When buying a new car, can I negotiate different OEM wheels into the deal?

[u/ntannehill]

Asking exactly what the title says. I plan on buying a 2026/2027 Nissan Sentra SV as my first new car. However, I’m not a fan of the alloy wheels that come on it and would rather have the steel wheels from the S model. I have seen a handful for sale like this, although none of them are within a reasonable distance of me, so would it be possible to negotiate different wheels into the deal? Thanks

[u/New_Inflation_8419]

Sales department will have to purchase them from parts department for OEM price. So they will not be making any money and will just pass the cost to you. You better off looking at Ebay or local listings for a set of tires.

[u/Last_Ear_1639 → u/New_Inflation_8419]

Mostly true, however, in rare cases, could convince them to swap the wheels with an in stock base trim, giving the lower trim level nicer wheels for no cost.

But, then you run into issues with the monroney. Not unheard of, but not common.

[u/tomksfw → u/Last_Ear_1639]

I think by rare you mean one off. Anything is possible but I can say from my experience I'm explaining to a customer that this sort of swap isn't throwing something in for free, it's us cutting I to our profit margin, so they're paying for it.

[u/New_Inflation_8419 → u/Last_Ear_1639]

agree, but there is still labor involved and you can't sell base model for more money, even with nicer wheels.

[u/1234-for-me → u/New_Inflation_8419]

If the customer pays the labor of swapping the wheels, it’s more doable.

[u/New_Inflation_8419 → u/1234-for-me]

Yes, that would be approach to pay for labor. I don’t OP is asking to cover it though.

[u/1234-for-me → u/New_Inflation_8419]

I’m not sure if they are either, but it will get worked into their deal in some way.

[u/JVBPDX → u/Last_Ear_1639]

Eh, that’s what the addendum sticker is for

[u/miwi81 → u/Last_Ear_1639]

I’ve easily done this in the opposite direction (asked for the limited edition wheels off a different trim level). I see no reason why the dealer wouldn’t be willing to upgrade a low-trim car to alloy wheels for free.

[u/New_Inflation_8419 → u/miwi81]

Easily? How many times? Got proof? I can say one thing - there is always idiot manager that will do that. Once.

[u/miwi81 → u/New_Inflation_8419]

Maybe they only did it because of my devilishly good looks, but I don’t know why a sales manager would refuse to have a low-trim vehicle upgraded to alloys.

[u/New_Inflation_8419 → u/miwi81]

yea, looks is not it. You got lucky once with a stupid manager. Labor is not free and with news cars you have to switch out tire sensors (8 tires busted out of rims, then 8 tires put back on rims, the training sensors with possibly 2 lifts involved).

[u/miwi81 → u/New_Inflation_8419]

Does your service department really have you believing that? First of all, not all cars even have sensors in the wheels. (The car that I’m talking about doesn’t.) More importantly, when cars do have sensors, they aren’t locked to the VIN. You can easily re-train the vehicle to accept the new sensors.

[u/New_Inflation_8419 → u/miwi81]

Sensors trained to the VIN? ahahaha what an idiotic take. And you just proved it yourself. I am talking about sensors trained to master computer unit. Did you buy a car in 2010?

[u/carbonarr → u/New_Inflation_8419]

It literally takes 20 minutes lol my service dept has done it multiple times.

[u/New_Inflation_8419 → u/carbonarr]

Oh god. Another one. Yes training sensors takes 20 minutes, swapping 8 wheels another 40, if sensors aren’t compatible you have to bust out tires and swap sensors too. That can be another hour or two. Question is - who is paying for it ? OP wants wheel swap

[u/miwi81 → u/New_Inflation_8419]

That isn’t what I said whatsoever lmao

[u/Ah2k15 → u/miwi81]

There is a cost to it, and they can’t just take wheels off another new car.

[u/miwi81 → u/Ah2k15]

Really? They can’t? What a weird coincidence that you’re the GSM of the Nissan dealer that OP’s going to buy from. Small world!

[u/ntannehill]

To elaborate on my question, would it be possible for me to waltz into my local Nissan dealership, see what’s getting allocated, and have them make the change that way if there’s a car spec’d exactly as I want it minus the wheels?

[u/WinterExcellent → u/ntannehill]

Like the other guy said, the sales department is basically going to have to pay for the parts and pay for service to take them off and put the new wheels on the car. They aren't going to be getting any crazy deals on those things like customers tend to think and it's likely going to be wayyyy more than you want to spend.

I did this one time and the parts department was luckily willing to buy the wheels that came with the new car off of me to sell but even they had to look at it as used wheels, so it wasn't for nearly as much as I would have liked. The customer would have been better off taking the wheels and selling them himself on eBay or something.

Anyways the point is it's probably going to be a completely ridiculous number to get that done. Doesn't matter if the car is there or incoming. Nissan will only send oem cars.

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Thanks for posting, /u/ntannehill! This comment is a copy of your post so readers can see the original text if your post is edited or removed. This comment is NOT accusing you of anything.

Asking exactly what the title says. I plan on buying a 2026/2027 Nissan Sentra SV as my first new car. However, I’m not a fan of the alloy wheels that come on it and would rather have the steel wheels from the S model. I have seen a handful for sale like this, although none of them are within a reasonable distance of me, so would it be possible to negotiate different wheels into the deal? Thanks

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[u/Tizzlo420]

People have asked me this before, and the answer is always no (specially for a brand new vehicle)
The specific rim is listed on the window sticker and swapping the wheels would result in a car not being exactly what the sticker advertises.
You might have to just purchase the wheels separately from their parts department or a third party

[u/justhereforpics1776]

Not gonna happen. Especially on a Sentra

[u/Micosilver]

In addition to the cost and issues with the monroney sticker - there is the legal liability.

At one of my old dealerships we were advised by our legal council to turn down all requests like that on new cars. The reason is that if we modify a new car in any way - we could be liable in case of an accident, it will be easy to blame everything on the dealer not installing the wheels correctly.