Chevrolet Dealer’s Secrets

Chevrolet Dealer's Secret 1: Consumer Incentives

Zero percent financing, employee discount, cash back, out-the-door price tags...

Most dealers work hard to offer the public competitive prices. These incentives can grab your attention, but they can also obscure the actual terms you're getting on your purchase.

Chevrolet Dealer's Secret 2: Finance & Insurance

Most state franchise laws prohibit manufacturers from selling cars directly to the public, so the dealer will be your middleman. But in terms of financing and insurance, you can choose a bank or the dealer directly.

Chevrolet Dealer's Secret 3: Additional Costs

Destination charges, taxes, license and title fees, advertising fees... When going to a dealership, you must ask for an explanation of any fee you don't understand. But you need to choose your battles wisely. Your local car dealer may have taken a loss or slim profit along the way, and your fighting over something like a doc fee when the deal is nearly wrapped up may be counterproductive.

Chevrolet Dealer's Secret 4: Trade-in Value

If you currently own a car, it probably represents profit. The question is, whose profit will it be?

With few exceptions, you'll get the most money for your used car by selling it privately. That's because dealers pay wholesale prices — not retail prices — for used cars, and they sell them at retail.

Your current car's value can be used to lower the price on your new Chevrolet Silverado 2500HD Classic. However, most people underestimate their used car's value when going to a dealership.

Chevrolet Dealer's Secret 5: Dealer Holdback

The car manufacturer holds back a fraction of the price of all vehicles the dealership sells. Then, it returns the money to the dealership, usually on a quarterly basis.

Dealer holdback began its life as a safety net that ensured the manufacturers would have a security deposit of sorts if a dealership missed payments, and the dealerships would have money on hand to cover overhead costs when the holdback was returned.

Chevrolet Dealer's Secret 6: Dealer Incentives

Unlike consumer incentives, dealer incentives are factory-to-dealer incentives that reduce the dealer's true cost to buy the vehicle from the factory to below invoice.

Manufacturers offer these incentives on a regional basis to generate sales on specific models. These incentives are sometimes referred to as "spiffs," and they can touch off competition among dealers to move slower-selling stock.

For instance, a dealer incentive may kick in when a certain sales target is reached, with each subsequent sale resulting in a higher factory-to-dealer rebate.