You are here: Home / Articles / Books / Review of the Book

Review of the Book

As you embark on the search for a car purchase, whether a new car or a used car, you may find yourself wondering why some of your friends seem to get better deals than others. If not someone in your circle of friends, maybe a friend of a friend was able to negotiate a car purchase and managed to get the price down below invoice and got a rebate, too. Where do people get the "inside scoop" on asking the right questions, giving the right answers, holding out until the price was just what they wanted to pay...and then...bang! they close the deal and leave the dealership with a smile the salesperson can't match.

Obviously there are a number of writers who think they have the answer; a simple search of Barnes and Noble's website using the words "car buying" and "auto buying" returned dozens of responses from their database. How do you decide which one or more of these publications will give you the ammunition that you need to fire the winning salvo at the dealership? Well, I believe that there are only three kinds of information you can get from an instructional book: the kind you already know, the kind you may use immediately, and the kind you may use in the future.

Unless you have read other books on the topic, there will be very little in this book you already know. That's a good sign. What you can use immediately to your benefit are the handy forms which Jake has included. There's one called "Checklist for New Cars", one called "Checklist for Used Cars", and a sample "Used Car Appraisal" form. These forms will help you organize your thoughts prior to embarking on your physical shopping trip.

Mr. Jacobs has threaded three real-life car buying experiences in which he participated on the sellers' side into the first 100 pages of the book. The fifteen chapters of conversationally written text share many inside views to managing your shopping and buying adventure and avoiding the common pitfalls.

Appendix D of "Hassle Free Car Buying" contains Payment Tables displaying Annual Rates from 1.90% to 10.5% and Finance Periods of 12 months to 60 months. By calculating your purchasing ability up front, you can avoid the trap of shopping for a payment rather than the preferable shopping for a bottom line.

Why do I say that? Well, I learned that from Jake Jacobs along with insights into handling your tradein as a cash value, not a "tradein allowance". If you can't save yourself many times over the cost of this book, you need to re-read it. But maybe you should give it to your teenager, too. It is written for the uninitiated to save you money. Get it...read it...use it. It will remove a layer or two of the veils that the car sellers have been casting over our eyes since time immemorial.

The price is $14.95?