Hi, this is my first post here, but I have been reading PriusOnline since January. I learned a lot. I started thinking about purchasing a Prius near the beginning of January. I live in So. Cal. I first looked at my local Toyota dealer. They would not take a waiting list. They offered what they had at $5000 over MSRP. They had 2 white #9 and one salsa red #3 not spoken for at the time. I said no thanks and the sales person was willing to come down to $2000 above MSRP. I still said no thanks. Besides I did not want a white car again and the salsa one had the wrong package. I am driving a white VW Jetta (95 GLX) right now. It has 208 k miles on it and still runs great. But I think I am ready for a new car.
I decided to use CarsDirect.com. They directed me to another nearby Toyota dealer and they quoted me a MSRP price. So I signed up with them near the end of January, for a $500 refundable deposit. They said it would take about a month. That was a lie. At the end of month the story was oh we did not get the allocation we normally got, it will be another month. I asked the sales person what number I was on the list. He said 15. My name was given to Toyota corporate so I got the Prius key tag and letters. A month later the sales man said it will be another month. I am now around 22 on the list (I let it slide because he did not have the exact numbers handy at the time). Another month passes. This time the sales man said I am around 30 on the list and have a two to three month wait. This is when I blew my stack (well not really -- I always remain polite). I asked how can I start out at 15 and now be 30. He says: the 15 position was the number of Prius car buyers on my own list. I asked how that is relevant to me, and asked him to find out my exact position on the dealers list. He said he would call me back.
At this point I was upset enough to call the Toyota corporate number (the one they had in the mail to us). It told them I think this dealer is crooked. I gave them the whole story. They gave me a formal complaint number. They also told me that my car has not come up on the shipping list yet. So apparently they do have some kind of tracking. They knew who I was.
At this point I decided to put my name on other dealer lists. I was going to try to find dealers that were away from the big cities, because from other email posts that seemed to work for some fairly well. I live in the LA area. It was the end of April when I started this search. I decided to print out the list of all CA dealers that I got from the Toyota web site. Then I used my Delorme USA map software and entered the zip of all dealers to locate them geographically. For the ones that were in less populated areas I put a note tag on the map, with their phone number and name. Then I displayed the map and picked likely dealers to call. (This is all happening while waiting for the call from the original dealer to give me the position in the waiting list I took the day off from work.). I called about 7 dealers that were likely candidates. One flat out said we only sell to local customers. That was a dealer way up north. Another sounded fairly promising. They had only 5 on their waiting list. I would be number 6. They said they get around two Prius a month. But they also said it might take from 1 week to 2 months. It all depends on what comes in and that some on the waiting list have some very specific requests that they are not going to get (like a package #7 which is not being delivered to CA). I put my $500 dollars down (refundable) with them. By the way I wanted a package #9 with any color except black or driftwood.
Next day: My original dealer did not give me the order on the waiting list yet. I left a message with him and he called me back (finally) and said exactly this: You are number 14 now, you were number 51. Huh? Do you think corporate called them? I dont know for sure but it sure seems strange for him to say it that way. Anyway I did not count on them anymore.
Last Wednesday (May 13) I decided to put in an order for the front end mask from the Toyota parts store, just in case I get the call from the second dealer. Its a 5 hour drive from that one.
Next day (May 14) I got a call from the original dealer. He said it would be another 1 to 2 months. The same old story, except this is the first time he ever called me.
On the same day I got a call from the second dealer. He says, We have a silver package # 9 available. The person it was for was not ready yet (not ready yet? I was ready for months). He still had not sold his other car. Would I like this one? You know the answer to that. I am going to pick it up this coming weekend, also totally at MSRP. It did come with the carpets, bumper appliqu� cargo net, and wheel locks. The price he quoted was exactly the MSRP with those accessories on the Toyota site. I waited 1 day shy of two weeks at this second dealer.
So the whole point is that it is not a hopeless wait. There is always a chance to find a Prius somewhere quicker if you put in the work. It did not list dealer names, because it is not pertinent. What worked for me might not work for someone else. And things change. But if you dont make the effort to find one and are not flexible in colors or pick packages not being made for the region, for sure you will have to wait.
PS: Actually I think it was the fact that I ordered the front end mask that got things rolling.
