"I can't sell to you because you are outside my sales region."
How true is that statement? I have been contacting dealers outside of California to purchase a Raptor at MSRP and have heard all kinds of things such as we can't sell because of emissions (false?) etc. But this was a new one.
Dealers do not have sales regions as they can sell to anyone that they want. That dealership most likely wants to keep their sales local for a variety of reasons. They may have had issues in the past with identity theft related to an out of state buyer or some other logistical reason that came back to bite them in the past. If it is a smaller dealer who does not have a big internet department they may just be willing to accept losing out on a few sales here and there not to deal with non local buyers.
Also for what its worth internet buyers tend to be lower margin buyers ie get the best prices on their vehicles since they shop around a lot, do not buy any kind of extended warranty, either pay cash or use their own credit union. All of these factors lower the total amount that the dealer can make on a sale, thus making it even less attractive for a dealer to do an out of state sale.
Not saying that dealers should not sell to non local buyers, its just up to each individual dealership on how they want to handle those transactions.
