Are Idaho Ram dealers worth the drive?

[GBuilders]

I’m looking at the new 2019 Ram 2500 longhorn trucks. I have seen were some have posted buying from a few dealers in Idaho. Dave Smith and Dennis something are two of the largest dealers in the country. I have heard you fly in and they pick you up and put you in a hotel at the dealers expense till your truck is ready??
Not sure if that is true or not? Being in Texas it would have to be an amazing savings for me to purchase and drive back.

Has anyone done this and how much did you save off of MSRP?

Thanks G

[JALLEN4]

moresmoke wrote:

ksss wrote:

goducks10 wrote:
When I bought my 12 Ram from Ron Tonkin in Portland Or they were nearly the same price as DD. So close that by the time I spent money for gas and diesel then a hotel room it really wasn't worth saving a few $100 dollars.

That is exactly what most find around here. Dealers HAVE to be competitive or they will lose everytime to these mega dealers. If you have a dealer that wont budge off MSRP and wont honor a price when a vehicle is ordered then let the free market teach them a lesson. It surprises me a dealer would not honor a price agreed on, that said the vehicle is subject to rebates at the time of arrival. So if you banking on taking advantage of a hypothetical 10K off rebate deal, your ordered vehicle will be subject to what the rebate is when your hits the ground. That can be lower than what current pricing is or more depending on if your banking on using a current rebate that is in effect at time order is placed. That is standard practice and I get that. You should be given a price without the rebate and if you get it great, but if the rebate is increased during your build, you would get that additional rebate as well.

Last two Chrysler vehicles I have bought, it was in the order paperwork that any incentives available when I placed the order would apply at delivery, and any better incentives available at time of delivery were available also.

This was in Chrysler’s contract.

The buyer's order, contract, is between you and the dealer...not Chrysler. The terms of incentives offered to both the dealer (Dealer Cash) and the incentives offered to the consumer (Customer cash) are different from one incentive to another. Often these incentives do carry forward on ordered units but they are also often dependent on delivery by a specified date.

[moresmoke]

ksss wrote:

goducks10 wrote:
When I bought my 12 Ram from Ron Tonkin in Portland Or they were nearly the same price as DD. So close that by the time I spent money for gas and diesel then a hotel room it really wasn't worth saving a few $100 dollars.

That is exactly what most find around here. Dealers HAVE to be competitive or they will lose everytime to these mega dealers. If you have a dealer that wont budge off MSRP and wont honor a price when a vehicle is ordered then let the free market teach them a lesson. It surprises me a dealer would not honor a price agreed on, that said the vehicle is subject to rebates at the time of arrival. So if you banking on taking advantage of a hypothetical 10K off rebate deal, your ordered vehicle will be subject to what the rebate is when your hits the ground. That can be lower than what current pricing is or more depending on if your banking on using a current rebate that is in effect at time order is placed. That is standard practice and I get that. You should be given a price without the rebate and if you get it great, but if the rebate is increased during your build, you would get that additional rebate as well.

Last two Chrysler vehicles I have bought, it was in the order paperwork that any incentives available when I placed the order would apply at delivery, and any better incentives available at time of delivery were available also.

This was in Chrysler’s contract.

[R__Walter]

Same experience pretty much as Minnow above. Bought my 2016 Ram Cummins SRW BigHorn from DD, had to use their Bank of America financing which they wanted me to keep in place for 6 months. Paid that off in cash at 3 months with no penalty. Save about $4K from best local prices but selection locally wasn't great. 1,100 mile return trip broke in the rear differential. Flew up from Albuquerque which cost me $200 or so. DD salesman picked me up at the Boise airport. No hotel and it was never offered by DD. Did take their lifetime drivetrain warranty which may or may not have made sense. Think it was about $1,200, but what the heck. We'll see someday whether that was worth it, I suppose.

[tchil]

Dennis Dillon is a volume dealer. They are actually a very small dealer in a small town but I was told they average 500 vehicles a week. I was surprised when I showed up though they pretty much looked like every other small town dealer I have seen. Nothing like the mega lots we have in Denver and Phoenix. but if you make a little on every vehicle and are selling nearly 100 a day your probably going to do ok.

[Grit_dog]

^Good to know. You came from SC to Idahoo?
I thought there were some volume dealers on the E coast like Kernersville? They couldn't get close on price?

[minnow]

Grit dog wrote:

whododat wrote:
Just an fyi. At Dillon, you have to finance the vehicle through the company they use. You can then refinance later if you wanted to. I thought that was a little odd but did not go through with it. He definitely have very good prices, just be sure to read any fine print. I did not buy a vehicle through them.
All this is irrelevant, if you are paying with cash I think.

No you don’t unless you want to qualify for another $1000 off or something like that.
They had a 3 -6 month min carry without penalties too. It “could” net you about 1/2 the finance discount if you played it right, but not significant if you have cash or a better rate

Bought mine from Dillon. Said I had to keep their financing(at the time it was through Bank of America) for 6 months. I drove the truck home and refinanced through our credit union the next week. No issues and not a peep out of Dillon or BOA.

Dillon beat the 10 or so local dealers by over 4 grand on price too. This was on a factory ordered truck.

[ktmrfs]

Grit dog wrote:
Must depend on your locale.
I was gonna dump the old 07 for a new one a couple years ago and first, none of the local (Seattle) dealers had squat for selection, or at least not what I was after, but more importantly, none would budge much of any off the sticker and a few were still playing the markup from sticker price game.
Dillon would have sold me the truck I wanted over the phone for the (good) price advertised, no BS.

I never worry about dealer selection. I outline what I want and let the dealer find one. Even when going through a broker, a dealer will look around several states to find what you want. No reason to be restricted to what is on the lot.

Like I mentioned in an earlier post, when I bought our 2015.5 denali, the only one in a 4 state area that had what we wanted was at Dave smith. Local dealer the broker used made a trade or whatever with Dave Smith and had it trucked to portland and we picked it up at the dealer.

Often times you will find that a vehicle is first delivered to Dealer A, then shows up at Dealer B, and is finally sold by Dealer C or later. Dealers work with each other to swap vehicles as needed based on what they want/need.

And the local price was within $100 of what Dave Smith quoted.

If your looking for a specific list of options, GM, Ford and Dodge will let you input what you want then give you a list of every one that has that configuration in a multistate area and which dealer it is at.

[ksss]

goducks10 wrote:
When I bought my 12 Ram from Ron Tonkin in Portland Or they were nearly the same price as DD. So close that by the time I spent money for gas and diesel then a hotel room it really wasn't worth saving a few $100 dollars.

That is exactly what most find around here. Dealers HAVE to be competitive or they will lose everytime to these mega dealers. If you have a dealer that wont budge off MSRP and wont honor a price when a vehicle is ordered then let the free market teach them a lesson. It surprises me a dealer would not honor a price agreed on, that said the vehicle is subject to rebates at the time of arrival. So if you banking on taking advantage of a hypothetical 10K off rebate deal, your ordered vehicle will be subject to what the rebate is when your hits the ground. That can be lower than what current pricing is or more depending on if your banking on using a current rebate that is in effect at time order is placed. That is standard practice and I get that. You should be given a price without the rebate and if you get it great, but if the rebate is increased during your build, you would get that additional rebate as well.

[goducks10]

When I bought my 12 Ram from Ron Tonkin in Portland Or they were nearly the same price as DD. So close that by the time I spent money for gas and diesel then a hotel room it really wasn't worth saving a few $100 dollars.

[tchil]

Yeah I shopped my Dillon price around to 4 dealers locally they were all between 3 and 5K more. And would not guarantee that price if I ordered. Dillion was a no brainer for me. It cost me less than $300 to go pick it up including 1 night in a hotel. Some people are more than willing to pay the 3K for the convenience I am just a cheapskate and was up for a fun to me road trip.

[Grit_dog]

Must depend on your locale.
I was gonna dump the old 07 for a new one a couple years ago and first, none of the local (Seattle) dealers had squat for selection, or at least not what I was after, but more importantly, none would budge much of any off the sticker and a few were still playing the markup from sticker price game.
Dillon would have sold me the truck I wanted over the phone for the (good) price advertised, no BS.

[Vanished]

There was nothing special about those places last time I tried, local deals, incentives, etc were all the same.

[rhagfo]

Well one plus to buying that far from home is that by the time you get it home, you have the necessary break in miles on the differential.

[Ralph_Cramden]

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