Confessions of a Car Salesman

Chandler Phillips recently went undercover for Edmunds.com, the car buying website, to provide a glimpse into the secret world of car sales. He was hired as a salesman at an LA dealership, and provides these insights into this shadowy world.

“At times Michael became very excited as he thought of new things to teach me. At one point he said, “Oh! This is a good one! This is how you steal the trade-in.” He looked around quickly to make sure no one overheard him. “When you’re getting the numbers from the desk, they’ll ask if the customer has a trade-in. Say it’s a ’95 Ford Taurus. And say you took it to the used car manager and he evaluated it and said he would pay four grand for it. If you can get the trade for only three, that’s a grand extra in profit.

“So what you do is this,” Michael pretended to pick up the phone again, “you ask the desk, ‘What did we get for the last three Tauruses at auction?’ Then they’ll give you some figures — they’ll say, $1,923, $2,197 and $1,309. You don’t have to say anything to the customer. But he sees you writing this down! And he’s going, ‘Holy crap! I thought my trade was worth $6,000.’ Now it’s easy to get it for $3,000. That’s a grand extra in profit. And it’s front-end money too!” (I later learned that front-end money was what our commissions were based on. Back-end money was made on interest, holdbacks and other elements of the deal.)