2023 Nissan Z Slapped With Eye-Watering $73K Markup at Washington Dealer
The tacked-on fee brings the total price to nearly $130,000!
There is no doubt that the 2023 Nissan Z is in high demand. The 400-hp, twin-turbo sports coupe is likely one of the last of the Japanese variety to be purely motivated by an internal combustion engine, making it a coveted last hurrah sports car to acquire.
Basic economics tells us that when demand is high for something not widely available, its price tends to be on the high side. Hey, it's 2022—you needn't look far for examples of this Econ 101 lesson in action, especially if you were to turn your attention to inventory-starved car dealerships. Whenever there is a highly anticipated new vehicle on the market, it's almost a guarantee that a few dealerships will take advantage of the situation and apply an "Adjusted Market Value" fee to the window sticker. And that's in "normal" times.
"Adjusted Market Value" (AMV) is essentially a dealer's way of saying "we know some of you want this car so badly you'll gladly pay more than the sticker price." Generally speaking these markups aren't too egregious. However, every now and then a particular car dealer will get particularly ambitious (or greedy, if you're willing to describe things less charitably) and tack on exorbitant AMV fees that are so high that they go viral.
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This has happened recently with the Ford F-150 Lightning, with some dealers asking over $100,000 for versions that had manufacturer suggested retail prices (MSRPs) under $50,000. Sometimes, manufacturers will get involved—like when GM threatened to pull allocations from dealers who gouged customers on the new Hummer EV or Z06 C8 Corvette—to keep things in check, but that doesn't always work.
Case in point: Bellevue Nissan in Bellevue, Washington. The dealer is one of the few in the country that currently has the 2023 Nissan Z "Proto" edition on its show floor. There are only 240 of these special-edition new Zs, period, so while Nissan sets its MSRP at $52,990, the conditions here are ripe for exploiting Z fans' enthusiasm for a little extra cheddar.
Given the demand of the car and the rarity of the trim, it's not unreasonable to expect a dealer to mark the car up a little bit. However, Bellevue Nissan has gone far beyond "a little" and hit the Z with a$73,881markup. Think about that for a moment: the markup is higher than theoriginal MSRP of the freakin' car! On top of a $54,915 MSRP and that wacky markup, there is even a $1,195 "Bellevue Nissan Protection Pack" which includes door edge guards, door handle cup protectant, "lux care" ext/int protectant, and lifetime car washes.
Combined, the grand total for the Z comes out to $129,991. That'sGT-Rmoney! Assuming the dealer didn't mark that one up, too, that is.
This Z's markup went viral after an image of the window sticker was posted to the r/Datsun Reddit page; but it soon spread throughout other social media platforms. To be fair, we wanted to give the dealer a chance to explain the situation so we contacted Bellevue Nissan's sales manager. However, when we asked about the Z they told us that we had to be referred to the dealer's marketing department. Their marketing team never got back to us. We even tried calling again, speaking to the same sales manager. When we asked if he could just confirm the price he still insisted on referring us to the marketing department, which again was unresponsive.
We would love to know the justification for adding a $73,000 markup to a car that has an MSRP below $60,000, but for now it seems like the store would rather just leave us guessing as to the (likely obvious) motives here.
Andrew Beckford’s passion for cars started as a middle schooler when his friend Richie explained how an internal combustion engine works. He was bitten by the bug and the rest, as they say, is history. He dug deep into the tuner scene and eventually wrote for Turbo Magazine, Import Tuner, Super Street. He covered car shows, feature builds, and reviewed racing games for those magazines in addition to covering motorsports including Formula Drift, Indy Car, and F1 for his personal blog. Eventually Beckford joined MotorTrend to cover the daily automotive news beat. Besides being a gearhead, Beckford has been a gamer since the ’80s and is a huge fan of the arcade racing games of the ’90s like Daytona USA, SEGA Rally, and Ridge Racer. Beckford’s a movie buff as well, especially comic book films from DC and Marvel. When car culture crosses over with gaming and entertainment, rest assured Beckford is aware of it. In addition to serving as a consultant on a “triple A” racing titles, he’s reviewed major racing games such as Forza Motorsport, Need for Speed, Gran Turismo, F1, and more. He’s also interviewed blockbuster directors including Steven Caple Jr. (Transformers: Rise of the Beasts) and Neill Blomkamp (Gran Turismo). His biggest profile to date was with Robert Downey Jr. on his love affair with cars and his show Downey’s Dream Cars on MAX. Beckford’s profile of Downey Jr. was the first print cover story written by an African American in MotorTrend’s history. Along with KJ Jones, Andrew Beckford also heads up MotorTrend’s celebration of Black History Month by spotlighting diverse voices in the automotive industry and motorsports. Beckford’s first car was a 1982 Nissan Stanza affectionately named “Stanley” by his late mother.
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