# All of a sudden, "dealer invoice" prices are a big secret



## Autoputzer (Mar 16, 2014)

A friend's buying a new truck and asked for some help. 

My normal process is to spec' out a vehicle on the manufacturer's website, and then spec' and price it out on KBB.com or Edmunds.com, with MSRP's and "dealer invoice" prices on the base vehicle and options. But, neither of those sites do that anymore. Instead, they want you name and e-mail so they can refer you to the local dealer for that brand.

These "dealer invoice" prices used to be a big secret back in the 1990's, before the Interwebs. The local newspaper in SE Virginia had an article on car buying and recommended buying a paperback new car price guide published by Edmund's. The local car dealers were so mad they pulled all of their advertising from the paper. I was dating a car salesmanette at the time. On her first weekend at my place she cruised my bookcase to get some insight into how my brain worked. She saw an Edmund's guide as was pissed. I think I would have fared better if I had a stack of Hustler magazines instead.

I always put "dealer invoice" in quotation marks, because as we all know there are holdbacks, spiffs, trunk money and trunk monkeys, etc., etc. etc. But like MSRP's, "dealer invoices" was a good starting point.

I'd priced and spec'd a GM POS about a year ago. According to my spreadsheet, I'd determined that the "dealer invoice" was 4.8% below the MSRP for the base car and 9% below MSRP for options. During our last BMW purchase, March 2018, it was 7% below MSPR on the base car and 8% below MSRP for options.

Does anybody know where they still publish the "dealer invoice" prices on new cars?

In other news, BMW sent me a spam e-mail saying that I've "reached a unique moment in my BMW experience" where my trade in value might me enough to pay off my loan balance. Really? Do people fall for that? I guess some do.


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## southcoastguy (Jan 3, 2017)

Not sure why this is so important. You can't force the dealer to take your offer just because you know the invoice price. If the best price is important, just ask several dealers for their "out the door" price for the model and options you want.


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## ard (Jul 1, 2009)

southcoastguy said:


> Not sure why this is so important. You can't force the dealer to take your offer just because you know the invoice price. If the best price is important, just ask several dealers for their "out the door" price for the model and options you want.


You can take 100 monkeys, put them at computers- and eventually they would type out all of Shakespeare's works.

Its more efficient if you know the invoice price. That way you arent monkeys pounding on dealerships.


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## Doug Huffman (Apr 25, 2015)

ard said:


> You can take 100 moneys, put them at computers- and eventually they would type out all of Shakespeare's works. Its more efficient if you know the invioce price. That way you arent monkies pounding on dealerships.


"The conspiracy of ignorance masquerades as common sense.". Of those 100 monkies two will agree on something and that's a fact and becomes a fact, it's just commonsensical!


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## Autoputzer (Mar 16, 2014)

southcoastguy said:


> Not sure why this is so important. You can't force the dealer to take your offer just because you know the invoice price. If the best price is important, just ask several dealers for their "out the door" price for the model and options you want.


It's not the end of the world, but it's a fundamental change in how new cars have been sold for the last 40 years or so.

I don't shop around when I buy a new car. I like my BMW dealership. I've been dealing with them for almost 20 years. I keep cars a long time, so the quality of the service department is far more important than a few hundred bucks when I'm buying the car. I'm also willing to pay for good service in the showroom, specifically: no tricks, factory ordering a car, and having it delivered unwashed and therefore unscratched. If I replace my F10 with a G30, swapping out the run-flat tires as part of new car prep' will be in the equation. If they do all those things, they'll probably make more money off me than they do on the next guy. Similarly, I tipped 28% at dinner tonight. The good service thing can go the other way, too. I'm done with the local GM, VW-Honda, and Chrysler-Dodge-Jeep-Ram-Hyundai-Mitsubishi-Lincoln dealerships, based on how their showrooms (new car sales departments) are run.

When I buy a new car, I "need" to be below MSRP after taxes and titling fees. That makes the first year's deprecation where it needs to be.


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## Jon Shafer (Dec 15, 2001)

*"Invoice" is absolutely, positively, 100% irrelevant today* as far as selling new BMWs goes, anyway.

There is 6.5% profit margin built in, so it is easy to calculate invoice. Practically every deal that I work, the buyer could not care less what invoice is. *The Internet says they should get 10% off MSRP, so invoice is not even a consideration*.


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## ard (Jul 1, 2009)

I


Jon Shafer said:


> *"Invoice" is absolutely, positively, 100% irrelevant today* as far as selling new BMWs goes, anyway.
> 
> There is 6.5% profit margin built in, so it is easy to calculate invoice. Practically every deal that I work, the buyer could not care less what invoice is. *The Internet says they should get 10% off MSRP, so invoice is not even a consideration*.


isnt this just semantics?

People need a target to know if they are getting a good deal. Call it "10% off MSRP" or "Invoice"....

Or are we going to do the insulting "what number will get you into this fine car today?"... the old 'a good deal is a deal you like'...or 'shop until you get tired and take the lowest' or 'ask 5 dealers take the lowest.'

(Jon, you are not a good example because your sales process is unlike 99.9% of dealers in the US.)
'
We know BMW is working very hard with their dealers to hide pricing, hide incentives and make invoice irrelevant.

Anyway, 10% off? I'll call you tomorrow about that Kith M4....


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## Jon Shafer (Dec 15, 2001)

ard said:


> I
> 
> isnt this just semantics?
> 
> ...


Bimmerfest.com exists today because for many years I posted factory wholesale (invoice) pricing .pdfs here with every update from 2001 until 8 or 9 nine years ago. We were threatened with litigation so many times, finally they got so strong with us we had no choice but comply and scrub our servers of any incriminating posts.

Its kind of sad. But I am trying to make a point that today, invoice is meaningless If buyers were willing to pay invoice or anything close to it, I could/would sell out my pipeline in short order.

I've had nobody inquire about M4 lately, no interested parties in Kith until now!


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## namelessman (Dec 23, 2004)

Autoputzer said:


> Does anybody know where they still publish the "dealer invoice" prices on new cars?


This does not sound promising, at the same time if dynamic market prices with hidden incentives can drop prices even further, then invoice will also be meaningless.

Given FMV/trade is inflated, and new car incentives/real costs are hard to decipher, one-price(like Telsa's) may be the best deal(i.e. no room to move) at the time.


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## Jon Shafer (Dec 15, 2001)

Autoputzer said:


> Does anybody know where they still publish the "dealer invoice" prices on new cars?


Not sure about other brands, however, if you divide the MSRP for any BMW (> $100k) by 1.065 the dividend will be a figure so close to invoice it will blow your mind. Always within a couple of hundred.


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## Autoputzer (Mar 16, 2014)

Jon Shafer said:


> Not sure about other brands, however, if you divide the MSRP for any BMW (> $100k) by 1.065 the dividend will be a figure so close to invoice it will blow your mind. Always within a couple of hundred.


Anytime is use the phrase "dealer invoice" it's always in quotation marks.

I'm not really BMW shopping for another 2.5 years or so. But, if my car was totaled today, I have a 330i, 530i, and a 540i already spec'ed and priced out. When we bought Frau Putzer's X3 in March 2018, "dealer invoice" prices were readily available and it was 7% below MSRP on the base car and 8% below MSRP on options. Using those rates, and Jon's "MSRP/1.065" here are the numbers for those three cars on my wish list:


Auto's FormulaJon's FormulaMSRP330i $ 49,546.50 $ 50,065.73 $ 53,320.00530i $ 60,729.80 $ 61,347.42 $ 65,335.00540i $ 65,612.30 $ 66,277.00 $ 70,585.00

I tend to load cars up with options. My 2014 535i MSRP-ed for $73,030. So, that would skew my estimated "dealer invoice" down.

Back in the 1990's, my car salesmanette girlfriend sold Ford's and lived and died by "dealer invoice," because that's how her commissions were calculated.

Now, let's talk money factors and residuals...


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