How can I tell if this internet sales manager is telling me the real “true cost” of a new car to the dealer
I don't buy new cars anymore, but I've helped family members negotiate prices on new cars recently. There are various online services to see the average price paid, as well as the low outliers. I've looked at truecar.com for instance to see what others have paid within 50 miles of my zip-code. I think the only way for you to know you're being offered a good deal is to see if any of the other dealers that have not responded are willing to talk when you offer them $22,300 which the dealer above suggested was break-even point. If none of them respond, then you know you're really at the bottom of the negotiating window. If one of them does respond, then you can go back to that internet sales manager and ask why another dealership (do not disclose which one) is willing to sell it to you for less than $22,400 (do not disclose how much lower they offered to sell it for).  In my experience, most dealers will sell at or just below the break-even price at the end of the quarter so that they can beat other dealerships out for the quota. That gives you a week and a half to find the bottom price before going in on New Years Eve to seal the deal. "Consumer Reports offers a service that can tell you detailed actual cost to a dealer for a specific model and accessories -- real cost after rebates, not just invoice price. It costs a bit to order these reports, but if you are serious about buying a new car they are a highly recommended tool -- cu is independent and will give you the best info available, and simply walking into the dealership with the report in your hand can save huge amounts of negotiating. ""If you can give it to me for $500 over the real price, as shown here, I'll sign now."" Of course, standard advice is that it's usually better to buy a recent-model used car. I believe cu has other reports that can help you determine what a fair price is in that case, but usually I just bring it to a trusted garage and pay them to tell me exactly how much work it needs and whether they think it's worth the asking price."
I just described its function. Tell me what they do other than what I described, and also tell me how much of drug companies' budgets are consumed in this process (preferably the unecessary parts of the process), especially compared to the rest of the drug spending and inordinate profits.  Drug companies run ads, they have sales reps (pharma girls), they have tort cases (not a symptom of regulation), they have research, they have HUGE employee and CEO salaries and bonuses, they have distribution costs. Trust me when I say that regulation isn't the driving force here. "First and foremost, being ""cool"" stops being a thing you have to worry about once you graduate from secondary school. Nobody's really going to care what car you drive; the ones that do care aren't worth maintaining personal friendships or relationships with. The notable exception would be a sales job, requiring you to look successful to be successful, and in that case you'll need to either have a nice-looking car or buy one very quickly. Also, consider what you're buying. An E46 (which for the U.S. crowd was the previous generation of 3-series coupes and sedans) will be, at best, a 6-year-old car, and they made these as long ago as '98 which would make it 15 years old. The standard in the U.S. is to put about 10k miles (which would be about 17k km) per year on it, so you would expect even the newest E46s to have at least 100 000 km on them. At this point, even the best cars start needing increasing amounts of maintenance, and on a BMW that maintenance doesn't come cheap.  Consider why a BMW would be sold. It sounds cliche, but in the U.S. at least there are three ""tiers"" of used car in the luxury class; there are the one- and two-year-olds, used by the dealer as a loaner or owned by the type of guy who buys a new car every year; they're practically new, for 30-50% off sticker, and a great deal when you find them. There are the 15-year-old (or older) cars which were used up and traded in; the majority of these end up auctioned off and cannibalized for parts with the remaining hulk sold for salvage. Then there are the in-betweens; between three and ten years old, you get a wide variety. This car could have been garaged all its life and driven to and from work and around town before its owner got a raise and decided to splurge, or its previous owner could have driven the wheels off all over the continent for work or travel. It could have a major problem that developed or was discovered after the warranty expired (and there isn't an E46 on the road that's still under warranty) which caused the owner to sell. Overall, I would wait until you have your first real job to spend real money on a car like this; the one that will actually pay the bills with enough left over for fun. When you're making 35k a year with only your own personal expenses, as long as you manage your debt well and don't get in trouble with credit, you should have no trouble buying a car like this (or even a newer one). If you are going to buy used even then, I recommend you do your homework on required maintenance for the brand and in general, what each milestone will cost you, and (based on mileage) how soon, and I would find a reputable used car dealer (which is stereotypically a contradiction in terms, but there are guys out there who aren't out to completely screw you over)." Buying and selling cars a lot is something that makes money if you are a dealer but usually doesn't if you are not.  The question to ask yourself is why you want to sell it.   If it is because you are feeling poor and need money, it might make sense to sell it, particularly if you don't need it.  But $12k or whatever is not a ton of money.  If you do need a car and will have to replace it if you sell it then selling it is likely not a good idea. If it is because you want a nicer car and can afford to upgrade, then selling it is likely a good idea.  The fact that you have had it for years and not paid off the loan tells me this situation is unlikely. You should think of the value of your car to you (and the potential cost of replacing it) and the amount of money you owe on it as two different things.  The debt you have is a debt that you will need to pay no matter what you do with the car or how its value changes.  The value of the car to you is pretty much a separate issue from how much you have outstanding in debt.   If you want to sell the car to pay off the debt that is fine if you don't need the car or if you can get a suitable replacement car for MUCH less (which I find unlikely). You decide whether the improvements will result in a net higher price.  You also need to figure on how long the house will be on the market and the cost of carrying the home, unoccupied.  Some people would prefer the quickest sale. Others would wait to get the highest price. If you sell to a known buyer, you avoid using a real estate agent. If you plan to sell on your own and avoid the agent, there's a bit of effort dealing with the public, especially those who just want to look at houses with no real interest in buying. (As an agent, I can tell you, there's nothing like talking for nearly an hour, and then figuring out these people are from 1/2 mile away, but just attend every open house in the area.) "Sounds like a Ponzi scheme, amplified by social media. Ponzi schemes always rely on some ""winners"" to say they are winners, so they can grow the pot. If you put in $100 and got out $120, that's the $20 the operator pays so that the next guy who puts in $100 gets back... zero." There is no rule that says the dealer has to honor that deal, nor is there any that says he/she won't.  However, if you are thinking of financing through though the dealership they are likely to honor the deal. They PREFER you finance it. If you finance it through the dealer the salesman just got TWO sales (a car and a loan) and probably gets a commission on both. If you finance it through a third party it makes no difference to the dealer, it is still a cash deal to them because even though you pay off the car loan over years, the bank pays them immediately in full. I agree with the deposit part. But if you are buying a new car, the loan term should meet the warranty term. Assuming you know you won't exceed the mileage limits, it's a car with only maintainence costs and the repayment cost at that point. Determining the value of a service is an art, not a science. It depends on what others are charging, the quality and complexity and annoyance factor of the work, availability of people with the skill to do the work, etc. This topic can and does fill books, plural, and can't be answered fully here. As a customer, the answer is to get multiple quotes, understand how they differ, and pick the one you are most comfortable with. Last job I priced, I got three quotes, discarded the lowball who didn't know PT from cedar, discarded the one with the luxury price, and went with the guy in the middle who did adequate (not great) work for a tolerable fee. For a different kind of job I might have decided otherwise, or chucked all three and looked for more quotes from respected firms.