Has anybody had success with purchasing their MINI through Costco? I went to Costo's website today and actually built my MINI the same way I did on the MINIUSA website. When I finished I noticed I had saved $2000.00 by going through Costco. When I submitted my information to Costco, I was told there were no dealers in my area that offered the "aggressive pricing" they require. Is there a MINI dealer that actually exists that will do this? Just curious...

 

Ahhhhhh..... 2k sounds good...

 

Hi,

I tried to get Costco auto financing (It was the best rate around - only by a little bit.) They use Capital One Auto Finance as a 3rd party vendor. At any rate Capital One turned me down. Which came as quite a surprise to me since I pulled our credit reports before applying and our scores were over 800 and our debt ratio was only in the teens. Capital One wouldn't tell me what was going on over the phone and even when they finally sent written information it was too vague to tell me ANYTHING. Since Capital One wasn't responding I phoned and emailed Costco to see if they would put some pressure on THEIR vendor to see what mistake they were making. They replied that they would look into it. After their intial response I recieved NO more responses from Costco. Costco has been OK to deal with in their stores, but apparently they don't give a crap about their 3rd party vendor's service to their customers. Since this is how they operate on the financing side this is how I'd assume they operate on the auto purchasing side as well. You can ask them if they have a Mini dealer, but my guess is they don't and really don't care.

FYI, a supervisor from Capital One did finally call back after a couple of weeks, with no prompting from Costco (I asked.), and I found out that they never even ran a credit report. They turned me down because their records showed that I had a credit card with them that had been past due. I've never even had a credit card with them and I've never been late on any credit card payment. Apparently they have some incorrect data in their system, perhaps a SS # transposition. I told them it was their loss. I was approved in minutes at another lender at almost as good a rate and didn't feel like taking their deal after they had been so slow to respond.

 

financing....vs....discount on cars..................two topics but on the same company..........OK.....

 

MINI dealers participating with COSTCO??????? NO!

 

Our local Costco recently had a MINI sitting on display inside their store. The price on the window looked good, but I didn't give it much attention. I'm not sure I'd buy my MINI at the same place I buy bulk toilet paper....but maybe that's just me.

 

I did the samething and after wasting the time, received the same message. Seems if Costco does not have dealers in the area, they would remove the Mini listing.

 

Yes... MINI dealers will not deal with Costco.

Your best bet is to look for a dealer that will let you order your spec'd MINI for MSRP or find somthing sitting on a lot and try and negotiate some accessories into the price. If you believe everything you read, these cars are "collecting dust" everywhere... so huge blowouts sales cannot be far off.

 

I actually had a good experience with costco/ capital one financing. Not only did i get a quick response (next day because i applied on sunday) but i received about 2 tenths better off their best rate from the website. Besides, i love costco no matter what!

 

what do we go to costco to buy next, a horse?

 

Did the MINI's come in a family size pack of 12?

 

why not? you like paying MSRP?

again....if you can get a better deal, why not?

Costco rocks. Best retailer out there....if I could buy a house through them, I would because I know they'd take care of things if there were issues. We had a hot tub go bad and the manufacturer wouldn't stand by the warranty after two years...Costco gave us a $5k refund. Who else in the US does that?

 

 

I'm not a Costco member, but I'm curious to see what pricing comes up for a 2007 MINI for the 23456 zipcode.

 

55 gallon drums, next to the peanut butter.

 

Costco is AWESOME I gotta put the plug in for my own NW backyard

Besides having impeccable customer service, they pay their employees decent wages.

Who the heck wouldn't use them if a MINI could be had cheaper through them? But, alas, they aren't.

 

Do you guys know costco's policy and how they deal with the gray market (and why they have such good refunds, warranties, etc. - other than to get more buyers)?

Not dissing them but do a little research. =)

 

yes - your point?

 

You can get a better deal on a car than what Costco, Sam's, AAA, etc. will fetch you.
Do your due diligence and go to the dealership armed.
And always arrange your own financing anyhow. There's a local dealership around here that was fleecing cusomers by pre-approving a loan for them, taking their trade, and then having their loan fall through two weeks later. Then the customer would have to re-fi at a much higher rate.
Remember that dealerships make a percentage of your loan; if you use their financing, use that knowlege to get a better price.

 

all true, but we are talking about a better deal on MINI's in this thread.

 

Right.
Which Costco can't do...

I bought an F-150 in 2000 for $13,700 out the door.
The Costco price was over $15,000 before TTT. That was the only time I tried Costco. I tried Sam's and AAA --- both were similar.

Edmunds and Consumer Reports both give good advice.

I'm a car-aholic. I've had 8 new cars in the past 2.5 years.
I'm hoping to keep these two Minis for a while now and mellow out a bit...
But I have alot of experience buying cars.

 

I just got financing thru Costco Capital One too. At 5.9% for 60 months, it is the lowest I can find in the area including my credit union. I didn't try their auto purchase program thinking that I would not have gotten a better price. I tried Edmunds, and guess which dealer they used? They use Crevier which is about the only dealer left in the area that charges over MSRP.

I wonder if there is actually a Mini dealer signed up with Costco somewhere in the country.

 

So, what exactly are we talking about here?? Is it just arranging car financing through Costco, or literally buying the car from Costco? The latter sounds kind of funky.

 

Actually, the OP's question was asking whether there were really any MINI dealers that participate in Costco's program.

 

I thought the OP was trying to buy a Mini via Costco thus saving $2k. And he couldn't do it because Costco couldn't find a dealer to take the deal. Which doesn't surprise me, they probably sent out an email to nearby Mini dealers asking if they want to sell it for $xxx and get no responses. Just a guess. Maybe try a Dodge truck, I bet that works!