Personally, I wouldn't put a deposit like that down. Too many questions, and it's likely not enforceable on your side. If the owner of the dealership decides he wants the first one, who do you think will get it? If the owner's poker buddy wants one for his wife, will you get yours first?
Are you locking in a price? Are they free to add $2K to the MSRP "due to high demand"? $4K? If someone offers $5K more than you, will they sell it to them?
Are you stuck with whatever shows up on the truck, or do you get to order what you want?
Fully refundable deposit if I change my mind or we can't negotiate a mutually agreed price........I've told her I want something under MSRP. I bought my Chevy Volt from them and if they bushwhack me, they have an excellent reputation to risk.
The price, colour, options will all be worked out when they get the info from GM and are able to put in an 'official' order for me. I take them at their word that I will get first order and first Bolt EV thru that dealership. I have an excellent relationship with them.
I did the same with my local dealership, but with just $100 deposit. Sounds like a similar situation - I've bought a few cars at this dealership over the years, and I contacted the sales rep I most recently worked with when we replace the family SUV a few years ago. Bought my current commuter car there nearly 10 years ago - hope to get that same 10 out of my new Bolt!
A couple weeks ago my rep contacted me to let me know he got to sit in a preproduction Bolt at a training that he attended - thought it looked great. (What else would he say? Heh.) But I thought it was cool that he thought of me a few week after putting the deposit down.
Haven't heard yet when I'll be able to go in and be able to actually place the order, I'm guessing it'll be late August / early September given that production is supposed to start in October.
very similar to what I experienced. I test drove a 2017 Volt and seriously considered it for my 70 mile commute. I told my salesman that I would wait for the Bolt. He called me a few weeks later after seeing the Bolt for himself. He also said it looked great. He offered to contact me when their order sheet was enabled for the Bolt and find out how I wanted it and bring in a Bolt and give me an opportunity to buy it first. I have no guarantee of course. This is a small dealer and their allotment will also be very small.
Have you already looked into local, Provincial and Federal EV tax credits? Hopefully in the end you're able to get a good amount back. I heard Ontario brought back some of the credits it took away, or something along the lines of that.
Ontario originally gave a maximum $8,500. tax rebate.......it was $8,250 on my 2012 Volt.
Now the Ontario rebate is max. $14,000 and that is what the BOLT EV is eligible for.
No federal tax incentive that I'm aware of in Canada.
I don't see a problem with putting a refundable deposit down and they seem to have gone to trusted dealerships. At least you know you'd probably get a Bolt EV this year, can't say the same for people waiting for their Tesla.
They have no idea what the pricing will be like at this point; it is pure speculation on my part that GM will take full advantage of the Ontario incentive rebate since they know it CAN be $14,000.
With a full roll-out coming up, they have a lot of BOLT EVs to build in order to supply all the dealers and then begin supplying orders; GM could be expecting big demand and it would be a shame if people had to wait months in order to get their car.
With that said, I wouldn't be surprised if they are ahead of schedule.
Then there's the other concern of parts, with all this demand for the actual cars, it leaves me concerned about their ability to have replacement parts available for the first few batches of owners. Last thing I want is to wait months for a vital part.
GM has repeatedly stated Bolt will not be production constrained, so parts will be available.
I doubt that will be the case with the Model 3. Plus, if some idiot blows a red and T-bones your new Model 3, do you go to the end of the queue to get it replaced?
This is just one more indicator of the Bolt EV approaching release date! Good to hear that training starts earlier since EV cars are different that gas powered ones.
It might even be worth checking Instagram since we might see photo's pop up of the Bolt, Bolt mules maybe even one that is production ready that is getting driven around from dealer to dealer (they do that)
I got the little Chevy Bolt version at the Detroit Auto Show; they weren't giving them out 'willy nilly' but I suspected that they had something that was similar to the '16 Volt that they gave out the year before. They did and I nicely asked if I could have one, I assured her that I was ordering a big one before the end of the year.
Once you take delivery of your Bolt EV, you should stick the small one on the dash. unless you plan to keep it mint and in its original packaging. Where did your see the Bolt in the wild?
I love the fact that they forgot to put the driver's floor in that pre-production BOLT EV...............lol
Maybe transparent so you can see the grass growing under your feet.