[IOP]

We put a down a deposit last week on a Sagebrush EX-L with DVD after talking with several local dealers. We are concerned however, about the different "stories" we received from the different dealers. One dealer told us that the Sagebrush was not in his next allotment but he could trade with another dealer to get us one. The dealer we are using told us we had to get our order in before he put in for his next allotment. He is hoping for a September build date. If the dealer can't get a Sagebrush in his next allotment can he order one anyway or do we have to wait for the next allotment? Does anyone know how the dealer alloment/ordering system works?

 

[MDXlite]

A dealer gets x amount of total vehicles where they have some flexibility on which type. One dealer may opt for a few more Odyssey's than Pilots or vica versa, but their is a cap, a cap on quantity and how many of a given color. Normally, it is up to the dealer to specify the colors which they usually order based on demand. I believe with new vehicles like the Pilot which are in relative short supply, the dealers may just get what they're given unless they special order against their allocation.

Talk to a dealer GM, not a sales guy, they'll tell you exactly how it works.

 

[havasu]

The dealer has some flexibility even when they are 'assigned' a set of vehicles with build dates. In our case we wanted EXL/RES in Havasu Blue, which wasn't coming on their list. They supposedly 'traded' with another dealer from that dealer's allotment so that the switch is done 'at the factory' and the blue will come to our dealer. So it sounds like they could not change one of their coming vehicles in color. Or at least, that's not what they chose to do. We have a build date (8/5 supposedly) but not a VIN (yet).

The dealer originally said they would try to trade actual vehicles (after arrival) with other dealers but had no luck. Don't know how hard they tried but with the popularity of the Pilot it may have been quite difficult to find one w/o a reserve on it that another dealer was willing to trade for (the vehicle they got in return would have had a few miles on it, with the drive to do the swap).