2010 vibe vin number/advertising cost

[stans39]

I located a 2010 vibe about 45miles from my home that I may purchase. That is a 45 mile drive over very narrow crooked roads that I only want to make once. I sent an e-mail to the internet manager with an offer of $200 over invoice which I got off Edmunds com. He e-mailed back that the invoice was a little more than $200 more than I had stated and that he would be glad to show me the invoice. I was wondering if there any advertising costs added on to the invoice by GM. I know Toyota has such charges, but was unaware that this was done by GM. If what he says is true then the profit on a $20500 car is only about $850. Looking on Edmunds, I also noticed that Pontiac had reduced the markup on the 2010s over the 2009s, which is a sneaky way of rasing the price. I also asked him when the car was manufactured, when the dealership received the car, and the mileage. He didn't respond to any of these questions which got me wondering. I'm sure if I press him I will get some answers, but I thought I would get some information from genvibe to make sure he was giving me the correct information. The vin number on that vibe is 5Y2SP6E05AZ402707. I assume the last 5 numbers are the number of cars made at any certain time. Since I Make Vibes said that the last one was AZ420771, this appears to be an early one which may mean it has been sitting on the dealer's lot for long time which I don't particulary like. I am curious when they started making the 2010 vibe and approximately when this one was made and about when would it get to a dealer in Kentucky.Thanks,John

[jake75]

There are several added charges on the invoice - advertising is the big one. It varies by area - in my area it is about $350. Your $850 spread between invoice and msrp on a $20,500 car is in the ballpark.The dealer also gets a 3% holdback on the msrp before destination charge. Dealers rarely bargain away their holdback - that's how they keep their doors open.The dealer also may be getting some dealer incentive money - there is/was some ($750?) on the '09's but may not be any yet on the 2010's.Last January it appeared that dealers were being given $2,000 if they ordered extra Vibe inventory. The deals were only on specific VIN numbers. My dealer had 4 or 5 1.8L's that they sold for $2,000 under invoice. I got one of those. Of course the rebate at that time was $1,500, not $2,500 so you are only paying $1,000 more than I did* and you are getting a 2010. Not a bad deal.*I also had a $3,000 GM Card Earnings rebate.but that is a totally separate issue.

[scherry2]

at a rate of around a thousand a day built. (guesstimate cause GM builds trucks at 70 per hour.) that vehicle isn't that older than the last one built.

[Kincaid]

I bought my Vibe sight unseen and was a bit nervous (and explnd that if I drove the hour to the dealership and found so much as a scratch I expected to get back my $500 deposit). I had previously looked over a gray 1.8 liter and found several little nicks and scratches but a black GT was pristine. After I couldn't get the IM to deal on the GT, I ended up finding mine at the dealer an hour away.

[michaelgt]

Was sending information via IM

[joatmon]

Quote, originally posted by stans39 »That is a 45 mile drive over very narrow crooked roads that I only want to make once. Sounds appropriate for someone who lives in a place called Hazard.I think Vibes are going fast now that they stopped making them, won't be long before it will be hard to find one still new.

[stans39]

Quote, originally posted by joatmon »Sounds appropriate for someone who lives in a place called Hazard.We are always being kidded about the name. I have to explain that it was named after Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry famous naval officer in the War of 1812. They named the county Perry and the city Hazard. Question I always asked and never got a good answer, was why didn't they name the city Oliver? While there aren't a lot of 2010 vibes around here, the nunber has decreased very little in the last 2 weeks.

[vibolista]

Cash for Clunkers runs out in about an hour and a half here on the East Coast and by 11 pm Eastern Daylight Time, it will be over on the West Coast as well. That should start to slow the sales stampede a bit. Just better hope there are some new Vibes left to negociate over. Good luck.

[jammies]

Hello,Yea, I'm new here. I've been lurking for months... But I saw this topic and having gone thorough the process two months ago, I have an idea whats going on. Plus, I sold cars a while back...I went through the same question about advertising costs. I did a search for DEALER IMR CONTRIBUTIONS and LMA GROUP CONTRIBUTIONS. Both refer to GM billing the customer for advertising.Now, when I contacted one dealer in particular, they told me they do not belong to a group advertising, so they were not going to pass on the fee. I still feel it is a wee bit fishy. I heard the same line about only $850 mark-up. Come on.They should be able to tell you when the vehicle was entered into their inventory. More than likely is it written or stamped on the invoice. Tell the internet guy to "go pull the deal jacket," and get the date it was inventoried. Or the sequence of the stock numbers should also work.You did say a 2010, right? It should not have been sitting around more than a month or two. I would be more concerned with the mileage and how carefully it was parked on the lot.BTW -- When I started my search I went to Pontiac's web site and did a search. I had to set it for a 250 mile radius in order to find what I wanted. It also lists the build sheet so you can check the appropriate boxes on edmunds... but I guess you already knew that.Also, I sent out emails to over 20 different dealerships. This was before the CARS program. Now that is over, they may take your inquiry a bit more seriously. Last I looked there was $2500 + $750 dealer cash on 2010s. One differnce in my method.. I never made an offer. I requested price quotes then simply informed the dealerships with higher quotes that dealership XYZ was lower... Creating a sealed bid for my business. Having been on the other side, I know it works. Internet negotiations.

[jake75]

Quote, originally posted by jammies »Hello,Yea, I'm new here. I've been lurking for months... But I saw this topic and having gone thorough the process two months ago, I have an idea whats going on. Plus, I sold cars a while back...I went through the same question about advertising costs. I did a search for DEALER IMR CONTRIBUTIONS and LMA GROUP CONTRIBUTIONS. Both refer to GM billing the customer for advertising.Now, when I contacted one dealer in particular, they told me they do not belong to a group advertising, so they were not going to pass on the fee. I still feel it is a wee bit fishy. I heard the same line about only $850 mark-up. Come on.They should be able to tell you when the vehicle was entered into their inventory. More than likely is it written or stamped on the invoice. Tell the internet guy to "go pull the deal jacket," and get the date it was inventoried. Or the sequence of the stock numbers should also work.You did say a 2010, right? It should not have been sitting around more than a month or two. I would be more concerned with the mileage and how carefully it was parked on the lot.BTW -- When I started my search I went to Pontiac's web site and did a search. I had to set it for a 250 mile radius in order to find what I wanted. It also lists the build sheet so you can check the appropriate boxes on edmunds... but I guess you already knew that.Also, I sent out emails to over 20 different dealerships. This was before the CARS program. Now that is over, they may take your inquiry a bit more seriously. Last I looked there was $2500 + $750 dealer cash on 2010s. One differnce in my method.. I never made an offer. I requested price quotes then simply informed the dealerships with higher quotes that dealership XYZ was lower... Creating a sealed bid for my business. Having been on the other side, I know it works. Internet negotiations. 1. Maybe the $850 mark-up included the holdback? On the lower msrp Vibes I don't think the spread between msrp and invoice is as much as $850.2. I saw the $750 dealer incentive on the '09's, but my research indicates that there is no dealer incentive money on the 2010's. The dealer incentive money is a somewhat well kept secret. When I bought my 2003 Vibe the dealer was in a small town about 35 miles from Columbus without any regional adv fee - but not long after that they were included - I think because the city dealers were complaining this small town dealer had an unfair advantage.

[stans39]

I would like to thank everyone for the information provided and their comments. I also hope to hear from IMakeVibes.Update: I sent the dealer I mentioned in my original post an e-mail with Edumunds invoice costs and ask for an explanation for the difference, and repeated my questions about the vehicle. I have not heard from him. However, a person who works for a dealer and seems to have acess to all the informatiom gave me the invoice for this car and it was exactly the same as the dealer had quoted me. I am now sure there is an advertising cost. He also told me that the car had been in inventory for 131 days. Since this dealer has only 1 vibe and many others have only 1 or 2, they probably don't have a demo and these cars will probably have more mileage than the usual 5 to 10 miles. Even though a car may only have a few hundred miles( unless it has been driven from another dealer) these will be "hard" miles compiled during the break-in period. When people take a test drive they usually want to see how well the car accelerates and how well the brakes work. I have a feeling the car I am seriously considering will have more than a hundred miles on it. Another dealer who was going to get back to me sold the vibe I was interested in. I am now also considering the 1.8 L vibe.I did a search of 150+ miles that seems to go out over 200 miles . There are 149 vibes( 49 base, 50 AWD, 50GT) in this area but only a few that I am interested in. Just for fun, I did a 150+ search from Los Angeles and there are only 15 vibes.The incentives on the 2010s are 2500 plus 750. I am wondering if they will change for September. I am also wondering if a dealer could give you the option of waiting to September 1 and then back dating the order one day if the incentives were better in August than September.

[jake75]

A Google of DEALER IMR LMA turned up an actual 2009 Corvette invoice. Dealer IMR was 634.65 and LMA Group 350.00. The holdback of $1,903.95 [3% of msrp not incl. destination] was shown as a separate item. The invoice stated at the bottom "Invoice does not reflect dealer's ultimate cost because of manufacturer rebates, allowances, incentives, holdback, finance credit and return to dealer of advertising monies, all of which may apply to this vehicle."About 15 years ago there was a class action suit against Toyota in regard to advertising that offered vehicle for $xxx over invoice - the invoice including ad fees. But later a portion of the ad fees were refunded to the dealers because the group spent less on advertising. Toyota settled mostly for practical reasons - the lawyers got millions and the consumers got a $100 coupon good on their next purchase or lease of a Toyota car. I think most class action lawsuits are shams - more blackmail than legal - and make my profession look bad. As they say, 90% of lawyers give the rest of us a bad name.

[IMakeVibes]

Quote, originally posted by scherry2 »at a rate of around a thousand a day built. (guesstimate cause GM builds trucks at 70 per hour.) that vehicle isn't that older than the last one built.That was approximately correct for two shifts for both Corolla and Vibe. Vibes were anywhere from 18% to 40% of production on the car side (trucks operates separately), average was about 25%, so approximately 250 Vibes per day average. This did increase to about 40% in the last few weeks of the Vibes life and then slowly decreased to 0%.Quote, originally posted by stans39 »I would like to thank everyone for the information provided and their comments. I also hope to hear from IMakeVibes.What specifically do you want to know? Seems like most of your questions have been answered, at least by those on here, maybe not from the dealer. Others on here are better to answer your questions about what goes on at dealers and rebates and such than I am. I don't deal with any of that much. But if you still have questions, let me know, I'll do my best to help.

[jammies]

This must be deja vous.. I went through the same situation...Ask the dealer the mileage as the car sits. Call them up and have them run out and physically look at the odometer. Tell them you'll wait. This is the only way to be sure. Your concern about how the mileage was accrued is not uncommon.Incentives -- This past June is when I did my shopping. There was $2500 cash back and $500 dealer cash on 2009s. In addition, several dealerships were using "coupons" from the factory on Vibes. This was before CARS. Also, TheGMCard was allowing people to use ALL of their earning on Pontiacs ( Usually limited to $1000-$2000 depending on the vehicle ). We took delivery July 2. The incentives stayed the same, but TheGMCard earnings were now limited. So the dealership DID back date the paper work. In fact the salesman encouraged us to wait to see if the incentives would get better. But, we had two Vibes sold out from underneath us during the waiting time.As for selection, yea it was and still is limited. You have not mentioned the features that are NEEDS and which are WANTS. All I NEEDED was an automatic. I WANTED a 2.4 with alloys. So I searched for GTs ( I know a big leap from a base with alloys, but the other features in a GT are nice WANTS as well ). I found only 3 in my wife's number one color choice. Two were manual transmissions. The 3rd was 200 miles away. Too far for us to travel for follow-up problems and too far for the dealership to DX a car ( dealer exchange ). So on to color choice number two. Zero ina 250 mile radius. Third color choice --Only found 2 GTs, both auto. One was 90 miles away. That is the one we got -- the dealership DXed it in. On a side note, there were scads of Red and Black vibes, and I think the on-line search for vibes is capped at 50 per model type, unless you specify certain options.On a side note -- I know the advertising costs are listed on the invoice. I have the invoice for my car. BUT, I strongly suspect they are bogus OR the dalership recovers the costs from the manufacturer in other means. I sold Toyotas for several years. You could count on a 10% mark-up. A $20,000 Camry would have a $2000 mark-up, for example. Stating that Vibes have such small mark-ups I feel is just a method to pad the deal.

[stans39]

[QUOTE=IMakeVibesWhat specifically do you want to know? Seems like most of your questions have been answered, at least by those on here, maybe not from the dealer. Others on here are better to answer your questions about what goes on at dealers and rebates and such than I am. I don't deal with any of that much. But if you still have questions, let me know, I'll do my best to help.[/QUOTE]My specific questions to you are:When did they start making the 2010 vibe?About when would a vehicle with the vin 5Y2SP6E05AZ402707 have been made.I'm seeing several vehicles I am interesting in with vins ending in numbers of less than 5000 which I "think" means they have been on dealers lots for a while. I did find one in the 8000 range. Just trying to find out if that is correct. Thanks for the information.

[michaelgt]

Quote, originally posted by stans39 »My specific questions to you are:When did they start making the 2010 vibe?About when would a vehicle with the vin 5Y2SP6E05AZ402707 have been made.Thanks for the information. They started making the 2010 Vibe the last week of February. The vehicle in question was probably made mid-April. I do not have the specific date available.

[jake75]

My 2009 VIN ends in 469945 and I know it was built in Dec. 2008 but I can't remember where I saw that date. That said - IMO worrying about how long it has been since the car was manufactured is a bit (removed) to say the least. My 2007 T&C that I bought in July 2007 had been on the dealer's lot for 6 months. So what.Opps - I now see that these questions had to do with the 2010's.

[Old Tele man]

...on one of the DOOR TAGS?

[stans39]

Quote, originally posted by jake75 » That said - IMO worrying about how long it has been since the car was manufactured is a bit (removed) to say the least. My 2007 T&C that I bought in July 2007 had been on the dealer's lot for 6 months. So what.Well Jake, it depends on your perspective and I will give you mine.I have bought 7 new cars in my lifetime. I ordered every one of them. When I pay thousands of dollars for something I expect to get something in brand new condition. NOT something that has been sitting on the lot for 6 months that may have dings and scratches, and been driven by many people in less than ideal conditions during the break in period. The cars I am considering are not near so it is not easy for me to check them out. I only put 8 or 9 thousand miles a year on my car. I trade or sell a car because of its age, not its mileage. If I buy a car that has been sitting on the lot for 6 months, that means I will get 6 months less use out of that car.The only reason I didn't order this car was that in June there was no incentives on this car. In August there was a $3250 rebate, but it was too late to order one. Probably around the first of July would have been the cut off date. In July I checked with several local dealers and none of them were going to get any more vibes. My local dealer only got in one 2009 vibe in 2010 and since it took him over 3 months to sell it, he never got another vibe. It was an expensive red GT which I wasn't interested in. I had about given up on the vibe, but when I noticed the large incentives last week, I decided to start looking again.I do appreciate your other comments.

[jake75]

The T&C I bought in July '07 only had 10 miles on it though it was sitting on the lot for those 6 months. The first Vibe I bought in late Jan. 2003 had been made in October 2002 & about 250 miles because it was traded between dealers twice I think. But it was equipped pretty much like I wanted and as now, the price was right (At the time it seems almost every Vibe had the moon & tunes, a waste of $1,000 as far as I was concerned). Since I don't drive more than 6,000 miles a year, miles did not seem to be much of an issue, and while I too was concerned about how it might have been driven, the breakin is not as important as it was 50 years ago. I never thought that I would get less use out of a car because it was made some months ago. The warranty starts when you take title to it, not when it was made. I guess in the end it all depends on how much you want a Vibe at about $4,000 off msrp.

[jammies]

I agree with everything you said Jake. And I can see Stans point as well. What I can tell you is either the 1.8 or 2.4 is nearly bullet proof. Hell, nearly every four cylinder engine is bullet proof these days. With that in mind, I had a customer many years ago who wanted a Corolla. We had over 40 on the lot. He wanted one made in Japan. The ole "J" on the vin told this man that is was superior to North American built Corollas. In addition, he wanted one straight off the truck. Zero miles ( actually 3 was the lowest due to factory testing prior to shipping ( which by the way included full-throttle testing ) ).Needlss to say, he got his car.... six months later. Ordered from Japan. The Central Atlantic division of Toyota at that time only received North American Corollas. He waited, but got what he wanted.Break-in period -- The only corporate training I ever received from Toyota on this was to avoid using cruise control, driving at one contrant speed for any length of time, and avoid quick stops ( brakes ) and full throttle starts. There are as many other thoughts on this. One professes to always change your motor oil ( break-in-lube ) after 500 miles. Another, popular among motorcycle enthusiasts, is to break it in like you intend on driving it......Stan, good luck with your search. I hope you find the car in the condition you desire. In my situation, 103 miles on the odometer ( 90 from being DXed ) was not as much of a factor since I knew the underpinning of the car were Toyota. Using just over 5k on my GMCard + factory and dealer incentives was too good of a deal to pass up. I hope you do not pass up a good opportunity looking for your ideal situation.

[jedcaum]

It's called "Paralysis of Perfection," man. No offense, and I hope Stan finds what he wants, too. I too have had this malady, and spent many sleepless nights poring over my decisions, second guessing every little thing that could be wrong with the item in question. Thankfully, I'm over it.As for me, I'm happy to pick up the dregs from the stealership and have them make it right to my satisfaction, at thousands less than ordering one up fresh off the truck.Cling plastic on the seats just isn't worth that to me. Was once, but the demos I've bought with a couple thousand miles last just as long, look just as good, have every bit of the resale value, and NONE of the artificially inflated brand new car price.So do with that what you will, Stan, but one thing is certain: Keep waiting much longer, and agonizing over a production date a week or two later than you hoped for, and your decision will be made for you... No more new Vibes.I have never had a buyer or trade-in wonder if my car was built at the beginning, middle, or end of the model year - ever.

[joatmon]

Quote, originally posted by stans39 » I trade or sell a car because of its age, not its mileage. At what car age do you get rid of it?I tend to keep vehicles until they are too expensive to repair. When I bought the Vibe new in 12/2002, I traded in a pickup truck I bought new in 1985, so this concept of a vehicle timing out is alien to me.I fully understand a need for an absolutely reliable, dependable car. I just don't see how a car's calendar age is a direct factor in that.

[michaelgt]

Quote, originally posted by stans39 »Well Jake, it depends on your perspective and I will give you mine.I have had this perspective, as well as my father. However, in Feb 2002, I bought a 2001 2500 Yukon XL that was manufactured in Nov 2000 and had sat on the dealers lot for 15 months. The truck had 56 miles on it, I guessed that those were miles from moving it to plow snow, realign vehicles, etc. The only issue that was related to this time on the lot was the effort to remove the oil filter and grease the fittings. Using a grease gun with my air compressor, all the fittings took grease.I saved over $5000 on this truck (I could buy it at GM employee price, so this was the increase in trade-in amount over three other dealers that had 2002 models. This spring, my dad selected an Impala that had been on a lot for 100 days because it was invoiced prior to a $500 price increase. He has not had any adverse affects.

[ou.grizzly]

Worst case scenario if a vehicle is sitting on a lot for a very long time is rusted brake discs which goes away and a dead battery which will need a charge.

[IMakeVibes]

Quote, originally posted by michaelgt »They started making the 2010 Vibe the last week of February. The vehicle in question was probably made mid-April. I do not have the specific date available.This sounds about right.I do not have access to lookup by vin. If you know the body number (the five digit number on top of the radiator support) I would be able to help. That is how we reference our vehicles and then that body is assigned a vin. Not saying its not possible to look up by vin, I just don't have access to that. Also as mentioned, the month and year of manufacture are on a sticker on the left side front door opening.