Avoid These Fake Black Friday New Car "Deals"

'Tis the season (for misleading offers).

Automakers and their dealerships are anxious to sell you a car this weekend. Not only are we quickly approaching the end of the year, but it’s also Black Friday, the busiest and most lucrative shopping day of the year. There are special prices on everything right now, new cars included. Cars Direct has done some investigating and discovered what appears to be fake deals specifically aimed at maximizing Black Friday profits. Of course, there are some quite good Black Friday deals out there, which you can read all about here.

But these are the ones you need to avoid because you may actually wind up paying even more money than you should.

Chevrolet Malibu

First up is a so-called deal on a new Chevrolet Malibu. For Black Friday, Chevy is offering a choice between 0 percent APR financing for 60 months or $3,250 in cash incentives. Sounds good, right? Not exactly. Breaking this down further, the Malibu in question costs about $25,000, meaning your cost with 0 percent would be, yes, $25k. Tack on the rebates and you’ll wind up paying $24,626 assuming it’s a five-year loan at 5 percent. However, earlier this year Chevy offered a whopping 20 percent discount on the Malibu, meaning the nicely equipped LT trim saw a $5,500 price reduction off MSRP. Point being, perhaps it’ll be best to wait to see what Chevy can do for you closer to December 31.

Jeep Grand Cherokee

The Jeep Grand Cherokee continues to be a popular SUV and now is a great time to buy, but you need to be made aware of a few things first. Not all Jeep dealerships in the country are offering special Black Friday deals, despite advertising otherwise. For example, a new Grand Cherokee Limited for sale in Green Bay, Wisconsin is being offered with $5,500 in cash back. Sounds good, yeah? Not so much, here’s why: that figure includes a $1,000 bonus you can get only if you finance through Chrysler Capital. Furthermore, though this offer is worth $500 more than a similar one last month, closer examination reveals Jeep simply compensated by reducing a separate offer by – you guessed it – $500. If the buyer opts to pay in cash or already has private financing arranged, they’ll only be receiving a $4,000 discount, which is the exact same amount as last month. Some Black Friday deal, right?

Cadillac XT5

Lastly, Cadillac is offering 0 percent APR for 72 months on all XT5 trim levels. Here’s why that’s not really so great. This is a “standalone offer” which can’t be combined with other discounts. If you were to take this specific offer, you could potentially be missing out on up to $9,000 in savings. How so?

Based on trim, the XT5 has discounts between $1,000 to and $2,000, though the best savings are the top trim Premium Luxury. There’s also a bonus worth up to $2,000 on most trims if you were to trade in a competitor. Want more savings? How about $2,000 in “down payment assistance” if you were to finance through GM Financial. Lastly, dealers are being given up to $3,000 in unadvertised Flex Cash to help further bring prices. Add it all up and there’s $9,000 in savings on Premium Luxury and Platinum XT5s. Not bad at all on a $55,000 crossover.