Why do people dread buying a car, even if they love the idea of getting a new car? It's because on the whole, new car dealers aren't a whole lot better than used car dealers. Whatever car dealer tricks the new car dealers have access to, you're pretty sure they will try them.

Cars are huge purchases – one of the biggest ones we ever make through our lives. Make a mistake here, and you lose big time. But it doesn't have to be this fearsome; not if you understand the ways of car dealers and their salesmen.

There are two areas in which car dealerships can put one over you very easily – the finance terms they offer you and the trade-in value they determine for your old car. Let's get the finance thing out of the way, because that's the easiest.

You're always in much better shape thinking about the finance far before you think about walking into a dealership. You need to check out your credit score, ask around at a few credit unions and banks in your area and line up the finance first. Depend on the dealer to put the finance together, and you have no idea what else is out there.

If you do go with the dealer and his finance arrangements, make sure that you go in with your credit score. That's one of the top car dealer tricks – lying about your credit score.

And then we come to the trade-in value. The trade-in scam begins in a very encouraging way. The salesman will look at your car, run a few fantasy numbers on his calculator, pretend-consult with his colleagues and then come back to you with a price for your old car that you wouldn't believe.

Actually, you shouldn't believe it. That's just a way he uses to make you feel committed to his dealership. What he plans to do is to have you jump up all enthusiastic and discuss actually buying a new car. When you've done everything you need to buy the car short of pay for it, he comes back all crestfallen and says that someone high up rejected your trade-in price. He quotes a much more reasonable trade-in price instead now.

What he hopes for is that you'll feel so invested in buying the car at the dealership that you won't walk away at this point. There is practically nothing to do here except walk away. You just need to know that this is a scam. Of course, there are few shameless car dealer tricks they will often try to keep this from happening. For instance, they'll pretend they've misplaced the keys you gave them to your old car. You still have to go.

Another great trick they have is to ask you a very reasonable question – “How much are you willing to pay each month? “That's pretty reasonable, right? Except that he's just going to use that to sell you an expensive deal that's only reasonable-sounding because the deal has to do with getting you to make payments for years and years. Just go in there with your wits about you and not all the car dealer tricks can cheat you out of a dollar.