Negotiating is one of the most dreaded aspects of buying a car. A car buyer in New Hampshire recently tried a novel technique to avoid negotiating and secure the best deal: they hired a professional negotiator. This arguably brilliant move ultimately didn’t land quite right with the car salesman, however, begging the question of whether it was worth it.
The salesman, who goes by Preacher Pete on TikTok (@preacherbourne1), recently shared the story about how it all went down.
Pete says this was the first time one of his customers brought someone to negotiate the deal on their behalf.
“We know there’s a lot of these guys out there who negotiate car deals for a living. And they work on behalf of the customers and help out trying to get the best deal,” he says.
Pete claims it was pointless in this case. He says the dealership where he works doesn’t require buyers to even leave the house to get the best deal. All they have to do, he says, is call.
“We do things like that all the time. And when I say all the time I mean literally five to 10 times a day I do that,” he says.
Long-Term Professional Car Negotiation
Pete says that they spent it took two months to completely finalize the deal. The delay, he claims, was due to the middleman’s insistence that he’d handle the registration.
Two weeks after the car was sold, Pete says they received a call from the middleman, who told them he was having difficulty in registering the car. When Pete returned the call he says he was met with a level of disrespect he’d never experienced on the job. Their conversation ended with the negotiator hanging up on Pete.
This prompted him to directly contact the customer, who, conversely, was a pleasure to work with.
Pete says he doesn’t fault the buyer for attempting to secure the best deal possible on a car. But due to the negotiator’s inability to get the car registered, the paperwork had to get re-drafted.
“We’re taking care of registering the vehicle. Making sure the taxes are all taken care of. Making sure we do right by our customer,” he says.
Pete acknowledges that while he understands car dealerships get a bad rap for being “shady,” this wasn’t the case. “On our side, we register cars for out-of-state customers on a daily, almost weekly basis. And we handle these over the phone deals all the time. I know we’re not like normal dealers … who do this type of stuff. But this is what we do,” he says.
Do People Trust Car Dealerships?
Some people who commented on Pete’s video didn’t seem to entirely believe his glowing remarks about the dealership where he works. One penned, “When a dealer says they are giving you the best deal, they are lying. In fact, if a dealer’s lips are moving, they’re lying.”
Another person claimed that they’d attempted to buy a vehicle from his dealership and it wasn’t exactly the best experience. “I tried buying my Lincoln from you. You guys did not want to negotiate anything,” they said.
Someone else said that sales associates at a different dealership lied to them about contacting their bank for financing. Afterwards they learned that they didn’t reach out to the financial institution at all. Instead, they attempted to secure financing through a bank of their choosing. When the customer insisted the dealership contact their bank as requested, they say they ended up with a much better interest rate. The experience made them vow to never buy a car without securing financing on their own first.
Are Car Negotiating Services A Real Thing?
There’s a slew of businesses and independent contractors that specialize in getting the best car deals for clients. They make a range of claims, such as saving customers upwards of $5,000 off MSRP, avoiding hidden fees, and simply giving customers hassle-free car buying experiences.
If you truly do not want to deal with the negotiation process and feel more comfortable with a professional negotiating on your behalf, you may want to hire one.
But when it comes to registering the vehicle, do you really need your negotiator to handle that? Probably not. Capital One notes that dealerships typically handle this for buyers. In most cases, dealerships don’t charge for this convenience.
So hire a negotiator if you choose, but you may want to leave the registration process to the dealership.
Motor1 has reached out to Pete via TikTok direct message for further comment. We’ll update this article if he responds.
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