These are typical inquiries we receive from potential customers who visit our site. If they do not answer your specific question, please call or use the "Contact Us" page. We will reply! 1. Why do your prices seem so much cheaper than others, especially the big franchised dealerships? 6. Do you make your profit by adding on services? Are there any hidden costs? 7. Do you take trades and offer financing?
In the first place, SAB is a small independent dealership and brokering service yet we have access to purchase vehicles at venues other small dealers cannot get near, the ones where the major franchises shop for inventory. This access to closed venues is key. We are buying units directly from the manufacturer’s leasing subsidiaries where franchise dealers shop. Second, the franchise dealers carry heavy overhead expenses for inventory, franchise fees, maintaining large facilities, salaries, etc. that we do not have. Those costs of course must be covered by marking up the profit margins in their sales. Finally at SAB we price our cars at a reasonable commission based on what we’ve paid for them and try to keep the prices near Edmunds.com’s wholesale values. It’s this combination of access to the best venues, very low overhead, and absence of greed that allows us to sell "virtually new vehicles" at the prices we do.
2. Is SAB a regular used car dealership or a brokering company?
Well, there’s nothing "regular" about our business, but the answer is both. We are a licensed used car dealership in the state of DE and we do buy and offer "retail" units for sale at our Selbyville holding lot, but we started years ago as a brokering service and continue to feature that service. You can buy a car we have on hand at a great price, or see the type vehicles we purchase at our lot, and order one in a different make, model or color.
3. How exactly does the brokering service work?
We use a signed purchase agreement specifying what our customer is ready to buy: make, model, year(s), mileage range, and equipment. Once we have that and a 5% good faith deposit, we will find the vehicle they are after. Before we buy it, we confirm via phone or e-mail that this is the unit they want and get their approval to purchase. Once purchased we take care of delivery any needed reconditioning, and then the customer inspects the vehicle and completes the sale. We have NEVER had a customer not complete a sale on a car we have purchased for them. We are VERY careful about what we buy.
4. Do you offer such great prices because you buy accident history cars and fix them up, or flood history cars, or poor condition cars and recondition them?
Nope, we hate to do any work on cars whatsoever. Our goal is to buy the cleanest units coming off lease possible, and we see full condition and history reports before we buy. Ideally we want to take a car off the transport, wash it and deliver it–although sometimes cleaning carpets and removing a door ding is necessary. We never handle any accident history or branded title cars. NEVER.
5. I live in CA., can you handle sales out of your local area?
Yes, have delivered cars to customers all over the USA and even in Europe. It is not difficult using fax and certified mail to complete the necessary documents. We can deliver your new car right to you!
Most dealers make a large portion of their profit selling after market warranties, tacking on additional fees for paperwork, adding points to your financing agreement, etc. At SAB we don’t play any of those games. The price we advertise or quote is the full price you pay. We do not sell warranties. We only sell cars that are in factory warranty, and you can get additional warranty through the company that manufactured the car if you choose. We do not add anything for paperwork, temp tags, etc. If we are delivering a car to Ohio, we include delivery costs in your price.
At this time we are not doing either. Trading is a convenient, but economically unwise thing to do. Whatever you can sell your vehicle for yourself is a lot more than any dealer will pay you for it. Clean it up and offer it locally. Price it at wholesale if you want to sell it and those numbers are readily available from Edmunds.com. As far as financing goes, we are working on ways to facilitate this for our customers, but right now we are only making recommendations to other sources. Financing adds a tremendous amount to the real cost of buying a car. Be careful about the rate you pay!
8. Is it really better to buy a 1 or 2 year old car than brand new?
Please read our "Car Buying Advice" page. There is really no comparison. Cars depreciate drastically in the first year or two. We buy off lease cars, repos, demos, estate cars, etc. with very low miles on them which we call "virtually new". The savings are HUGE. It is not at all unusual for SAB customers to save 30–50% off the list price of new cars on units you cannot tell from new. Read our "Testimonials" page to hear what SAB customers think after making such a buy. So if you’re vain, buy a brand new car and pay an extra $10–$30K! But if you’re smart, buy from SAB!!
