I am interested in a new explorer and wanted to see if anyone had any dealer recommendations. I have spoken with a few places and my favorite so far was a lady a Joe Cooper, she was very down to earth and not pushy, but had a big personality. I didn't know who may have the best offers when it comes down to price though.

If I were planning on buying a new or used Ford today, I'd pop myself into Bob Moore at I-35 and SE 89th. Don't know any of the sales staff, but the GM and his spouse are truly good eggs, as are the Moore's.

It is Diffee in El Reno for me. Of course, I am retired and can drive over there almost anytime and I still like their Saturday service hours.

Diffee in El Reno is where my parents bought their most recent car (2007) and my father said it was the easiest car purchase he has ever had.

I have bought 3 new cars from Joe Cooper. The is nobody better to deal with. I told them what I was willing to pay they did not pressure me and accepted my offers.

I got mine from Joe Cooper and was happy with them. I wouldn't buy a spare tire from David Stanley.

If I were planning on buying a new or used Ford today, I'd pop myself into Bob Moore at I-35 and SE 89th. Don't know any of the sales staff, but the GM and his spouse are truly good eggs, as are the Moore's.

I would not recommend anyone go to the Bob Moore Ford at I-35 and SE 89th. My wife and I went to look at cars and the saleslady helping us was very uninterested in helping us once we told her we were looking for used and gave her a price range of less than 20k. We left and ended up buying a used car in Texas (autotrader.com) in our price range. Later I took our new car to Bob Moore for service and was very disappointed with their service department. After buying a $180 key from them they wouldn't program the new key to work with the remote start which was already on the car (I had told them up front it had remote start and the new key needed to work with it), also they broke my original key where it would no longer work with the remote start. I ended up going to Malibu's in Moore and they had both keys working in literally five minutes. I could continue about Bob Moore' service department but I know this isn't the place. As for who i would recommend I have dealt with both Joe Cooper Ford in MWC and Patriot Ford in Purcell and was pleased with both of them.

I am interested in a new explorer and wanted to see if anyone had any dealer recommendations. I have spoken with a few places and my favorite so far was a lady a Joe Cooper, she was very down to earth and not pushy, but had a big personality. I didn't know who may have the best offers when it comes down to price though.

If I may, allow me to suggest that you not start the dealership choice process in this way, at least not for a new car. Mind you, for used cars, this process isn't really valid.

If you already know the model and options for the car you want, do some research up front to know the invoice and MSRP numbers for the vehicle you want. Learn about the promotional holdbacks, floor plan allowances, rebates, and the other promotions and incentives (if any) available from the manufacturer to you and the dealer that affect price. Your research should eventually, give you an excellent idea of the "invoice" price, which the dealer tries to make you believe is his price (which it isn't). Factor in those incentives, and you start to have an idea what the dealer's true cost is. That's about the closest you can get - a good, educated idea. Because that dealer has to pay to keep the lights on and the coffee pot running, factor in some profit over that number - anywhere from 2 to 5% depending on the popularity of the particular model you want. Dealers always try to work a price from their MSRP down, when you should always work the negotiation from their cost up. You can't know *all* the dealer's numbers, but you can come up with pretty darned close guestimate.

With your homework done, then and only then should you then send solicitations via email to multiple dealerships for their "best and final offer, inclusive of all documentary, advertising, or other fees " for a vehicle so equipped with precisely the options you want. And wait for their replies. See which one comes closest to your own, private computations, and proceed accordingly.

I used precisely this approach for the last new car I purchased about four years ago for a new Toyota Sienna, and I predicted the best sale offer I would get within $100. And I went to the dealership about two days later, financing in hand, and bought the car precisely as it had been negotiated and offered. No document fees, no advertising fees, no extra markups...just handed them a check for the agreed-upon amount and, after enduring the requisite pitch for an extended warranty from some noname company I never heard of, I drove it home.

The point is that you should, IMHO, never select a dealer based on the hope that they just happen to have "good offers" or "nice salespeople." To them, you are a money source from which maximum profit is to be extracted. Do your homework. Get your numbers. Know, up front, what *you* plan to pay, and how *you* plan to finance it - not how much *they* want you to pay, or how *they* want you to finance it. And you remain in complete control over the purchase process, not hoping that I "caught the manager in a good mood" or found my "cousin's best friend's mother's sister's son's girlfriend's uncle" who "will give you a great deal."

A few other notions: Many people believe the "longer a car has been on the lot, the more the dealer will deal on it." That's almost always wrong. The longer a dealer has a car on his lot, the more in financing costs he's paid to the manufacturer, which in turn squeezes his profit calculations. Just like you pay interest on a car loan, most dealers finance the cars they purchase from the manufacturer, so a typical dealer has more latitude to deal on a car that just arrived on his lot than one he's had 30, 60, or more days. And those costs also relate back to floor plan allowances, which give preferential rates and other incentives to dealers for taking odd combinations of vehicles that include some models that don't sell well. And its that hazy combination of incentives, allowances, and holdbacks that make knowing the "real" price a dealer pays for a new car all-but impossible to know.

And if there's an existing car to be leveraged in the process, if at all possible or practical, sell it yourself as a private individual. You will *never* get full value for a trade in a new sale deal, and much of the trade-in sales nonsense we see on TV ads allows dealers to play a bit of a shell game with numbers. Keep the transactions separate - again, if at all possible. If it isn't, at least you know up front you will pay a premium for going the dealer-trade-in route.

I used to engage in roughly this process in the pre-email days by going to dealers, which was a hassle, but it worked; you can apply the same approach if you wish. I believe that email makes it much, much simpler, and documents every word said between the parties along the way. I opened up a throwaway email account on gmail for precisely the purpose of sending out my solicitation offers, knowing I would close the account once the transaction was done, and wouldn't get pestered with a bunch of sales spam later.

Good luck.

Excellent post soonerdave. I've read about that type of process elsewhere but it was using faxes. Glad to know the email route works.

Excellent post soonerdave. I've read about that type of process elsewhere but it was using faxes. Glad to know the email route works.

Thanks!

Email works great, and many dealers are starting to recognize that avenue as a way to generate volume - if you solicit an offer, a dealership can realize you're much more likely to be a serious customer than someone who is just out on a Saturday drive and window shopping. But there's no substitute for knowing your prices/numbers up front no matter how you choose to shop...dealerships rely on underinformed consumers as a means to maximize revenue.

The other aside I didn't emphasize in my above post is to, if at all possible, pre-arrange your financing through your own bank or credit union. Doing so makes you a cash customer in the eyes of the dealership, increasing your bargaining power. Of course, that advice must be tempered with any financing offers the manufacturer may have available, and that kind of balance has to be computed to the needs of a specific individual. For some, 0% financing is the right deal, but for others, a $xxx cash incentive with third-party financing is better. Knowing which is all part of the homework - either way, you control the decision, not the dealership.