Well.. I have been on a waiting list for 4 weeks now. My HCH2 finally arrived. Well. Sort of. I wanted the Magnetic Pearl, but a Galaxy Gray is available and i'm first on the list. Not a big deal It was my first choice, but the wife preferred the Magnetic Pearl... and it grew on me.

Still, no disappointment here.

Hopefully i'll be driving the sucker within the next few days. I'm donating our old 1988 Subaru beast to charity (grandfathers old car, 76k miles!). Keeping the 2000 Subaru Forester (117k miles) for short trips and hauling stuff around. Assuming its transmission holds up.. its slipping a little bit and of concern.

I'll post a followup report with opinions of the car and dealer and such once i've put a few miles on it. Hopefully everything goes smooth at the dealership. I'm super glad they honored their quoted price. I think I got a pretty good deal considering HCH2's are pretty hard to come by in these parts (Mass. - New England).

$21,000 base NO NAV.
$1,000 options (fog lights, autodim mirror, splashguards)
$550 destination
$170 doc fee

total = $22720 before taxes, title/reg.

I'll pickup a few other things later. All weather floor mats and such.

I tested the waters at numerous dealerships.. its near impossible to get them to go below MSRP. My dealer admitted they goofed on their quoting, but stated he would honor it. At first I thought of it as a sales pitch, but seems to be true.

I toyed with the idea of going NAV, but really. I just won't use it. It will primarily be used for commuting to work. I know that route all too well. I'll just mount up my portable Garmin GPS for those rather infrequent road trips.

-GaryW.

The doc fee is basically a rip-off but it's made up for the $700 off MSRP you got. You got lucky there.

Yeah, I wanted to contest the doc fee, but it was the best quote I could come up with. Another dealership wanted MSRP, $1250 for options, a $500 doc fee, plus $550 destination. No way. Nearly $1,500 more total price.

I didn't mind the extra $170, considering It was ~$700 below MSRP already and notably less than others.

Most dealerships were charing $1250 for the options or more.. they reduced it to $1000. Even though its probably worth $600'ish. If I had the will, I would have purchased them separate and installed myself.. but with a 16 month old baby at home, finding a free afternoon for such things is near impossible

I'm organizing the payment over my lunch break today. I may buy the sucker this evening and plop the plates on. The hitch is I won't be able to pick it up for a few days. I have to drive up with the wife.

The faster I buy it and get the plates on.. the less 'strangers' will be able to test drive it. Until then the dealership can do what it likes. It just got off the truck yesterday with only a couple miles on the odometer.

-GaryW

Come to South Florida to buy your car!

I just bought one for $1000 under MSRP and did not have to pay for mats or any other fees other than $250 dealer prep - 1/2 their normal fee. The dealer had 4 in stock, and I had checked several dealers in the area and a couple had cars as well.

Good Luck!

I got my 2006 HCHII Navi for $700 under MSRP (including destination). There were no prep. fees only DMV fees which includes plates and registration-no doc fees-those are actual NY State DMV fees. I actually took magnetic pearl early because the silver one we wanted was a month later or so and another customer who had the mag. pearl on order wanted a silver one so we swapped places. Ironically we liked Magnetic Pearl best but the dealer originally didn't have it to offer to us.

I went to cars.com and requested a quote and had the car in 3 weeks (would have been 2 weeks but we wanted to delay picking it up for a week.)

Michael

I love my autodimming mirror. I wish it had Homelink instead of the stupid compass.

Support the Troops - Drive a Hybrid!

I can't wait..

Options being installed today. Registration should be done by tomorrow morning. Hopefully I can pick it up on Friday or Saturday.

As I posted in another thread..

I Paid $979 for 8/120,000 with $0 deductible for the HondaCare warranty from the dealership.

My overall experience? Mmm good question. Well, without my research, patience, counterquotes, and .... more patience... I saved a good deal of cash. I know the dealership wasn't all too happy to not get MSRP and 2x the price for the warranty (they wanted $1,900 originally), but they got their sale and they did make a profit. What in my opinion was a fair profit, so I am happy with the final results.

About the dealership? (Peters Honda of Nashua NH). They did try to slide a few fast ones, but that is expected. The sales guy was rather friendly and knowledgable. He BS'd a bit, but it really didn't bug me all that much. Examples of BS are.... 'i'll make sure you get a free car wash with every service if you give me all 5's on my review card'. Turns out the dealership gives free car washes anyway... ;P I understand it is his job.. and he has to make a living too.

And no, they did not try to sell me 'vin etching', or 'detailing', or 'seat protection'. They didn't even ask me. Though I did notice one form that I had to sign at closing that I 'declined' to receive the 'detailing' and 'seat protection' service. They knew that I knew what I was doing so didn't even bother. And NO, they did not bring up Vin etching at all. I don't believe they do that. Unlike Clay Chevrolet In Lexington MA does. They tried to sell it to me once.. 10 years ago.. on a lease. *phhbt*

-Gary.