One of the great pleasures in life, right up there with root canal work, is the buying or leasing of a new or used car from a dealership.
By Egon E. Mosum
One of the great pleasures in life, right up there with root canal work, is the buying or leasing of a new or used car from a dealership.
Upon entering the lot, we are greeted warmly by a salesperson who will do his level best to make us feel welcome as he eviscerates our bank account as much as he can.
Upon making an overpriced deal with this particular devil, we may then be escorted to the F&I man — the finance and insurance man — who is a better dressed thief. He is there to make sure we can get all the car we really can’t afford while increasing the dealership profits with some fugazy finance details.
And, if we are particularly naive, we are offered a special deal for an extended warranty with anti-rust-proofing, special wheel package and an all-expense paid (by you) trip out the door when they are finished picking what financial flesh remains on your bones.
Let’s take a look under the hood and see some of the dealership dirty deals done dirt expensive…
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One of the naughty-boy tricks the finance man pulls is the yo-yo trick.
You are quoted an interest rate, and they let you drive away secure in the deal you thought you made. However, very soon after, you get a call that there’s been a problem; that you didn’t qualify for the stated rate, and the only way you can keep your wheels is to agree to a different and higher interest deal.[1]
In this situation, you might be able to negotiate with the dealer. If you get the originally quoted rate, you will forget the contact information of the Consumer Affairs department and the State Attorney General. You will not hit speed dial and contact your attorney.
Here’s another example of how much the F&I man cares about you. It’s in his earnest attempts at providing (selling) you gap insurance and credit life insurance, so you know the car loan will be fully paid if the worst happens.[2]
Of course you can get such insurance, should you so choose, at a much better deal from your own insurance broker. Therefore, when offered this ‘benefit’ you should respectfully decline.
But wait, there’s less.
Before you have the pleasure of an introduction to the F&I guy, you will deal with the salesperson who has a smile emoji for a face, and the conscience of a cobra.
You may have come into the dealership to get that great deal advertised in the newspaper or on their overloud television commercial, only to find that deal has disappeared into another dimension, but, lucky you, they just happen to have some other car available.
That’s classic bait and switch, and when they try this, you might want to swim far, far away.[3]
These are just some of the tricks the dealership delinquents have up their short sleeves.
The good news is they don’t always get away with it.
In May this year, eight Nissan dealerships in New York got a nasty surprise. The New York State Attorney General announced the state had collected $3.2 million from the dealerships for overcharging customers for end of lease buyouts.
In fact, it was more than seventeen hundred customers that were victimized by Nissan. ‘An investigation by the Office of the Attorney General (OAG) found that these dealerships added junk fees or falsified the price of leased vehicles that customers wanted to buy when their lease ended, forcing them to pay higher costs.’[4]
In 2024, in Illinois, the Leader Automotive Group, which operated 10 dealerships, was forced to settle with the Federal Trade Commission for $20 million for its deceptive and unfair trade practices relating to car sales.
These dealers displayed false advertising, hit buyers with junk fees and ‘mandatory’ options at additional costs, and even posted phony online reviews about themselves.[5]
The $20 million paid in the settlement might not have been the most profitable deal made by the dealerships, but at least it didn’t come with an extended warranty and a special wheel package!
Another dealer group in Maryland, received a Christmas present from the FTC and the State Attorney General when ‘the Federal Trade Commission and Maryland Attorney General […] charged Lindsay Automotive Group with systematically deceiving and overcharging car-buying consumers for years, costing them millions of dollars in junk fees and unwanted add-on products.’
Among those dirty dealings were allegations of false advertising and deceptive financing practices.[6]
In a 2024 survey, it was revealed ‘that about one-third of Americans have experienced things like deceptive selling, hidden fees, or dishonest salespeople. Yet over three-quarters of Americans (76%) don’t trust dealerships to be honest about pricing.’[7]
The aforementioned survey was reported at the beginning of 2024. At the end of that year, in a Gallup survey, only seven percent of those surveyed gave car salespeople a high credibility rating, while forty seven percent gave them a low rating.[8]
The others, who gave them an average rating, probably hadn’t purchased an automobile recently—but that’s just speculation on your author’s part.
WHY YOU SHOULD CARE
Outside of a house, an automobile or truck is likely to be the largest expense we undertake in our financial lives. In the vast majority of areas of this country, a vehicle is a necessity, not a luxury, and a luxury vehicle can cost as much as a condo in some areas.
As soon as we hit a dealership, the odds are stacked against us.
The smiley guy salesman does deals all day — or at least hopes to — and he knows all the dirty tricks to get you to pay too much for a car before he ships you off to the F&I guy. That’s the guy who can make the salesman look like Mother Theresa when it comes to honest dealing.
There is a reason that car dealers rank so low on the public trust scale — it’s because you can’t trust them. They have no problem lying, they have no problem with false advertising, bait and switch, interest rate chicanery, or giving themselves glowing phony online reviews.
Such practices are their bread and butter. To protect you, there are both private and public legal agencies where you may try and obtain recourse and compensation.
To protect yourself at the ground zero of a dealership, you must educate yourself to the tricks of this tricky trade, and pay attention to the man behind the curtain who would otherwise treat you like the scarecrow in the Wizard of Oz.
Sources:
[1] 12 CAR DEALER TRICKS TO AVOID BANKRATE https://www.bankrate.com/loans/auto-loans/dealer-tricks-to-avoid/
[2] IBID.
[3] IBID.
[4] ATTORNEY GENERAL JAMES SECURES OVER 3.2 MILLION DOLLARS FROM NISSAN DEALERS 5/6/25 Press Release NYS Attorney General https://ag.ny.gov/press-release/2025/attorney-general-james-secures-over-32-million-nissan-dealers-cheating-consumers
[5] FTC Posts $20 Million Settlement With Dealer Group For Alleged Deceptive Practices 12/23/24 Sandy Recinos, Seyfarth Shaw Law Firm https://www.seyfarth.com/news-insights/ftc-posts-dollar20-million-settlement-with-dealer-group-for-alleged-deceptive-practices.html
[6] FTC, Maryland Attorney General Act to Stop Lindsay Auto from Falsely Touting Low Prices and Overcharging Consumers for Unwanted Fees and Add-Ons Press Release 12/27/24 FTC.gov https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2024/12/ftc-maryland-attorney-general-act-stop-lindsay-auto-falsely-touting-low-prices-overcharging
[7] WHILE A MINORITY OF AMERICANS EXPERIENCE DECEPTIVE SELLING AT DEALERSHIPS MOST STILL DISTRUST THEM 2/22/24 KPA SURVEY https://kpa.io/blog/kpa-car-dealership-trust-survey-while-a-minority-of-americans-experience-deceptive-selling-at-dealerships-most-still-distrust-them/
[8] Americans' Ratings of U.S. Professions Stay Historically Low Lydia Saad, 1/13/25 GALLUP https://news.gallup.com/poll/655106/americans-ratings-professions-stay-historically-low.aspx