A Few Lexus Deals for May 2009

May 5, 2009

Lexus does want to be viewed as a discount car brand and is very stingy with incentives. However, every now and then they slip a few deals out, although very restricted deals.

For May 2009, there is a $1000 rebate on the Lexus ES350 — but only to loyal customers who now have an ES350 and have it financed or leased through Lexus’ fianance company. Talk about playing hard to get.

There’s also a good 2.9% APR loan deal (good until 6/1/2009) on the Lexus ES350, IS250, and IS350 — but only for 60 month loans. And only for people with good credit. Talk about playing even harder to get.

However, there are two other, potentially more interesting, deals on the Lexus RX350 SUV and RX400h hybrid. On both these vehicles there is a hidden factory-to-dealer rebate of $5000 and $6000 respectively. This means the dealer can share some or all that money with customers as a nice price discount without making it obvious that the vehicles are being generally discounted. If the dealer is overstocked with these vehicles, you can be assured you can get most of that money.

In summary, Lexus buyers don’t often get manufacturer incentives but, it happens occasionally. Of course, customers can negotiate prices discounts that come directly from the dealer. Lexus has one of the highest profit margins built into their MSRP prices of any brand. Dealers have a lot of “wiggle room” — although they also have a lot of business expense and overhead to pay for those nice showrooms, free cookies and coffee in the nice service waiting room, and so on.

You can get free price quotes on any of the above cars from Edmunds.com. The quotes will automatically include any cash-back rebates or discounts that are currently available.