The Internet has made it easy and free to look up invoice pricing, holdbacks, incentives and rebates, even to price out options on cars. Here are a few of the sites out there:
– Edmunds.com (www.edmunds.com) was the first site on the Internet to provide automobile pricing information at no cost. Edmunds.com also provides automobile reviews, consumer information, information about incentives and rebates and consumer tutorials for buying and leasing. Also available is Edmund’s True Market Value, based on price surveys and the supply of the particular model of car, that attempts to set a low sales price for new cars that is still fair to buyer and dealer.
– Kelley Blue Book (www.kbb.com) Les Kelley published his first Blue Book of Motor Car Values in 1918, for the used-car industry. He showed factory list price and cash value on thousands of used vehicles. The company would later publish a consumer’s guide and eventually set up on the Internet. However, readers beware. In most cases dealers will not want to give you the Kelley trade-in value on your car, any more than you will want to pay Kelley retail value for the cars on their lot.
– CarSmart.com (carsmart.com) Originally a service for credit unions, CarSmart reached out to consumers with the advent of the Internet and is now a division of Autobytel.com.
Autoadvice.com (www.autoadvice.com) Reading on this site, written by a former auto salesman, includes “The top mistakes you are likely to make” and “Sneaky stuff some dealers do.”
