5 Tips When Buying Your Next Vehicle

Buying a car should not feel like a trip to the dentist. This is a huge investment, so It should be exciting and fun as well as a learning opportunity. You should feel confident you’re getting the best price for the vehicle your purchasing and your trade-in. Your sales advisor should be looking out for your best interest like a family member. Unfortunately, we can’t guarantee that to be the case at most dealerships but we can here at Woody’s Automotive Group. All our sales advisors at Woody’s Automotive Group in the Greater Kansas City Area are paid a salary to provide that level of service to all our customers. Here are 5 tips to keep in mind before buying your new or used vehicle whether at our car dealership or another car dealership.

Researching your car online

Do your homework before visiting the dealership. The Internet is a great resource for your car buying needs. Check out reviews for the make, model, and specifications of the car that you are buying. Look for the average selling price in your area. Check out the pictures of the vehicle, there should be more than 30 pictures which show the exterior and interior condition and options. Make sure the vehicle you’re interested in comes with a free Carfax report, so you can confirm it’s excellent history. At Woody’s Automotive Group you can view FREE History reports on all our used vehicles (Over 1,000 Cars, Trucks, SUV’s and Vans)right here on our website by clicking Find a Car Above.

Research the Dealership

This is a step that is overlooked by many car buyers. Look up ratings and reviews for the dealership that you are visiting. Visit online forums and sites with dealer rankings. Pay close attention to what past customers have to say about a particular dealership so you can stay away from high pressure dealers. Woody’s Automotive Group has over 2,000 reviews posted on many 3rd party sites including Presto Reviews. There is no worse feeling when buying a car than feeling like you were ripped off when you bought your car. At Woody’s Automotive Group in the Greater Kansas City area we guarantee you will never feel like that after you purchase a vehicle from us.

Work out your financing in advance

If you have cash to pay for your vehicle, then financing is not a concern. For most people this is not the case and they need to use some form of traditional financing. Credit unions are well known for their low interest rates and open financing policy. At Woody’s Automotive Group in the Greater Kansas City area we can also help you with this since we have partnerships with many different finance companies which can offer excellent financing options including zero percent rates during certain times of the year. We also have a Pre-Approved in Seconds form on our website if you would like an immediate answer.

Know your trade-in value

It’s important to know the value of your trade-in before going to the dealership. Car dealers are notorious for low balling customers when buying their trade-ins. They will use tactics such as increasing the price of the car to the same amount of your trade-in. However, this is not how Woody’s Automotive Group does business, one of their philosophies is to give the customer an upfront value on their trade with a purchase or not. As you read or watch reviews on third party sites like Presto Reviews or YouTube you will hear from customers who are genuinely happy with their trade values and reiterate Woody’s Automotive Group Philosophies.

Do a credit check-up

Why wait until you get to the dealership to find out your credit score? You should take a look at your own credit before getting there. Too many people let multiple dealers run their credit. Some unethical dealers will actually lie and say that you cannot test drive a car until they run your credit. This is 100% false. At Woody’s Automotive Group we don’t ever require you to run a credit check before you test drive, because we want you to take your time and find the right vehicle that meets your needs whether that’s testing driving one or twenty vehicles. Did you know that more than two inquiries on your credit report will actually lower your credit score? Besides, you may catch a credit score error which you can fix for free. So save yourself from any unneeded hassle or embarrassment and run your own credit! I just wanted to clarify that freecreditreport.com is NOT the website offered by the federal government that gives you a free credit report each year. AnnualCreditReport.com is the correct website that allows you to pull your credit report from all three credit reporting agencies for FREE, once per calendar year.

Once you have all the facts and figures make a list of some of the options you will definitely need and then head over to our new search by options & payments widget on our website to see the vehicles that match your criteria.