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Well, after a year on this site, and looking at the Murano, I finally got one...well, sort of.
I placed an order for one over the weekend. I had decided I wanted one for April, and I knew that dealers were not stocking the color/option combination I wanted, which meant I had to place an order. Well, the deadline for placing a factory order for March production (and April delivery) is today, so I did the deed.
Ordered an SL FWD with Touring, Dynamic Control, Navi, Wood, Mats, Cargo Protector, Sunroof Deflector and Splash Guards in White with Cafe Late.
Originally I wanted Sunset Red with the new Hazelnut interior, but I found out from an internal Nissan production bulletin that that color has been put on hold indefinitely (it can no longer be ordered), and the White/Beige was my second choice (actually original choice before I found out about Hazelnut).
MSRP is $37,385, and we agreed on a selling price of $33,978, which is exactly invoice. In addition, they are waiving their $599 dealer fee. This was not an easy thing, but once they realized that I was going to pick up the car the same day it came in (since it was a factory order), and that all of their holdback money would be profit, they agreed to my price.
However, the price I was quoted by area dealerships varied greatly. One was $1000 over invoice, another was invoice (but they insisted on their $599 dealer fee) and a third was $300 over invoice with no dealer fee. So, it definitely pays to shop around!
In my research, I found out a few things I thought I would share with everyone. I have been following the incentives on the Murano for over a year now. My job with Edmunds makes that pretty easy to do. I had assumed that the incentives this year would follow what Nissan had done in previous years (get better as the year went on). Now, while they still may yet do this, the environment seems to have changed things a bit, and here is why.
First off, even with no finance or cash incentives, and with a weaker lease program than last year, sales on the Murano are actually up. This is pretty remarkable for a vehicle in its 4th model year. I attribute this to the fact that buyers are shying away from truck-based SUV's and towards car-based ones like the Murano. Second, with the introduction of the lower priced S model last year, the price-point was significantly lowered, putting the Murano on more people's radar screens. In fact, if you look at the inventory of most Nissan dealers, S models make up the vast majority (at least around here).
Second, sales have begun in Europe and Australia. However, there is only one factory in Japan producing Muranos, so with worldwide demand (along with US demand) up, Murano's are not as plentiful in the US as they had been in the past. For example, my local dealer (a fairly large one) only gets 12 Muranos for March production...12! Some dealers get as few as 6.
So, with sales up, demand up, and supplies down, Nissan doesn't feel they need to slap a whole lot of incentives on this vehicle...and they are right. Which also means that supplies may not be as good as they had been in the past, which in turn might mean higher transaction prices, especially for SL and SE models, since these are much more rare now.
Of course, I hope this changes, especially by April!
I placed an order for one over the weekend. I had decided I wanted one for April, and I knew that dealers were not stocking the color/option combination I wanted, which meant I had to place an order. Well, the deadline for placing a factory order for March production (and April delivery) is today, so I did the deed.
Ordered an SL FWD with Touring, Dynamic Control, Navi, Wood, Mats, Cargo Protector, Sunroof Deflector and Splash Guards in White with Cafe Late.
Originally I wanted Sunset Red with the new Hazelnut interior, but I found out from an internal Nissan production bulletin that that color has been put on hold indefinitely (it can no longer be ordered), and the White/Beige was my second choice (actually original choice before I found out about Hazelnut).
MSRP is $37,385, and we agreed on a selling price of $33,978, which is exactly invoice. In addition, they are waiving their $599 dealer fee. This was not an easy thing, but once they realized that I was going to pick up the car the same day it came in (since it was a factory order), and that all of their holdback money would be profit, they agreed to my price.
However, the price I was quoted by area dealerships varied greatly. One was $1000 over invoice, another was invoice (but they insisted on their $599 dealer fee) and a third was $300 over invoice with no dealer fee. So, it definitely pays to shop around!
In my research, I found out a few things I thought I would share with everyone. I have been following the incentives on the Murano for over a year now. My job with Edmunds makes that pretty easy to do. I had assumed that the incentives this year would follow what Nissan had done in previous years (get better as the year went on). Now, while they still may yet do this, the environment seems to have changed things a bit, and here is why.
First off, even with no finance or cash incentives, and with a weaker lease program than last year, sales on the Murano are actually up. This is pretty remarkable for a vehicle in its 4th model year. I attribute this to the fact that buyers are shying away from truck-based SUV's and towards car-based ones like the Murano. Second, with the introduction of the lower priced S model last year, the price-point was significantly lowered, putting the Murano on more people's radar screens. In fact, if you look at the inventory of most Nissan dealers, S models make up the vast majority (at least around here).
Second, sales have begun in Europe and Australia. However, there is only one factory in Japan producing Muranos, so with worldwide demand (along with US demand) up, Murano's are not as plentiful in the US as they had been in the past. For example, my local dealer (a fairly large one) only gets 12 Muranos for March production...12! Some dealers get as few as 6.
So, with sales up, demand up, and supplies down, Nissan doesn't feel they need to slap a whole lot of incentives on this vehicle...and they are right. Which also means that supplies may not be as good as they had been in the past, which in turn might mean higher transaction prices, especially for SL and SE models, since these are much more rare now.
Of course, I hope this changes, especially by April!
