16k for the Camry with a straight face – set the anchor low and work up.
- **Be Polite and Willing to Walk Away** [04:34] — Politeness and patience pay off – dealers may call back days or weeks later to accept a low offer.
- **Email Negotiation Example** [05:16] — Sent an email offering $42,000 for an F-150 (MSRP $51,000); dealer countered at $43,000 after a few exchanges.
- **Check Carfax and AutoCheck** [07:10] — Look for cars with clean titles and no accidents; avoid high-priced cars with accident history.
- **Dealer Handling Fees Report** [07:41] — Ask for a detailed dealer handling report – if they cannot provide it, it may be a red flag.
- **Independent Mechanic Inspection** [08:21] — Take the car to an independent mechanic for inspection and use findings for further negotiation.
- **Check Reliability History** [09:14] — Use sites like Car Complaints or Edmunds to research model reliability before buying.

### Conclusion

By anchoring a low offer based on trade-in value and using tactics like email negotiation, inspections, and reliability checks, you can save thousands of dollars at a car dealership.

## Transcript

this tip will save you thousands when
buying a car from a dealer this one
thing will let you walk away a winner or
a loser if you don't play it right and
that's not all I'll give you a couple
more tips at the end to save you even
more money so are you ready to take
control of your next car purchase let's
make it happen Okay the first tip and
this is huge you need to flip the script
on the dealer now what do I mean by that
let me explain you want to work the
price from the bottom up not the top
down the dealer ship always wants to
work the price from the price they set
down you want to have the leverage in
the deal work it from the bottom up I'm
going to show you how to do that now now
let's say you want to buy this lovely
2015 Camry with 41,000 Mi for
$28.95 but you don't like the price
right so let's let's get it down now in
order to make this dealer the right
offer you got to head over to Kelly Blue
Book we're going to look at the tradein
value for this Camry as if we were
trading the car in to try to figure out
what the dealer probably paid someone to
get this car on their lot if it didn't
come from an auction easiest way to do
that is just to grab the VIN plug it in
there and hit go and the next thing
we'll do is plug in the mileage and the
zip code click next a few times and get
your value now when you're trying to get
the Kelly blook trade-in value for the
car that you want to buy you want to
check this out and look at the condition
of the car so go through the images see
if there's any
obvious cosmetic or mechanical things
that are listed with it if not just
select good as a kind of a baseline or
very good don't ever select excellent or
Fair it's kind of two opposite ends of
the spectrum so we're going to select
very good in this case just to give them
the benefit of the doubt and we'll
bypass this form for now and then you'll
get this lovely tradein value tradein
value for this car is listed at $
4,886 so if I do some quick math on this
go back
$2,895 minus the $1 5,899 if we're
giving them the benefit of the doubt
that's still at least 6,00 000 that
they've got marked up on this car from
what they gave someone and they most
likely didn't give them anywhere near
$16,000 for the tradeing if you've ever
traded in a car I've traded in probably
40 or 50 different vehicles in my
lifetime I rarely ever see a dealer
offer me tradein value especially high
tradein value what they typically do is
they come back and say I'm sorry we
can't give you trade in value we can
only give you blackbook or auction value
for this car and auction value tends to
always be less than Kelly Blue Book
trade in value the only time there's an
exception to this is maybe from 2020 to
2022 or end of 2023 when there was a
shortage in the car market they actually
were giving a little bit more on trade
in because used cars were worth more but
those days are over we're getting back
to normal here and this tip should work
and if you're really interested in
checking this car out and you want to
see if my theory is correct you should
look at the car that you're interested
in call the dealership that has the car
that you're interested in and pretend
like you're trading in a very similar
car so give them maybe the same year the
same model and trim maybe change the
mileage by 5 or 10,000 miles one way or
the other and they will give you some
idea some ballpark estimate of what they
would give you on a trade for that car
now don't tell them you're interested in
buying theirs you just want to see what
they're going to give you on tradeing
value and you'll get a ballpark this
value over the phone is usually a little
bit higher than what they would give you
in person because they're trying to lose
you in and bait you in to the dealership
but it's still a good gauge and you can
still get an idea pretty quickly okay so
in this case I would call the dealer
actually I would probably go look at the
car first see if I'm even interested in
it drive the car go through a thorough
inspection and if it's a car you want to
buy I would offer them $166,000 for this
car with a straight face be very polite
uh don't be rude just
$116,000 and that's how you set the
anchor you set the anchor low they
wanted it high so now you're working
from a position of low and working your
way up you know you're probably not
going to get the car for $166,000 and
that's okay you have a little bit of
wiggle room to come up this also means
you don't have to negotiate out all of
those junk fees dealer handling and all
these other gations that people tell you
to go through if you get a good enough
deal on the base price then maybe paying
paying dealer handling and some other
etching fees and whatever maybe they
don't matter because you've saved
thousands on the front end of this deal
and you've changed the leverage now you
do have to remember be polite be nice be
willing to walk away be willing to even
leave wait a day maybe a week even a
month I've had car dealers call me back
the next day the next week the next
month and actually take a lowball offer
that I gave them because I was polite I
wasn't rude I just gave them an offer in
writing and I had a price I wanted to
stick to and they eventually called me
if they didn't call me I was okay with
that there are plenty of vehicles to buy
you don't have to buy that one and to
prove that this works I actually did
this on a new vehicle or a tactic
similar to it I didn't have the tradein
value to go off of but I still kind of
played it off the invoice price so check
this email out I sent this Ford dealer
an email about an F-150 XL the MSRP was
51,000 their initial email their first
email back to me they said they would
sell it for $
4,849 I said that wasn't good enough I
sent the most simple email back I said
hi P I might consider this if it's
42,000 but I think it's too much for a
2023 XL and this was sent just at the
beginning of March 2024 said let me know
if that's possible or not thank you she
emailed back and said let me talk to my
boss and run some numbers then we had
two more email exchanges this one she
writes back and says here are the
numbers for the F-150 these are average
we can get you 43,000 and as you can see
right there attached in writing they
took a little picture with their iPhone
or something and sent it to me in email
you can see 43 000 right here now keep
in mind I only did about 5 minutes of
work to get this email exchange going I
emailed some dealerships I found a truck
that I thought I might like and then
just started a conversation I did find a
dealership that had more stock than
another dealer you can use leverage
points like that to work in your favor
on the deal so coming full circle and
then we'll get to those other tips I was
talking about the the number one thing
that you need to take away from this is
look at the trade-in value of vehicles
if you're buying a used vehicle
or look at the invoice value on a new
vehicle and you'll find at least how
much leverage you can come from from the
bottom up rather than working from the
top down on the price works every time
if a dealer's unwilling to do it you
need to just find another dealer and if
a dealer tells you that times have
changed and we don't have that much
profit in these cars they are lying
trust me and keep in mind you will have
more leverage if you go in person I like
doing things through email first just to
try to to filter out who I think is
going to be more willing to work with me
but once you get in person you should
have even more leverage now I have a
couple more tips to help you out with
some leverage points first off you
definitely want to check to make sure
that the car has like an auto check or a
Carfax report make sure it's clean I
always look for cars that don't have
title Brands uh no accidents if I can
find them there are a lot of cars now
with accidents but it's just worth more
if it doesn't have any accidents if you
find a car that's high priced and it has
an accident history away there's there's
no reason to even start negotiating but
if you find cars that don't have
accidents uh and they're at a high price
there's probably a reason why they're a
little higher priced than the ones that
had multiple accidents so okay the next
tip is to look at the dealer handling
fees if your dealer is tacking on
another five or 600 or $700 onto the
dealer handling of the car what you can
do is say can you please provide me with
your dealer handling report I want a
detailed report of what you spent money
on if they don't provide that that might
be a red flag that they're they're a
little shady most dealers will provide
you with some inspection report and even
if it's fake they'll at least try to
identify what they put their money into
so if they say that they put new tires
on the car but you see that there aren't
new tires on the car that'll be a point
of negotiation for you same thing with
brakes or anything else the next tip
that you can do is you can say I want to
take this car to get it inspected by a
mechanic I assume you don't have a
problem with that they shouldn't have a
problem with that an independent
mechanic not the one at the dealer and
see what problems they come up with a
lot of the time independent mechanics
will find all sorts of things that the
dealer didn't find or just anomalies
that you didn't catch when you were
doing your inspection yourself so get
that inspection from another mechanic
then you can take that take it back to
the dealer and use that as leverage for
more negotiation off the price that
you've already hopefully negotiated down
to a reasonable price now you're
stacking multiple different things you
got them down on that initial price then
you're negotiating this extra inspection
and anything that might come up in the
inspection it's a used car they don't
have warranty so you want to definitely
get an inspection you don't want any
surprises and the last tip I have for
you and maybe this should have been at
the beginning but whatever is check a
site like car complaints or other sites
out there that have reliability data no
matter how bad you want a car just
because it looks cute or sexy or
whatever please please go check and look
at the reliability history of that used
vehicle and just see what the track
record is and you'll see websites all
over uh Edmonds car complaints uh many
different websites and they'll list out
cars that are known good cars known good
models and years and you can find those
drill down and maybe it's not the exact
car you wanted but you'll probably be a
lot happier down the road if you don't
have a lot of mechanical problems after
you buy a car and you spent the money
think about it 3 to 6 months down down
the road what happens the car gets dirty
it gets dinged or keyed or whatever and
eventually you're not caring about the
looks of the car as much as you are the
mechanical and reliability just point A
to B transportation so that's just
something you have to consider in the
purchase and it'll pay off down the road
I'm coming out with a guide here soon
and I'm going to actually include
something like this in the guide it's
going to be just a full guide of how to
research car reliability how to focus on
good cars instead of bad cars what to
look out for you can do inspections
yourself if you don't want to pay a
mechanic so that's all coming up in a
free course not completed with it yet so
I still got a lot of filming to do
anyway sub up if you want to see that
and we'll catch you in the next one