Answers Before You Walk Into The Dealership

Thornebriar is a step-by-step platform designed to help you buy a car without getting ripped off, understand real pricing, and confidently deal with dealerships.

Our goal is to help you understand every number before you make a decision, whether you’re buying, leasing, trading, or financing.

Thornebriar was created by experienced car buying professionals focused on helping buyers learn how to negotiate a car price and avoid common dealership mistakes.

Our focus has been to simplify complex processes to make products and services easier to buy, use and enjoy. This includes our efforts with a new start up many years ago by the name of Http://www.cars.com. We know how to put the consumer first.

To provide car buyers a true advocate tp ensure they always get a fair deal, save time & money.

There is no more complex, big dollar expenditure transaction most people will ever enter undertake than buying, leasing, financing, trading and/or selling a car or truck. A few “free” hints paid for by advertising revenue or the sale of your personal information in the form of “sales leads” by and/or to manufacturers, dealers, lenders and insurance companies too often leads to overpaying by thousands of dollars and/or spending hours on end sitting in a dealership. Why are customers at such great risk? Dealers price people, not products. Their goal is to extract the maximum profit from each transaction; sell for the highest possible price, pay the least for a trade-in, charge the highest possible interest rate, and get the most for extended warranties, maintenance agreements, GAP (Guaranteed Asset Protection) policies and more. If the same consumer shopping for a $50,000 new vehicle (the avg price in 2025) was instead shopping for a $50,000 home or property, they would have two advocates- a realtor and a title company or real estate lawyer to insure fair treatment. Thornebriar was founded to advocate exclusively for the Car Buyer.

https://www.thornebriar.com/collections/gameplans

Free is never really free. Bits and pieces of pricing info or tips are paid for by the industry (Mfg, Dealer, Lender, and/or Insures) to get you to visit their sites or collect your name, phone # & email to turn you into a lead they can sell to dealers, lenders and insurers. No one wants to be a lead. These companies will not protect you from overpaying, just the opposite, they will collectively work to get you to pay the most possible by forcing you to spend hours in sitting in a dealership. Remember, dealerships are like Casino- both want you to sit at their tables for as long as possible so you spend more and the house makes more!

It breaks down the car buying process step-by-step with the key insights and context plus the essential tools (email templates, deal calculators & transaction checklists) to assure you a fair price.

How dealers structure offers and hide profit margins

The real math behind leases and loans

How to value your trade accurately

Which fees are negotiable and which aren’t

What to bring to the dealership to stay in control

You can download the first quarter free directly from our website no credit card required. Once you’re ready to unlock the full version, you’ll gain access to all four sections and our digital tools.

Thornebriar offers simple, browser-based tools to help you analyze deals:

Offer Calculator – Reveals what a car should actually cost

Deal Analyzer – Compares multiple offers side-by-side

Trade-In Estimator – Finds your real vehicle value

Loan / Lease Calculator – Estimates payments, interest rates, and total costs

No software or downloads needed — just accurate data and transparency.

No calculator can predict every dealer offer exactly, but our formulas use real market data to give you a fair range for negotiation. They’re designed to help you spot overpricing or undervalued trade-ins before you walk in.

Even honest dealers are trained to maximize profit. Common tactics include:

Inflated trade-in values that get offset elsewhere in the deal

“Today-only” pricing pressure

Hidden fees rolled into financing

Add-ons like extended warranties or GAP insurance with huge markups

Read our blog on Avoiding Hidden Dealer Fee & the Perils of Digital Documents.

https://www.thornebriar.com/blogs/tips-insights/how-to-avoid-dealer-doc-and-other-hidden-fees-when-car-buying

https://www.thornebriar.com/blogs/tips-insights/how-digital-documents-enable-overcharging-at-car-dealerships

The Gameplan helps you identify these traps and counter them with facts, not emotion.

No one can guarantee that. But by understanding how pricing, financing, and trade values work, you’ll avoid costly mistakes and gain leverage in every conversation.

The first quarter of the Car Buyer’s Gameplan is free. Full access — including all four quarters and our digital tools — is available at a one-time affordable price. (No subscriptions or hidden fees.)

No. Thornebriar doesn’t sell cars, take commissions, or partner with dealerships.

We’re 100% independent — that’s what makes our advice trustworthy.

Never. We don’t run ads, sell leads, or share your personal information. Your data stays private — always.

Yes. Use our Contact Page to reach out anytime. We respond to most inquiries within 24 hours, Monday through Friday.

Absolutely. Our site and tools are fully mobile-friendly, so you can reference your Gameplan or run deal calculations right from the dealership lot.

Yes, for now. We currently focus on the U.S. auto market. Expansion into other countries — starting with Canada — is planned as we add verified vehicle and trade-value databases.

• This price is good for today only. Dealers work to create FOMO (fear of missing out) to pressure you into buying now. The only reason a price will not be honored after today is if the manufacturer changed its incentives.

• Bait & Switch. You come in to look at a particular vehicle but they push you to consider something else. Not always bad, but it leaves you unprepared to negotiate onsite.

• The 4 square close: dealers will show you 4 numbers: the sale price, your trade-in value, cash down payment & Monthly payment (most often without interest rate and/or term), then ask you which number is most important to you. If you’re like most people, you choose the Monthly payment as most important. Then they’ll excuse themselves to go talk to their manager. Then come back saying congratulations, we did it. Don’t say yes until you see all the detail- sale price, trade value, taxes, license, fees, down payment, rate and term. (This why you handle this process remotely, before you ever set foot in the dealership!)

• Inflated trade value. Once a dealer gets you to commit to buying if he/she gives you $X for the trade, they’ll raise the selling price and inflate the trade value. If the Price of the vehicle is $40,000 and initial offer on your trade is $15,000, so $40,000 sale price – Trade $15,000 = $25,000. If you commit to buy if they give you $18,000 for your trade, they’ll try adding $3,000 to the price, so sale price $43,000 - Trade $18,000 = $25,000. Always focus on the net trade difference (sale price – trade in).

• Low Monthly payments. If you’ve been at a dealership for hours and finally agree to buy at a monthly payment of $x…always confirm the interest rate and term. Otherwise you won’t know if the rate or term has changed until signing the final docs. Or worse, as too many consumers have found out, until after they signed the final docs and driven off the lot!

• Verify any Dealer Offer. In many cases dealers will quote you an inflated (“loaded”) amount to finance, payment or both that includes any number of extras. GAP coverage, paint & interior sealants/protections, and more. Always demand line item detail of any and every offer so you don’t get overcharged.

• Beware Hidden Fees. Beware the documentation fee and other dealer fees like “dealer prep.” They are not fees paid to the DMV, but rather a dealer charge that can range from $85 to $1,995 or more. Ask for more detail and negotiate to reduce them as much as possible. These fees are 1005 dealer profit.

Check with your current bank or credit union, then compare online with other lenders. Once you have an approved rate you can use it to negotiate a final rate from the dealership’s sources. Remember, you want to know the dealer’s buy rate from the lender to make sure they don’t mark up your rate. The dealership can produce the final contract or lease agreement for almost any credit union or bank where you are pre-approved.

• One way to find a great price is through Affiliate programs from companies including Costco (members), USAA (service members), and suppliers (companies with select relationships with Auto manufacturers. Check your company’s HR web site for possible offerings like those offered by Home Depot (GM), Comcast (Ford) and many more.

• Note: while the sale price is set by the manufacturer, you will still need to negotiate financing, aftermarket products and the value of your trade.

Best practice is to get two offers on your trade from Carmax & Carvana so you have a clear idea of current market value. Once you have your out the door (OTD) price locked down with the selling dealer, you can do a drive by at the dealership but only for an appraisal and/or test drive of the vehicle you want. Get a business card for the salesperson, leave and move final negotiations back to email. The alternative is to have them come by your work or home to appraise the vehicle.

Payoff exceeds wholesale value. Pay off is $15,200, wholesale value is $11,000. $11,000 - $15,200 = -$4,200 in negative equity.

Most franchise new car dealers offer some sort of certified pre-owned (used vehicle) program. Most include extending the new car warranty & some lower interest rates.

Dealers are allowed to mark up their buy rate and charge the customer more. Why? It is an enticement by lenders to share additional profit with dealers that can mean more contracts for the lender.

When a dealer agrees to locate and trade for an exact match of the unit you want from another dealership. How does this change the deal? If it’s less than a hundred or so miles away, they usually send an employee with the car they are trading. Shouldn’t change your price or if it does, not by much. If they have to pay a transport company, they will likely add the cost to your price. Ask to see the transport invoice to keep them honest. Price per mile is roughly $.75 to $1/mile.

It varies from state to state. Some tax the MSRP on new cars, others the negotiated sale price. Still other states tax the trade difference (new or used vehicle – trade in allowance) instead of sale price. If you have a trade worth more than $10,000 it can make a significant difference in the total price. Ask the dealer or check the state DMV site to see if they do or don’t tax on trade difference.