<prompt> Human: Recently my wife and I did some exhaustive research when deciding to purchase a new vehicle for the first time in 15 years. I hope this info will be informative. You can scroll to the end for the TL;DR info. 1. Know the True Cost So you budgeted for a 400 a month payment. Do not forget property taxes if they apply where you live and the fact that your insurance rates will go up. Factor these things in. They do matter. A lot. We worked out a 365 a month payment, but after calculating the property tax and insurance costs, the price raised to over 500 a month. If you have a vanishing deductible policy, I would recommend calling and upping your deductible on your insurance policy before buying a new car. This allows you to shoulder more risk, and keeps your insurance premiums down. Also, many state and local governments have property tax estimators for new vehicles. You can get a very good idea of what youre walking into so you dont have a massive surprise in the mail a week after your car purchase. 2. The Game has Changed Car buying aint what it used to be. The information age really has changed the game and car manufacturers and sales are not stupid. They all understood they had to change or get left behind. After we closed the deal, I asked the sales manager and our salesman a few questions privately and corroborated their answers with other subject-matter experts. The indication is that most customers are going to walk into the dealership these days armed with the value of the vehicle, what the invoice price is going to be and what the bottom line price they can expect to pay for the vehicle. Getting the best price is no longer a problem. Now dealers are focusing on service, features, safety, warranties, etc. This fact is going to affect several other items on the list. 3. The Salesman is your Friend So, item 2 may not seem like a big deal, but it is because it affects several other things. Because of 2, dealerships can no longer rely on making a ton of profit in the sales price, so their cheddar comes from moving a lot of units. In order to facilitate this, salesman make a flat commission on new sales regardless of how much they sell it for. This makes the salesman your friend. He wants you to buy that car as badly as you want to buy it. He does not care much or how little the dealership profits. The salesman really is working for you. He wants the sales manager to give you the best possible price so youll buy. Please dont treat the salesman like an adversary. Treat them like the two of you are working together to get the best price and deal, because you actually are. Additionally the salesman gets bonuses for units sold. More motivation to get a price for you that youll say yes to. 4. How to Get the Best Price -Focus on one thing at a time. When negotiating for a car, your one and only concern is the out the door price. Thats your bottom line. The out the door price includes all taxes, tags, fees, convenience charges, add-ons, etc. they try to add on top of the sale. Some dealerships will pitch you a lower price then tack a bunch of crap fees on the backend. Dont let your salesperson ask What payment do you want to make? or anything like that. Lets talk price first, and talk payment later. Do you have a trade-in? Maybe. Maybe not. Lets talk price first, then trade-in and payment later.-Timing matters. And some old rules still do apply even though the game has changed. As a matter of fact, 2 has probably made some of these rules even more pronounced. So buying at the end of the month really is a thing. Since dealerships and sales personnel make their money on units moved, getting a deal done at the end of the month is a great motivating factor to squeeze an extra sale in. You never know, that dealer couuld be just one sale away from that big bonus, and it would actually benefit them to sell you a car at a 5,000 loss just so they can get that 10,000 bonus. Also, in the US at least, buying in the spring time is about the worst time to buy. A lot of people get their tax returns in spring and start car shopping. The dealerships are flooded with customers and pre-owned inventory. Not saying you cant get a great deal, of course, but the Spring just makes it a little more challenging.-Know the invoice price for the vehicle you want. Its not difficult both Kelly Blue Book and Edmunds can give you invoice pricing on new vehicles. You can certainly pay at or below invoice pricing for just about any vehicle. -Getting below invoice pricing isnt difficult. The first step is to know your rebates. You qualify for certain rebates; military, college students, teachers, law enforcement, Uber drivers all qualify for rebates in some shape form or fashion. This is a good way to get below the invoice price. You can do this before you even walk into a dealership to have an idea what youre going to be able to pay. -Pit dealerships against each other, and dont be ashamed to do it. We got two dealerships into a bidding war for this transaction. When their prices got to within 100 or 200 of each other, we opted for the one that provided us with the better service, patience, attentiveness, and responsiveness during the bidding process. This might make me a bastard, but I dont care. What I do care about is saving thousands of dollars. That being said, once I made a commitment, I stuck to it even when the other dealership called me back with an even lower offer. I also used as a bargaining chip, Get me out of the door for X price and I will cut off communications with the other dealer and come buy from you right now. If they agree to your demands, be prepared to follow through, though.-Another way to get below the invoice price is to tell your sales person that you plan to use dealer financing. This is a bargaining chip he can use when presenting your wants to a sales manager. You can get a lower price if you use dealer financing, even if you plan to pay the loan off just make sure its a loan with no penalty for an early payoff.Youre most likely to get a good price on a slow car sales day. Go car shopping when the weather is bad, when its cold outside, whatever. Basically when customers are not in the store, thats when you should go. 5. Beware of Internet Pricing When you see some crazy-low price on the Internet, it probably has all the rebates built-in to the price. That means you could qualify for that price if you were a military veteran, police officer, college student and teacher who moonlights as an uber driver. I learned this the hard way. 6. Leasing really isnt a terrible option I know a lot of financially savvy people scoff at leasing, but hear me out. It really depends on your needs. There are some great videos and resources online that explain leases in more detail than I care to go into on this thread, but they can actually be finanacially viable. Like anything else, the key here is to do your homework. Leases can be bad, really bad. Or they can be really good. Theres a lot of traps to avoid and a lot of things to be aware of. Knowing these things can get you into a super lease. EDITForgot to mention in the OP, the car we got was MSRP 33,000. The invoice price was 31,500. We were able to negotiate a price of 26,100, out the door, which included all taxes, tags, fees, etc. TL;DR Version A lot has changed about the car industry. Sales people are motivated to sell you a car, they dont care how much or little the dealership makes. You can get a car below invoice pricing fairly easily by knowing the invoice price and knowing your rebates before you go in. Pit dealerships against each other, and opt for the one with the better service in my opinion. Internet pricing can be dodgy and dont automatically dismiss leases as an option to keep monthly costs down.  <response>: Salesman is not your friend. salesman make a flat commission on new sales regardless of how much they sell it for. This makes the salesman your friend. That does not equate to them being your friend, unless your idea of friendship is very warped. More likely that line you spewed is what is taught to salepeople as a canned response to push the buyer into buying. we are paid a flat commission, therefore I am your friend 