
An FBI Hostage Negotiator Buys A Car [audio] - kungfudoi
http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2012/12/21/167802325/episode-425-an-fbi-hostage-negotiator-buys-a-car
======
nathannecro
Fantastic Planet Money episode. However, it is about 17 minutes long which a
whole bunch of political stuff which may be viewed as fluff. Approxcript of
the negotiation techniques below:

1\. "Nibbles": Reach a general agreement (agree on a basic premise). Instead
of instantly accepting the deal, push for one small concession at a time.

2\. Before entering into a discussion, think about a 'BATNA' = Best
Alternative To Negotiated Agreement. Are there other options? Is there a
minimum you are willing to agree with?

3\. "Expanding the pie": While certain points in contention may be very
inflexible (salary, job position), "expand the pie" and seek out other areas
which may be more flexible (vacation days, compensation). This also serves to
clarify the central hinge of the negotiations.

4\. Disarming Empathy. Essentially, the act of being empathetic (in a sort of
self-deprecating way perhaps?) so that the other side bargains against
themselves while you do not budge from your initial offer.

~~~
S4M
I was looking for this kind of summary, thanks for posting it, but after
reading it I fail to see how "Nibbles" and "Expanding the pie" are not
basically the same thing.

~~~
neilk
"Nibbles" are when you extend an agreement with further small concessions.
Works best when the other side is under more pressure than you - they were
happy to get to your yes, and the pain of losing your agreement is something
they will avoid.

"Expanding the pie" is more like changing the game. You have one thing you're
negotiating on, and it's a zero-sum situation. One winner and one loser. But
what if you bring other things into the negotiation, to turn that into a win-
win situation? Then it's easier to find agreement.

~~~
S4M
Yes, I get that, but "Nibbles" still seem like after having concluded some
sort of initial deal, you "expand the pie" by asking new stuff (instead of
negotiating on the salary, you negotiate on salary+holidays+benefits).

~~~
kstenerud
It's called expanding the pie when a change in the terms of the negotiation
generates an even greater win for all parties involved.

The actual example in the podcast was over pumpkins. There was only one person
selling pumpkins in the village the negotiator was in during her time in the
Peace Corps. She wanted to buy all four of them but the farmer would only sell
her two. She even tried offering double but the farmer wouldn't budge.

The customer took the position of buying all four pumpkins because she needed
them in order to make enough pumpkin pies.

The farmer took the position of keeping two pumpkins because she needed the
seeds to plant for next year's crop.

Once they got out of positional bargaining and discovered the root of the
problem, the solution became clear: The customer gets all 4 pumpkins at the
original price, but first the farmer opens them all and takes the seeds, which
the customer would have thrown out anyway. Thus, both got more than they would
have if they'd stuck to their original positions.

------
runjake
_This is hastily-written, sorry_

Step 1: Decide what car(s) you want to buy, down to the color, trim, options,
etc. Type it all out in concise list form.

Step 2: Visit Edmunds.com, etc and get a general idea of local fees, taxes,
and costs.

Step 3: Find the dealer websites within 120 miles or so, and write down their
"Internet Sales" and "Fleet Sales Manager" email addresses.

Step 4: Compose an email to each of the email addresses you wrote down. Say
that you are sending this out to several dealers within 120 miles and you will
be selecting the lowest cost for the following list (which you created in step
1). Ask them to give you their "walk out the door" price. This price will
include all fees, taxes, costs, etc.

Step 5: Wait. Maybe 30% of them won't reply, but that's OK.

Step 6: Take the lowest quote and tack it to the wall. Send another email to
the next 2 or 3 lowest quotes saying that the guy tacked to the wall is
quoting you $true_value (don't lie). See if they come down in price.

Step 7: Pick the one.

This has worked 3 times for buying a new car. No haggling or even stepping
into the car lot until negotiations are done. You don't necessarily have to
take the lowest quote (it's nice to pay a little more for a dealer closer to
home) but it sure does drive the price down.

~~~
chiph
I've seen this approach backfire, because the dealer says he has the exact
make/model as-quoted, but doesn't. Tries to pass it off as a simple
misunderstanding, then says "But we have this other one over here which is
close to what you asked for..."

IOW, only works if dealer is honest.

~~~
Spooky23
In my experience, this usually happens with high-demand cars that are hard for
the dealer to get or brands with a limited area presence.

VW has 2 dealers in my region. Want a TDI Jetta with a manual transmission?
Let the games begin -- they get 3 a month and the sales manager won't let it
out the door for a good price.

Toyota used to have supply constraints for certain Camry models (some trims
were made in Japan exclusively a few years ago). Want one of those? Good luck
-- my dad had the guy demand a deposit to be on a waiting list, or take a
lousy deal on one of the other trims.

Another thing that happens is that dealers need to trade with other dealers
for specific cars. Sometimes these deals fall through, and the dealer who
promised you a car is actually being honest -- he doesn't have it for reasons
out of his control.

~~~
mitchty
Yep this tactic doesn't work well for anyone that wants manual transmission
cars in the USA. Most places get so few of them its hard to get deals on those
specific types of cars.

~~~
obviouslygreen
I would not have believed this if I hadn't helped a friend shop for a car
recently. It was surreal to both of us that his only hard requirement was a
manual transmission and, despite visiting every dealership we could find, few
had them at all.

Interesting note: Be very careful about believing a dealer's website or phone
description of a car as a "manual." We ran into multiple dealerships that
misidentified paddle shift or "manumatic"/"tiptronic" cars as manuals.

He ended up with an RX-8, but that's an entirely different set of stories...
:)

------
russell
I let my girlfriend do it. The last time I bought a car, I decided what I
wanted and shopped around the local dealers and got a good offer at $18,000. I
told my girlfriend about the deal, and she said, "Way too expensive."

She gets on the web and looks at all the dealer in Northern CA, and finds one
of those lo-ball one-only offers in San Francisco. She calls the dealer and
gets him to hold the car for her, since we would have to drive 240 miles to
get there. Then she starts calling local dealers to find one that would match
the offer. The nearest one wouldnt, but one an hour away would. She got me the
car for $14,000.

A few years earlier we bought a house and needed a new refrigerator and
dishwasher. We go to Sears and find what we want. She then proceeds to
negotiate several hundred dollars of the sticker price. I didnt even know you
could bargain with Sears.

The downside is that I cant make a simple purchase any longer. She makes me go
for the best deal.

~~~
rayiner
I totally understand where you're coming from. My wife does all the
negotiating for us. She negotiated the price for the diamond for her
engagement ring. She almost walked away from the perfect one because the
seller refused to go down another $200, even though she had already bargained
down to a great price. I told her "honey, let me handle it, I'll get down
another $200." I just gave the seller what she was asking for...

~~~
jacquesm
> She negotiated the price for the diamond for her engagement ring.

<http://www.edwardjayepstein.com/diamond/chap20.htm>

on HN before:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4535611>

~~~
rayiner
It wasn't clear in my post--we bought the diamond on the secondary market.
Diamonds are like cars in that way--they depreciate tremendously the minute
you drive them off the lot.

On the other hand, the stuff about the DeBeers monopoly is quite inaccurate
today. DeBeers has gotten in anti trust troubles, but hasn't been an actual
monopoly for a long time.

~~~
wglb
I found the original story quite fascinating.

Do you have a link for updated info about their current practices and market
position?

~~~
rayiner
See this article:
[http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2001/...](http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2001/02/19/296863/index.htm).
It's from 2001, so when it refers to things that happened a "few years ago" it
means the late 1990's.

~~~
wglb
Wow. Thanks. No less fascinating than that story from long ago.

------
smugengineer69
Nerd moment.

This reminds me of the part in The Hobbit (the book, not the movie) where
Gandalf takes the dwarves to meet Beorn, the skin-changer. Before entering his
house, Gandalf warns the dwarves that Beorn is tempermental, and that in order
to get him to help them, they should stagger their entrances.

Gandalf initially only enters with Bilbo, but as he tells Beorn about the
adventures they have had so far, he repeatedly references an increasingly
large number of dwarves. e.g. "You have mentioned a dozen, yet there are only
ten dwarves here!", to which Gandalf replies by having two more dwarves enter.

In the end, master businessman Gandalf gets Beorn to house all 16 in their
party, by means of exactly this "nibbles"-like negotiation strategy.

I really do think Gandalf has a lot to offer the business community as an
astute and personable negotiator.

~~~
CamperBob2
_I really do think Gandalf has a lot to offer the business community as an
astute and personable negotiator._

"Wait, no, I have a better idea, how about this. You sell me the gray Prius
for 2.5% under factory invoice with the 2% APR financing we talked about
earlier, or I summon the great worm Catyrpelius from his resting place in the
Abyss to digest your entrails over a thousand years. What? Sure, I'll wait
here while you run it by the sales manager."

~~~
rhokstar
I'm imagining this whole scenario in his voice. Golden.

------
barefoot
If you enjoyed this podcast I can recommend the book "Getting to Yes":

<http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0395631246>

It's a little bit dated but an excellent introduction to negotiation and
overlaps with a number of the topics discussed in the show.

~~~
crazysaem
<http://www.amazon.com/dp/0395631246> (link to the desktop version)

------
zaidf
My dad does something similar every few years when purchasing a family car.
This is what he does:

1\. Decides ahead of time what exactly he wants and how much he wants to
pay(via internet, friends etc.)

2\. Calls up area dealerships that have the exact model/make

3\. Asks them to skip the pitch. No, he is not visiting the dealership. Yes,
he is damn serious about purchasing this car.

4\. Tells them to write down his number, which is the price he is willing to
pay.

5\. Requests them to call when they can sell him for that number. Promises to
buy it if they do so.

How it works out:

Typically he will get multiple calls back trying to get him to reset his
price. He stays firm and politely informs them he is serious about that price
and that he is _ready to purchase_. That part is very important because
dealerships get a fair share of timewasters. He usually ends up with a
dealership that can chalk up his sale as an easy one even if the margins were
low/non-existent.

I'll emphasize that my dad, like the negotiator in the story, will not budge.
This is harder than it seems but the key for him is to keep the conversations
short and set a no-bullshit attitude up front. He has had instances when the
dealership will lure him in and then try to do a switcharoo. He will laugh or
express disappointment depending on the day but in either case, he _will_ walk
out.

That said, he is a reasonable party. If it is $100 more, he will likely accept
it--but even then, only as a final compromise. If it is $1,000 more than his
price, he will almost certainly walk away.

Another key point is that my dad does his homework in figuring about the
lowest he feels a dealership can go while still having interest in selling it
to him.

Also, his being a doctor may help him in being taken serious, though it also
makes the salesman more aggressive in trying to get additional $ out of him.

~~~
chrsstrm
I did something similar with my last car purchase, with a little bit more
back-end research. I found dealers with the exact car I wanted on their lot. I
put copies of the window stickers of these cars onto my iPad, which I brought
with me during the negotiations. I also knew the exact MSRP and margins of
each of these cars, as well as the price paid for similar cars in the area
(truecar.com was very helpful). I walked into the first dealership and showed
them the sticker of the car I wanted and said, "I want this car, this exact
car, I'm paying cash, and I want to drive it off the lot today." We talked
(argued) for at least 30 minutes about price and they wouldn't come down. At
one point there were two other salesmen and a manager at the table with us
right in the middle of the showroom - apparently we were the main event. Each
of them tried their own pitch (one actually tried to sell me some random used
car that wasn't anything close to what I wanted). For each of their arguments
I showed them the data on my iPad and said my offer was fair, I wasn't
budging. They got angry, they yelled, they called me a liar and a thief and
talked about their kids who had to eat. Eventually I just stood up and started
walking out without saying a word, at which point they called me back and said
they would do my offer. The salesmen tried to give me a pep talk while the GM
approved the offer (at which point I caught him in a huge lie and I thought
the kid was going to have a breakdown right there). They presented me with a
written offer and I picked it up, folded it and put it in my pocket, and said
I would be back (they're not supposed to let you out of the dealership with
their written offer). I drove straight to the next dealer, presented him with
the window sticker of the exact car I wanted on their lot, gave him the offer
sheet from the previous dealer and told him I would be paying cash today. 10
minutes later I had the exact car I wanted at the price I wanted to pay. If
you're informed and persistent, there are deals to be had. Also, everything
you hear about all the tricks car dealers use are completely true, yet not
difficult to overcome.

~~~
khuey
The "huge lie" was about the vehicle? It's not entirely clear why you went to
the second dealer after getting the terms you wanted out of the first.

~~~
chrsstrm
He practically begged me to accept their offer and said I would be helping him
out, meaning my purchase contributed to his sales commission. He told me he
"was having a really bad month [for sales]" and had earlier on the phone tried
to forge a personal bond based on our mutual hometown, despite completely
forgetting who I was when I arrived on the lot. The problem was it was July
6th, and because of the holiday, the month had really only just begun. I
reminded him what day it was and he admitted his lie. Low offer or not, that
statement was typical of the attitude of all the sales people there (who yells
at a customer who is trying to pay cash for a car on the spot?). I had already
decided I wouldn't buy the car there since I didn't want to reward them for
their poor treatment and didn't want to have to return there for service. The
dealer I ended up at was the polar opposite - polite, accommodating, and not
pressed to make a deal.

------
coryl
The nibble technique reminds me of how clients drive freelance web developers
insane.

~~~
carsongross
Well, the reality is that the client has what the freelancer needs: money, so
they are always going to be in the position of power in the negotiation.

The only way to take the position of power is to not need (much) money, which
leads to the ironic situation where, by not needing work, you end up getting
paid more for it. Call it the Paradox of Need, you can see it in many
different socio-economic situations.

The fact that living a low cash-burn lifestyle also improves you morally, is
environmentally positive and gives you personal freedom are side benefits to
this approach.

~~~
jamesbritt
_Well, the reality is that the client has what the freelancer needs: money, so
they are always going to be in the position of power in the negotiation._

OTOH, the client is talking to the developer because the developer has
something the client needs: skills to provide something of value. It helps to
(politely) remind clients that they are free to spend more time looking for a
less-expensive developer while in the meantime nothing gets done and the
client possibly loses money, or loses an opportunity to make money, and may
then still end up with a less-skilled developer who will not deliver adequate
results.

 _The only way to take the position of power is to not need (much) money,
which leads to the ironic situation where, by not needing work, you end up
getting paid more for it. Call it the Paradox of Need, you can see it in many
different socio-economic situations._

I and many friends have found that best time to find a girlfriend is when you
have girlfriend. Some goes for finding a job; it's better to currently have
one while looking. Partly this signals capability (i.e. There _must_ be a
reason you do not have a job/girlfriend|boyfriend|whatever, even if I can't
see it), partly it allows you to act with some (possibly attractive)
aloofness.

So if you can _act_ like you don't need the job/money/whatever then you can
gain an upper hand.

I'm not a big fan of fronting in order to start a relationship, and if I got
the feeling that a possible client was going to try to weasel me on cost
because they think having money makes them the boss then I'd seriously
consider walking away. Of course, if I was in fact in _serious_ need of money
then the game changes, but past experiences tells me that clients who are
lording money over contractors are a big risk of refusing to pay.

~~~
enraged_camel
>>OTOH, the client is talking to the developer because the developer has
something the client needs: skills to provide something of value.

Yes, but freelance developers are a dime a dozen. Therefore clients will
always have the upper hand in business transactions.

~~~
erichocean
> Yes, but freelance developers are a dime a dozen. Therefore clients will
> always have the upper hand in business transactions.

Once you finally accept that clients are also a dime a dozen too, it'll become
a lot easier to only accept the good clients, and only accept good pay.

------
pdknsk
Slightly misleading, because there's only audio of him talking about it, but
no audio of the actual conversation.

~~~
Silhouette
He did get quite an impressive result, though, and there's some interesting
(to me, at least) discussion of negotiating tactics that people who do this
stuff for a living actually get taught.

~~~
joshfraser
Without knowing the invoice value of the car or what he paid, there's no way
to know if he got a good deal. There's a good chance he still overpaid for
that car. I worked at a car dealership for a summer. There were plenty of
times when a customer would start off with a reasonable offer but we'd still
negotiate back and forth multiple times. We did this not just to increase our
profits but also because we wanted people to walk away feeling like they'd
won. If the sales guy had accepted his first offer right away the customer
would have walked away feeling screwed (which is bad for repeat business and
referrals). My job was to make everyone walk away feeling like they'd out-
negotiated me. In reality, no car would leave the lot unless the dealership
was making money. This doesn't discount the value of the technique, just
remember car salesmen also negotiate for a living.

~~~
tptacek
Worth noting here that "invoice" is a meaningless number too. "The dealers are
provided with incentives by the manufacturers", which is another way of saying
that the invoice prices are a fairy tale. Invoice is the new sticker.

There's a pretty good EconTalk with Russ Roberts talking about the fine
details with a dealership sales manager. You have to read between the lines
(Roberts is not such a great interviewer that he gets a car salesman to
torpedo their own best interests) but it's pretty illuminating.

As in all things, it's mostly about the market. There are makes/models where
sticker isn't even the real sticker; for instance, cars with waitlists are
unlikely to get purchases under sticker. On the other hand, you can capture
much of the dealer's incentive if you choose the right time of month to make
an offer on a car the dealer would like to get off their lot.

------
leak
I don't have experience in a lot of negotiations but I have used similar
methods many times. I bought a bike a couple days ago and got them to throw in
a few extra things for free. I didn't negotiate the price of the bike but I
made a point of needing a light and a helment.

First, I asked for a light that would be go great with the bike and the sales
person put one he had laying around on the bike. I said it looked great. Then
I asked for a helment and found one for me that I liked. I put on the helment
and did a test ride with the bike. I told him I'll take the bike. Then I
asked, how much for the helment & light? He gave me the price. I said "That's
not bad but honestly, I don't have the money for everything. What can you do?"
He offered to give me 20% off the helment & light. I again said that was a
great deal but couldn't do it. A few more back and forth and me throwing in
that I would need another bike (for my gf) and wanted to come back and buy
from him, he eventually threw in the light and helment.

What I knew was roughly how much profit they were making from the bike. I knew
roughly the mark up of accessories and I knew how they wanted to sell the
bike.

It worked out really well for me and the business. I love the bike and the
business now has a new loyal customer.

~~~
jacquesm
I bought a bike too last year. I paid list price, had them install kiddie
seats, I paid list for those too.

The last place I would drive a hard bargain would be in a bike store.

For one, I can afford the bike + extras, otherwise I wouldn't go out to buy
it, we're talking relatively small money here. I simply set a budget and
didn't exceed the budget, which may have influenced my choice of bike but
that's fine.

When I went back a few weeks later with a small problem (crank play) the guy
instantly dropped what he was doing, fixed the problem immediately (obviously
no charge) and asked how my kids liked the bike. We talked for a bit more and
he asked me to come in any time there is anything wrong with the bike right
away.

I love the bike and that guy running his small business.

I wonder how he would have treated me if I had decided to haggle with him over
the price of the seats or the bike using my negotiation skills. Relative to my
income that guy is working a lot harder for a lot less.

Maybe my perspective about bike store owners changed when I worked for a bike
store when I was 15 (newspaper route + working in the bike store paid for my
first computer).

Car dealerships I approach in an entirely different way.

~~~
leak
I'm not sure if you've ever been to a bike shop when they are having a sale.
The bike shop I was at had some bikes listed for $999 on sale for $739. That's
more than $200 off a bike and they're still making money. The guy selling me
the bike doesn't lose that $200 difference. They are making higher profit
ratio on a bike than a car dealership does on a car.

If you get treated differently if you have issues in the future because you
bargained then that's an issue with the business not the price you paid.

Btw, I paid full price for the bike as it wasn't on sale. My guess is they
made 30% profit from the $800 purchase.

~~~
kaliblack
It's more likely that items on sale are sold at a net loss. The cost of simply
having stock is more than you'd think. As an example, I ran an ecommerce site
for a hardware company and after 30 days in stock laptops were no longer
profitable, even if sold at full price.

My understand is that bikes have a pretty slim margin and stores make their
money on accessories and servicing.

~~~
jacquesm
You got it just about right. Bikes now have annual updates, just like cars do.
Any bikes not sold end-of-season will be worth roughly their second hand
resale value the next year. Hence the stock clearance sales. This effect is
stronger for racing bikes and mountain bikes than it is for evergreens (for
obvious reasons). If a bike store is borrowing at 7% (good deal with the bank)
to buy their stock then a $500 bike that retails for $649 (30% gross margin)
will have cost the store ~20 bucks in interest after half a year. If they sell
it during clearance they will probably drop the price to $549 or $499
depending on how much inventory they have to move. At $550 they're still
making some money, at $499 they're losing.

And they still have to put the bike together, give it the '0' service (mostly
checking if everything is tight, re-inflating tires and setting it up for the
customer) and a warranty. And clean it up after every jerk that goes puddle
hopping with a new bike during their test-drive, after which they won't buy
it.

There is not a whole lot of money in selling discounted bikes.

Then after the first year you have hopefully a loyal customer that can't fix
their own punctures and that keeps coming back over a long time for fixes and
eventually an upgrade. It isn't rare for a sale to make more on accessories
than on the bike itself, compared to the price of a bike a bag set, seats,
lights (usually mandated by law to be on every new bike) and clothing are sold
at much higher margins.

------
cynwoody
FWIW, the FBI agent's favorite car color, salsa red pearl, offered by Toyota:

[http://i125.photobucket.com/albums/p80/02limited/Picture002....](http://i125.photobucket.com/albums/p80/02limited/Picture002.jpg)

------
jacquesm
FBI hostage negotiator is given the feeling he just made a good deal. Salesman
pockets his commission, dealership sells a car and makes money. Everybody
happy.

~~~
shawn-butler
This is why I generally dislike salespeople, marketers, and lawyers
(especially divorce lawyers).

If anyone in a deal is walking away happy it means some other party is
suffering whether they know it or not. Any equitable deal is one in which
every party is just a little bit unhappy and accepts it for the greater good.

What the aforementioned practitioners do is to convince someone that they are
happy and the further they can push them away from reality the more advantage
they take. Usually if not always a false scarcity of information is employed.

Tim Ferriss is the worst kind of con artist in the regard.

~~~
sliverstorm
_Any equitable deal is one in which every party is just a little bit unhappy_

Then I don't want to live in an equitable world. Sounds like an equitable
world means everyone is always just a little bit unhappy.

~~~
shawn-butler
Which is counterbalanced by the happiness found in collaborative aims achieved
by negotiated, equitable unhappiness. Kind of the definition of work I
suppose.

Everyone wants to be happy; the extent to which we do so at the expense of
others is pretty staggering in recent history.

~~~
sliverstorm
Oh yes, because before modern days we were so much more empathetic and loving
of our fellow man. Fiefdoms are an excellent example of this...

------
rguldener
If you haven't read it yet I can really recommend the book "Getting more" by
Stuart Diamond. He covers all of the techniques mentioned in this talk and
much more, with hundreds of brief examples from the everyday life's of his
students and himself. It takes training and time to apply these principles (at
least for me) but it has transformed how I think about everyday negotiations.
Amazon link: [http://www.amazon.com/Getting-More-Negotiate-Achieve-
Goals/d...](http://www.amazon.com/Getting-More-Negotiate-Achieve-
Goals/dp/0307716899)

------
gregpilling
I negotiated my last truck purchase by text message. I drove the salesman nuts
by not responding quickly. I was at a happy hour in a pub, so I would only
respond once per beverage. I got the price I wanted with no hassle. I avoided
going to the dealer, they delivered. I avoided the dreaded Finance and
Insurance guy that always tries to upsell, and I got them to buy the interest
rate down too. The best part was the lack of stress for me.

------
hippich
Bought from a guy on craigslist '00 Chrysler Concorde 3.2L for $2000 back in
2009 when we just moved into USA and desperately needed any car. Still drives.
This car has really nice leather interior, huge trunk and actually is quite
reliable. But because it is "domestic junk", price was very low. I am going to
drive until it dies. And once it die, I will buy another "domestic junk" car
and will be driving it for next few years :))

------
thewisedude
Information is Power==Money!

One thing I always believe helps is having information about the thing that
you want to buy. For eg:- If you know that the car that they are trying to
sell has been sitting in the lot for more than 2 months, then you know they
are desperate to get rid of it, so you can come up an appropriate(much lower)
ask price!

In all fairness, adding in the nibbles may annoy or piss of the person you are
dealing with(in some cases). In a way, you are sort of pushing them into a
corner.

However, expanding the pie and looking out of your tunnel vision is a useful
hint!

Also, in the case of FBI negotiator, not everybody will let you sleep over
their offer when they have matched your ask price without you giving them any
wiggle-room.

------
drucken
Techniques explained in NPR episode:

1\. _The "Nibble"_ \- ask a little more into the offer, especially if not
directly related.

2\. _"Best Alternative To A Negotiated Agreement (BATNA)"_ \- ensure there is
a viable alternative, preferably before negotiation.

3\. _"Expanding the Pie"_ \- offer can be often improved or agreed on parts of
an item or service rather than assuming it applies only to the whole.

4\. _"Bracketing"_ [my term] - offer low to point of anger but not withdrawal,
then praise counteroffer and negotiated item/service while claiming cannot
afford counteroffer.

5\. _"Defer Immediate Agreement"_ [my term] - on best offer, defer immediate
agreement with any reason so can gain time to check the offer or for other
offers.

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pseut
The last time I bought a new car, I used AAA's prenegotiated purchasing
service: <http://www.aaa.com/AAA_Travel/NewCar/buying_car.htm> (this was in
california; it doesn't seem to be available everywhere). So I don't have a
cool story or any tips, but it was about the least stressful purchase I've
ever made and was done pretty quickly.

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lis
Good examples for the discussed techniques.

I am actually surprised though, that the car sales man didn't ask how much he
could pay. If the FBI negotiator still stuck with his initial offer, I guess
he would have suggested some kind of monthly rate or a similar kind of loan
that would "fit his lifestyle better".

~~~
Tloewald
The way we bought our last car was much simpler (not sure it was better, but i
don't know if i could pull it off). We picked the car we wanted and then
emailed every dealership within a hundred miles what we wanted and asked for
quotes. Once we had quotes we liked we treated the tradein as a nibble. Best
car buying experience ever.

~~~
joshfraser
Did you use CarWoo or did you do it manually? This is a smart approach because
it's the only realistic way to comparison shop with dealers who are trained to
slow you down and drag out the process before giving you a number.

~~~
Tloewald
Did it myself on the advice of a friend. It worked like a charm, no bullshit
involved on either side.

Funniest thing was we had gone to a local dealership to attempt a test drive
and they wouldn't even talk to us. The guys who won our business then sourced
the vehicle from that same dealership -- they drove it up to our house with
the local dealer's plates on it, for something like $6k less than the dealer's
sticker price.

I left out one detail -- we ran our offer past the other dealers who had
responded and none would match it.

------
antihero
But then, when met with disarming empathy, what do you do if you have no
backup? Walk-away?

~~~
jacquesm
Sure. Your batna of last resort is 'no deal'.

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pan69
the "nibble" reminds me of scope creep. :)

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zerovox
Very interesting. Being from the UK, I've never listened to NPR before (aside
from the Tiny Desk series), can anyone recommend some good weekly shows worth
listening to?

~~~
objclxt
Depends what you're after. Some of the programming is quite similar to Radio 4
- the daily 'Morning Edition' is basically 'Today', 'All Things Considered' is
'PM', and then there's 'Marketplace' (no prizes for guessing what that's
about!). Outside the daily news shows you've got:

* _Wait Wait...Don't Tell Me_ , basically the US equivalent of Radio 4's _News Quiz_

* _Tech Nation_ , the title of which should be fairly self explanatory

* _Car Talk_ , a call-in show about cars. I am not a car person, and I enjoy it (the show stopped production a few months ago, but should be widely available online)

* _This American Life_ , does eclectic long-form journalism.

* _Science Friday_ , which is part of a daily call-in series _Talk of the Nation_ , but all about science.

If you're into science and tech, Radiolab (radiolab.org) is also well worth a
listen, it's not technically NPR (there are several different public radio
groups in the US), but it uses really innovative production and I _wish_ Radio
4 would broadcast it here in the UK!

Hopefully other people can add their own favorite shows...there are quite a
few of them, and I've just highlighted a few that I find interesting as a
Brit. I'm in the US a fair bit, and tend to listen to public radio where I can
so these are all shows I've just stumbled across and enjoyed.

~~~
zerovox
I love the News Quiz, so I'll give Wait Wait a go, and I'll give This American
Life and Radiolab a go, they both look great

------
ljoshua
For those who have purchased a house before (I may be about to start the
process) do the same techniques apply, or is it a different ballgame?

~~~
vidarh
Yes. I bought my house when the UK market was still booming, and sellers were
used to houses going substantially over the advertised price. Instead we
negotiated 10% off the advertised price, and I don't think we did particularly
well even though the estate agent we dealt with seemed rather shocked to get
an offer that low. In terms of picking the area, we did well - current value
has increased at least 10% more than the average for London in the time since
we bought.

We could likely have started lower, and we messed it up by using some repairs
that needed to be done (that were clearly priced into the advertised price) as
an argument for dropping the price when we ought to have been able to get that
price drop _and_ make the offer contingent on the seller having some of the
repairs done on their dime.

The key thing is to be able to move quickly. They picked us because the
alternative would have been to wait for other offers, while we turned around
and started negotiating as soon as we were sure, offer an agreement in
principle subject to a survey right off the bat if they could meet our price,
had an agreement in principle from my bank, and had been renting so we
stressed that we could move on everything immediately.

If you can stress to the sellers estate agent in particular that you can move
quickly, keep in mind that it will be in their interest to get a quick,
trouble free sale vs. hanging on for weeks for 10% more commission, and that
will influence how they deal with their client (conversely, it is in your
interest whether selling or buying to be very wary when an estate agent pushes
you to accept an offer - there's been some survey where it turned out estate
agents typically hold out longer and sell for more when selling their own
houses than their clients do).

------
knitting
For the last method, it is difficult to find the line between finding the best
deal vs. offending the seller so they move on to another buyer.

------
brainsqueezer
All those guys teach negotiation at university but never attended that class
in my CS degree.

Any book or online class recommendation?

------
drwl
if you're really interested in negotiations, i recommend beyond reason by
roger fisher and daniel shapiro

------
Benferhat
Any opinions on carsdirect.com?

