First ATV purchase
 

Hello all and I’m glad I came upon this website. Looking for help as I’ve never gone through the new ATV purchase before. My 13 year old daughter wants a 4-wheeler for XMAS and I figured I’d get one as well because I could use it for hunting and spending some quality time.

I went to to my local dealership in Florida looking for a Recon for her and a Foreman for myself as the price seemed pretty good. When I looked at my quote for OTD pricing I see a $399.47 dealer prep, $380 Freight and a $294 settlement fee. Is this all standard in purchasing and ATV?

What has went from a good looking price has quickly looked like an OMG. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Unfortunately that about right, it costs money to transport the machine to the dealers, then for them to do minor assembly and get it running, then the dear old governor needs to be paid along with the local taxes. I do hope he discounted the list price before adding those extras on to the bill. I had similar fees on my UTV but at least they discounted it 500 first, then also discounted all the accessories I got with it.

I appreciate the reply! That’s crazy. Over 2K in those fees for 2 atv’s. Geesh. Yes they were discounted prior but I have a hard time over shelling out cash for add on fees.

I have no idea what a settlement fee is but AFAIK there's dealer prep and freight on all ATVs and UTVs. Some places will advertise an out the door price, but others tell you what it is before fees. I don't know, but my guess is that most dealers advertise how much you save off the list price, and only tell you about the fees when you're ready to buy. That's been my experience at a few different dealers.

I believe the settlement fees are state and local taxes plus title fees. Most states have a sales tax and then many local cities or municipalities also add a sales tax. I have also read where some states have a recreation tax on things like boats, atvs etc. You might give some serious consideration to used machines. Look hard for well maintained machines and those owned by older people so there is less chance of abuse. I am an older guy (68) and when I sold our atvs I added that they were owned by mature adults and each one was sold to the first buyer. Both were well maintained with all receipts and a service manual for each one. If you looking at Honda's, do stay away from the electric shift machines, extremely expensive to repair and they do have there problems, otherwise Honda's are well built machines along with the rest of the popular brands. Most all machines on the market that are brand names are well built and if taken care of will last a long time.

What I would do is talk to at least two dealers and see if you can get them to beat each others' price. Maybe you can get it far enough down to be near your reasonable price. Always ask them what the out the door price is, not just the base purchase price.

Then there is always buying used ones.:)

I greatly appreciate everyone who responded with advice!! I am going to get a couple more quotes from dealers and take it from there. The pricing wasn’t bad (or I don’t think) I just wanted to make sure I wasn’t being taken advantage of with those fees. The OTD for the ‘17 recon is @ $4,300 and Foreman @ $7500.

The 2017 and 2018 Recon have the same list price, $4,099 + $330 destination charge. That's $4,429. The Foreman is listed at $7,299 + $380 destination charge for both years. That's total of $7,679. That sounds high for a less than 500cc ATV but it's a Honda. If they were selling the 2017 and 2018 for the same price I would get the newer models.

Hondas do seem to bring a higher price new than the rest for similar displacement machines. On a positive note, they are reliable machines so buying a used Honda isn't necessarily a bad thing. And when buying used, dealers don't tack on as many fees because many of those fees can only be applied once to a new machine. Buying used they only add taxes and title fees. You can buy both of them used in great condition for about half what those new prices are. Atvs depreciate very quickly, much faster than an autombobile. An atv thats 5 years old(like a 2012 model) will be worth about half the price of the same model brand new but still have many years of life left in it as long as it has been maintained well.