I'm thinking about purchasing a used car through cars.com. Anyone here have any experiences positive or negative they'd be willing to share? Thank you!

I've found it to be helpful as a search tool, but didn't know you could actually "buy" a car through them. I thought the whole site was a series of dealer and individuals listing cars?

It's crap, dealers pay for the leads that go through cars.com. You'll do just as well shopping through the dealers website and internet departments.

I sell Chevy commercial trucks for a living. The wife decided she wanted a new Cadillac XT4, Chevy didn't make anything that was up to her standards

Long story short, I found a loss leader ad on a local dealers website. Yes it was on a specific vehicles but happened to fit the CSM's criteria. The dealer literally lost about 4k on it. I'm happy, the CSM is happy

A loss leader is a loser price on a specific vehicle that is designed to get the leads coming in, not necessarily to sell that specific vehicle.

You cannot buy from cars.com, not new anyway

Cars.com was a good search engine to find vehicles I was interested in. Didnt think you could buy through them.

Whatever you do, do not bother with truecar. That is the biggest scam around. One dealers true car price (walk in no haggle price) was $500 off MSRP.

quote:

Originally posted by gpbst3:
Cars.com was a good search engine to find vehicles I was interested in. Didnt think you could buy through them.

Whatever you do, do not bother with truecar. That is the biggest scam around. One dealers true car price (walk in no haggle price) was $500 off MSRP.

That’s because Truecar is paid by auto dealerships so they can get car buyers’ contact info.

Thanks for the replies!

I guess I'm probably confused as to the purpose of cars.com. I figured that cars.com received some sort of percentage of the sale to be able to list on their site? Or do they receive a flat rate for the advertising listings?

quote:

Originally posted by HuskySig:
Thanks for the replies!

I guess I'm probably confused as to the purpose of cars.com. I figured that cars.com received some sort of percentage of the sale to be able to list on their site? Or do they receive a flat rate for the advertising listings?

It's pretty much a monthly subscription that a dealer pays them. They get leads from their own DMA ( Dealer Market Area)

quote:

Originally posted by BigSwede:

quote:

Originally posted by HuskySig:
Thanks for the replies!

I guess I'm probably confused as to the purpose of cars.com. I figured that cars.com received some sort of percentage of the sale to be able to list on their site? Or do they receive a flat rate for the advertising listings?

It's pretty much a monthly subscription that a dealer pays them. They get leads from their own DMA ( Dealer Market Area)

What about vehicles that are listed for sale by private owners, not dealers?

quote:

Originally posted by HuskySig:

quote:

Originally posted by BigSwede:

quote:

Originally posted by HuskySig:
Thanks for the replies!

I guess I'm probably confused as to the purpose of cars.com. I figured that cars.com received some sort of percentage of the sale to be able to list on their site? Or do they receive a flat rate for the advertising listings?

It's pretty much a monthly subscription that a dealer pays them. They get leads from their own DMA ( Dealer Market Area)

What about vehicles that are listed for sale by private owners, not dealers?

I didn't know those where on cars.com. It's probably a flat fee like Autotrader