Car buyers aren't haggling for savings

Britain's car buyers are haggling less hard for discounts than they used to - according to new research.


Britain's car buyers: "Wont haggle"



The report into car-buying trends from Sainsbury’s Finance suggests buyers should be looking to save an average of £1,700 when negotiating the cost of a new car, yet a staggering 27% of buyers intending to buy a vehicle in the next six months said they wouldn't haggle at all.And, only 39 per cent of people buying a new car over the next six months intend to haggle ‘hard’ prior to sealing the deal.

This compares to 59 per cent in March 2010 and 52 per cent in September.

The bank suggests that the inability of the country’s car buyers to secure the best deal will cost them a total of £740 million.

Sainsbury’s Finance attributes the current lack of haggling to a buyers’ market in which car dealers are offering freebies, special offers and discounts of up to 40 per cent.

It says consumers currently think they are being offered such good deals that haggling is unnecessary. Steven Baillie, head of Sainsbury’s Loans said: “It is disappointing to see how few people are willing to haggle on the price of a new car at the moment.

“The new car industry is belatedly seeing the effects of the recession in earnest, with car-buying incentives such as the car scrappage scheme and lower VAT, now both things of the past.“This has led the industry to offer some great deals at the moment, but consumers shouldn’t automatically accept that this is the best they can do."