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Future Vehicles Future Crown Vic and Grand Marquis
152 messages, Last post on Jun 07, 2008 at 4:54 PM
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You seem to be quite knowledgeable. The salesman told me that when they receive an invoice for the car, that it would be about 2 weeks from then that they would get the car and he would call me when he gets the invoice. There is an item on the printout they gave me that I didn't notice until I got home. Something called LMDA Assessment for $700. Looking online, it appears to be some non-negiotiable fee related to advertising? Do you know about this $700 fee they tacked on? If it does have to do with advertising, then it is a ripoff, as Ford DOES NOT ADVERTISE the Grand Marquis. If Ford were to make big improvements for 2009, I would be jealous, as it won't help me.
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There are a lot of people out there who have 3 to 7 year old, low mileage, above average Grand Marquis', who are not willing to trade-in perfectly good cars in for another one that's no different than their current one. But give them a car that looks like a NEW car, and WHAM!, you got their attention and their open checkbooks. Your statement applies to Town Car owners as well. If Jaguar had a dealer here, I would have purchased an XJ8 in 2004. Now, I'm considering an XJ8L, but still the nearest Jag dealer is in the next state. Saw a photo of a "new" proto type Town Car with suicide doors & I liked it a lot.
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Replying to: ionosphere1 (Dec 21, 2007 7:31 am) As to the LMDA, what that means is Lincoln-Mercury Dealer Advertising association. Every brand of car has some sort of local or regional advertising association, and a dealer would be stupid not to be part of it. Once a part, the assessment is non-negotiable. They don't just run ads, sometimes they augment the manufacturer's national marketing programs with additional or different incentives designed especially for the needs of their local markets. It's sorta like "Buy a Ford Mustang convertible from any of your participating Miami (or Southern Florida) area Ford dealers, don't buy a Nissan or Chevy" type of adds. The 'dealer specific' adds are additional to that, and paid for by the dealer himself to say 'Buy your Mustang from Joe Blow Ford, not from John Doe Ford across town' type of ads. The 2 weeks to arrival from invoice date sounds about right for most American cars. I hate to say it, but I hope you end up jealous about the 2009 or 2010 models. If they make the significant changes I'd like to see them make, I'm going to trade my low mileage, pristine 2005 Lincoln Town Car Signature L in on a new one. If they don't make any significant changes, I'm gonna keep mine. I still can't believe that Ford deleted the Moon Roof, THX Sound, and Navigation System from the options list. Now how stupid is that? 
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Replying to: euphonium (Dec 21, 2007 10:49 am) The XJ8L is an extremely nice car. I've driven a number of XJs. The newer ones are much more reliable than the mid-late 90's vintage and older, and the 80's & early 90's vintage XJs could be a nightmare to own. Still no matter how good the car is now, I'd have a little trepidation about owning one if there was no dealer within at least 50-75 miles of me. But the Jag is one very sexy set of wheels, no doubt. Good Luck to you if you do get one. By the way, what state are you from, anyway. You say you saw a photo of a "new" Town Car with suicide doors? That one must have slipped past me. Tell me where you saw it, I'd love to go look at it and do a little research on it. If you have a link to it, please attach it. A while ago I saw some photo's on what was purported to be the possible reincarnation of the Lincoln Continental, and that had suicide doors. But that was pre-Mulally at Ford, and since that time a lot of stuff was axed and Ford changed product direction. I'm aware of the probability of Ford bringing their re-engineered Australian RWD platform over to the U.S., and the possibility of it being the replacement for the Panther (CV/GM/TC) platform. Keep in mind that Ford had to mortgage virtually every asset they own, just to get the meager resources they do have. Don't expect them to get too bold in their product approach. At least not until some of their new products coming on line hit pay dirt for them. The new Fusion/Milan/MKZ, the 500-Taurus/Montego-Sable, the Mustang variants. and the Edge/MKX have all been working better than they expected. A lot of the face lifted vehicles like the '08 Focus, the Escape/Mariner, and the Expedition/Navigator are doing very well. The coming new stuff like the Flex/MK?, the MKS, the all new F150, and the coming Hybrid Fusion/Milan & possibly MKZ should add a lot to the bottom line. Together they'd fund a lot of aggressive product offerings. In the meantime, a significant facelift for the CV/GM/TC, about the magnitude of the new Focus/Mariner/Navigator, would recharge that market segment and buy Ford the time they need to develop world class replacements. Facelifts only cost a fraction of a complete re-do, and these cars are already very profitable for Ford, this could not only buy them the time they need, it would make them even more profitable and protect a market segment they already own.
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The strange thing is, is I am unsure exactly what the color will look like. It looks completely different on different websites. Even the Mercury website has it look different depending on the page, and even on the initial GM page if you rotate the car, it gets darker or lighter. The brochure looks different too, so I find it confusing. As dark blue is my first choice, I'm sure I'll like it, but I wish I knew what color to expect. Some webpages it looks sky blue, others purplish, and others grayish blue. There were no cars in that color on the lot. I'm in Seattle, so I don't know why the blue would be a hard sell.
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Replying to: peetiedog (Dec 21, 2007 6:28 pm) It is coincidental that Ionosphere1 & I live in WA, he in the Peoples Republic of Puget Sound while I reside on the Columbia down river from Portland, 50 miles. That I know the dealer there from his racing days fifty years ago causes me to hesitate about bringing a needy XJ8 to his shop for repairs & Tacoma is really to far to flatbed a car. If only the local Lincoln dealer had a qualified Jag mechanic. I understand your feelings about the BMW & Audi. My son in law has a recent 3 or 5 Sedan, our daughter just bought an X5 & our son's Audi A8 is very comfortable and quick. Out of habit, I prefer our TC for road trips. 66 Mustang GT Coupe, Ivy Green Metallic is my trophy car & garage queen having owned it for over 40 years. It hasn't been wet since '95.  "For the Love of Cars" 
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Replying to: ionosphere1 (Dec 21, 2007 8:19 pm) Your Lincoln-Mercury sales person must not be trying to hard to serve you, because putting your mind at ease about the color is easy. All Lincoln-Mercury dealers should have a photo album sized binder called a '2008 Mercury Product Portfolio' in their stores. Inside there is an 'Exterior Paint Colors' chart with small paint chips on it for every color offered on the 2008 Mercury product line-up, Those chips are 97-98% true to what the actual color will be, so should give you a reasonably acurate representation of what to expect. You should demand that he show you this information. Every store has had these product portfolios in store for about 3 months or more now. Ask him to print you out an order update, and while you're at it see if he'll provide you with a copy of the 'Dealer Order Retail Announcement' (DORA), tell him if neccessary he can hide or cover-up his cost numbers. This will allow you to see how the vehicle was ordered, so you can confirm colors and equipment, etcetera. You want to confirm your color soon, so as not to be stuck with the choice of taking a car you don't like, or loosing your $3000 non-refunable deposit. All production is down now, until just after New Years day; which means your car probably hasn't been built, and maybe not even locked in yet, so you may still be able to change it if necessary. Once the car is built, it should only take a couple weeks for transit time. Norsea Blue is not a hard color to sell in the Seattle Region. It's just that some dealers may not have had good success with certain colors, and so they don't stock them. Usually the hottest colors in cars like that are Black, Silver, and Champagne/Gold, with Dark Blue/Lite Blue/White all kinda vying for the 4th spot, with Red usually dragging the rear. If I were you I'd ask for a statement in writing about the deposit being non-refundable, signed by a manager. If you have not already signed one, DON'T. Clarify with them that you will loose your entire $3000 if you do not take the car, even if they later sell or dealer trade the car away? Obviously if they sell the car at a profit, their profit will immediately become $3000 greater because of them retaining your deposit. If they dealer trade the car away, other than transport costs, they're in a 'no harm - no foul' position. If they suggest that this is in fact the case, let them know that you are going to confirm the legality of this act with the Washington DMW, the Washington Attorney General's office, and the Better Business Bureau (BBB), then almost all the local TV & Radio new stations have some kind of 'Consumer Action Reporter' who'd probably love to sink their teeth into that one. Even if it is legal, $3000 seems like way too much of a penalty. Heck, from dealer's invoice to full MSRP, there's not $3000 of profit in the car. Try and negotiate some lesser, more reasonable amount, like $500 or maybe $1000 at the maximum. Sounds like this guy is gouging you. I'd bet that just having an attorney write a letter to the owner or general manager would solve that problem, and a simple legal letter probably wouldn't cost you more than a few hundred dollars. Whatever happens, good luck to you. The Grand Marquis is a great car, even if your salesman or dealership isn't so great.
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Replying to: euphonium (Dec 21, 2007 9:28 pm) NOW THAT'S WHAT I CALL A TROPHY CAR!  If you could only see me right now, I'm turning green with envy. I would look soooo cool in that car. 
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Replying to: peetiedog (Dec 21, 2007 11:09 pm) How did you get so knowledgable? Did you work in the industry? About the color, I didn't ask the saleman so I guess it's my fault. Before test driving it, I only looked on the Mercury website. It wasn't until later that I looked at lots of different sites and the brochure and noticed the color looked different. Any dark blue would be my first choice, so I'm not too concerned that I won't like it. Including this car, this will be my fourth vehicle in a row that I got in blue, so you can see that blue is my color. After giving deposit, I didn't get any "receipt" for it and saleman said they don't. Interestingly, they haven't cashed the check, because the $3,000 is still in my account and it's been about 6 weeks. Wonder why they didn't cash it? I'm not going to change my mind about the car and I'm going to give more than $3,000 for a down payment total. I wonder if they aren't cashing the check unless I tried to back out the deal? |
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I'm unclear about this. During the warranty period, does maintenance such as oil changes have to be done by the dealer to make sure they can't screw you in denying any warranty work? Like could I have my oil changes done by places like Jiffy Lube during the warranty period and not worry if my car gets problems during warranty? I'm assuming that the dealer charges a lot more for everything like oil changes.
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