Porsche lowers prices in Canada, but it's almost a joke...

[MantaGreen97]

So Porsche decides to lower their prices in Canada because, well, our dollar is now pretty much at par.

For those that don't know, buying cars cross-border has become a relatively big thing in Canada, because you can save anywhere from $4000 to over $30,000 depending on the car. It seems for the average car buyer, they are saving around $6-8k buying cars in the US. Now that the dollar is even, it's even more savings.

The only thing that stops people in some cases is lack of importability (due to different safety standards) and the fact that some manufacturers (not all) will not honour warranties when you buy a car in the US for use in Canada.

Anyway, so what does Porsche do about the overpriced vehicles and the dollar doing well? Well they lowered the retardedly inflated (even before the dollar got strong) prices of theirs! By how much? Well let's see...

Porsche announced Tuesday plans to lower prices by an average of about eight per cent on its 2008 models to better reflect the loonie's strength.

"We cannot ignore our customers and dealers in Canada who can look to the U.S. and recognize a substantial price difference," said Peter Schwarzenbauer, president and CEO of Porsche Cars North America, Inc., in a release Tuesday.

"We listened to the market and did what is best for our customers in Canada."

Porsche's 2008 Cayenne Tiptronic is now priced at $59,400; the 2006/2007 manufacturer's suggested retail price was $64,300.

Yay so for those that can afford a Porsche prices have dropped 8% here because they have "listened to the market".

Listened to the market have they?

I guess that's why the price of that same Cayenne Triptronic mentioned (at $59,400) is still only $46,400 in the US, a difference of $13,000 :roll2: Way to go with the price lowering there Porsche! I think they should have used the term "kick in the face" instead of "price drop", lol. I mean I can understand a couple thousand dollar difference but $13k, even after the "drop"? C'mon...

Oh right and where I'm going with this... Right mainstream/average cars. How about VAG lowers some prices on their mainstream cars???

Like for example, the GTI? That car starts at $22,220 in the US but here it starts at $29,575. A difference of $7,355. :roll2:

Good thing these manufacturers are "listening to the market" and the strong dollar though :roll2: Canadian prices are all the more FTL now that the dollar is about even. Really you'd be crazy not to buy a new car in the US (if it has valid warranty and is importable) if you're a Canadian in the market for a new car...

[car audio dave]

wow, what a rant. this isnt just a dollar value issue, its a political issue. You arent looking at the import tariffs (import taxes) that each country has when considering the final destination price.

look at california...we pay more than any other state for the same car because of our smog equipment requirements, and then the extra gas guzzler taxes. Do i complain about the higher prices tho?

sorry if i seem harsh. its great that porsche powered their prices, just be happy with that.

[Jchiasson]

Besides that's MSRP, if you would pay that I'm having a flea market this weekend! Headline items:
1 Bridge, slightly used.
Swamp, I mean water front acreage in Florida...

[MantaGreen97]

Originally posted by car audio dave
wow, what a rant. this isnt just a dollar value issue, its a political issue. You arent looking at the import tariffs (import taxes) that each country has when considering the final destination price.
Nah it's not really so much that, on many cars, it's just general gouging... Prices are higher here just because on a lot of cars. And unlike California, it's not about emissions at all. Furthermore cars are still going to be cheaper in California than they are here, so yeah you don't have much to complain about :P

If you import a car personally, NAFTA cars are only subject to GST/PST; non-NAFTA cars are subject duty + GST/PST, however it usually still comes out cheaper even with non-NAFTA cars which is interesting to say the least. Also, cars built here are cheaper to buy in the US. Explain that one with tariffs...

More manufacturers are trying to prevent dealers stateside from selling to Canadians as well--they are putting the pressure on. Plus some are ensuring warranty will not be valid, often all this is just to protect their bottom line (because they know they are making more money per car over here).

This has been discussed a lot on forums like RFD where you find out it's more than just tariffs and manufacturers passing on those costs. There are those costs, as I mentioned, but there's also more to it.

And I think I have a right to complain, lol. While in the US someone might be able to buy a GTI, a person affording the same kind of money here would be driving a Rabbit :roll2:

I mean if I told you that you had to have a V6 Camaro instead of an LS1 Camaro because the latter was like $8k more than you could afford, while your neighbour gets to drive the LS1 Camaro at the price you paid for the V6 model, because he doesn't live at your house, wouldn't you get a little ticked? Now as you said cars are more in California, but are they as much as 6 to 10 thousand more as the rest of the US? If they are then I guess you have it as bad as here, but something tells me it's not that much of a difference.

Totally better "standard of driving" in the US...

Now honestly if I were in the position of buying a car I would just import it from the US as a lot of other ppl do, and save a significant amount of money in doing so. But with the manufacturers actually trying to prevent it, plus the small amount of additional time/work/effort required to do it in the first place it just makes you wonder... Why?

There are indeed higher costs on the manufacturer, along with the fact that it's a smaller market, etc., however even accounting for all that, there's no reason cars should be as expensive as they are here. That's why I said a few thousand more is fine, but when it gets to ~$8k more, you realise why average Canadians are driving around Versas and Fits (and trying to save fuel like crazy as well but that's another story), when you guys don't really see these econoboxes have the same kind of market there.

Originally posted by Jchiasson
Besides that's MSRP,
Obviously. But I'm comparing MSRP to MSRP. It's not like we haggle cars down tens of thousands more than Americans do...

[TA^Guy]

It's not price gouging because it's not a nessesity, a Porsche is a luxury.

It's like if a Jewlery store had a reduction in price on all diamonds, you aren't going to go off on a huge rant about how jewlers are price gouging.

[MantaGreen97]

Originally posted by TA^Guy
It's not price gouging because it's not a nessesity, a Porsche is a luxury.

It's like if a Jewlery store had a reduction in price on all diamonds, you aren't going to go off on a huge rant about how jewlers are price gouging.
Riiiight... Okay yeah you guys are all right and I'm making a big deal out of nothing.

I guess that's why auto makers just got hit with a $2 billion class-action suit in Canada :roll2:

http://ca.news.finance.yahoo.com/s/26092007/2/biz-finance-north-american-automakers-slapped-2b-class-action-suit.html

The fact that Porsche's are a luxury was beside my point anyway, I was talking about car prices in general and how automakers want to make it seem like it's something wonderful they lowered prices here finally only the decrease is not enough, clearly.

[TA^Guy]

Well what do you want me to say, Sorry you live in Canada... lol

[MantaGreen97]

Originally posted by TA^Guy
Well what do you want me to say, Sorry you live in Canada... lol

Yeah it sucks for buying cars, unfortunately :cry:

[car audio dave]

its funny...when i was in training in NY last week there was a guy in my class from canada. he kept rubbing it in our faces how our dollar is dropping in value so much your loonies are going up.

not sure how it all works, but id say that car prices and house prices should dictate (at least partially) what the value of currency is, since those are your biggest purchases. house prices can vary greatly by region anyways, so id say that car prices are the most consistent way to judge currency, and now after what youre saying, the conadian dollar sint worth as much as US dollars.

i dont want this to look like im saying one coutry is better than another...just pointing out that the way they put value on currency is BS, and i dont think they can call US$ and CAN$ equal until major items car similar in price.

[b2089]

Canada has more local taxes on their cars, it's not ALL in tariffs even though some of it is. It's also an issue of the US forcing states (and in some cases the cities themselves) to maintain their own roads and local laws regarding the funding and Canada being more of a national base. That's why in some states the car prices are lower than others without tariffs. That doesn't explain all of it though. There must be a reason behind the rest of the price increases.

Perhaps a stupid question but do Canadians still pay taxes to England? I was always confused about the whole commonwealth thing and why the Queen is still on the dollar and so forth, I just never bothered to ask before now.

[MantaGreen97]

Originally posted by car audio dave
its funny...when i was in training in NY last week there was a guy in my class from canada. he kept rubbing it in our faces how our dollar is dropping in value so much your loonies are going up.
Yeah next time you see someone say that, let them know stuff is still cheaper in the US haha ;)

Originally posted by car audio dave
not sure how it all works, but id say that car prices and house prices should dictate (at least partially) what the value of currency is, since those are your biggest purchases. house prices can vary greatly by region anyways, so id say that car prices are the most consistent way to judge currency, and now after what youre saying, the conadian dollar sint worth as much as US dollars.

i dont want this to look like im saying one coutry is better than another...just pointing out that the way they put value on currency is BS, and i dont think they can call US$ and CAN$ equal until major items car similar in price.

I see what you're saying there but the value of a currency isn't really based on it's buying power to the general public. It's not that cars are really worth more or less in Canada or the US, it's just that the manufacturers of cars (and many other products) typically make more money than they do in the US. However given that the US is a far larger market, the cost of operating in Canada might arguably be greater.

Again this all has little to do with dollar value so how currency is valued isn't really a big issue either. It's amazing how one-dimensional news reports and the like are. Because recently there's a lot of talk on tv and radio news, pretty much everywhere you look, about the price of things in Canada v. the US. A lot of things have always been cheaper in the US at least for as long as I've been alive... But the currency at par only highlights it without having to do any math.

It's not just recently that cars have been priced at $6000+ more than in the US... It's just that now that people don't have to do simple math (are people really this stupid/lazy?) that it's getting a lot of attention. Prior to this it was some kind of "insider" or "niche" type "secret" that you could get a car in the US often for $10k less than here. But now it's big news. :roll2:

I mean I could be just as guilty by posting this you might say, but I just did it because it seems Porsche decided to "lower prices" yet still pull a fast one at the same time as clearly even the lowered price is still in excess of 10 grand more than the US price.

Again taxes, tariffs, duties, etc. all aside. Even if you account for everything from currency to operating costs, cars are still more expensive here. I really have no belief that's ever going to change, but I just think it's rather sneaky of a manufacturer to pretend to "correct" the situation when they aren't doing that at all, they are just knocking a few bucks off relatively speaking.

[MantaGreen97]

Originally posted by b2089
Perhaps a stupid question but do Canadians still pay taxes to England? I was always confused about the whole commonwealth thing and why the Queen is still on the dollar and so forth, I just never bothered to ask before now.

Haha :lol: No we aren't really part of the Commonwealth in that way. We are still part of the Commonweath but we are independent.

Our Head of State is the Queen who is also the same Queen of England, yes. However the Queen has little real power (she doesn't have any power in England either really), and the Senate has equally as little power. The Senate is really only persuasive though technically they can still essentially veto laws (laws are also not fully laws until given Royal Assent). However this is not hard to get around lol. One of the major Bills relatively in recent history that the Senate disapproved of (the GST), the PM (Mulroney) essentially added new Senators to approve it, LOL.

So The Queen of England still appears on things like currency because she is also the Queen of Canada--our Head of State. ;)

In terms of the legal system Canada has had it's own Supreme Court since 1875 but the "court of last resort" was still the JDPC/Westminster, in England up until 1949 where the SCC became the final court of appeal in Canada. Whereas the prosecution in criminal matters in the US is largely referred to as "the People of..." in Canada we have the Crown. The style of cause in criminal cases is often "R. v. accused" as opposed to "the people v. accused" (R stands for Regina, latin for the Queen). The Crown is essentially equal to the people, however (I once had to write an essay in uni proving this, heh).

Finally Canada's Constitution was repatriated (i.e. brought "back" from England) in 1982, making us truly independent. (The BNA of 1867 is still part of our Constitution but so is the Constitution Act, 1982 (which containst the Charter of Rights and Freedoms).)

While I'm sure a lot of that could be looked up, there's a brief overview of our connection with England/The Queen ;)

[sunrunner_pei]

Originally posted by b2089
Canada has more local taxes on their cars, it's not ALL in tariffs even though some of it is. It's also an issue of the US forcing states (and in some cases the cities themselves) to maintain their own roads and local laws regarding the funding and Canada being more of a national base. That's why in some states the car prices are lower than others without tariffs. That doesn't explain all of it though. There must be a reason behind the rest of the price increases.

Taxes are not a factor in this argument, as taxes are applied ON TOP of the selling price. So not only do we pay substantially more for the same car, but we also pay more tax. :banghead:

I don't usually agree with Roland, but in this case I side with him. Although I wouldn't have picked Porsche as an example, they are probably the only ones publicly saying they're trying to lower the prices to be more in line with the US.

Just for example...

2008 Pontiac G6 GT Convertible
US MRSP: $29,995
Canadian MRSP: $35,960

That's a difference of $6000 on a $30,000 car. Hardly seems right, eh?

Or how about the 2008 Toyota Matrix XR. Built in Canada.
US MRSP: $16,990
Canadian MRSP: $21,465

The difference is enough to drive the same car out of a person's price range depending on what country it's bought from. This has always been an issue here, but with the dollar at par and still gaining strength, it's an even bigger issue today.

[b2089]

Strange? Is there a reason or at least a lame excuse from the auto makers for this?

And thanks for the brief bit on Canada. I had a US History teacher who was in the US from England on a green card who taught a very unique perspective on the revolution and other issues. It was actually very enlightening. The one thing he couldn't clearly explain was the whole Canada deal. He said it was similar to the Hong Kong issue where certain treaties and such just expired.

[Gimli]

I don't usually agree with Roland, but in this case I side with him. Although I wouldn't have picked Porsche as an example, they are probably the only ones publicly saying they're trying to lower the prices to be more in line with the US..

Actually Porsche is THE worst example because none of their vehicles are built in North America so the US dollar has nothing WHATSOEVER to do with how much we pay for Porsche vehicles.

Also I have to point out that the Canadian dollar hasn't really been doing all that well, it's the US Dollar that's been free-falling for the last 5 or so years. Compared to the Euro (which is the only foreign currency that matters when you talk about Porsche vehicles) we've only gained about 10% over the last five years. It's not Canadian Porsche vehicles that are too expensive, it's the American ones that haven't reflected the drop of the US dollar value and are underpriced.