Tips on Buying Cars: cash to dealer, chrysler town and country, daimler chrysler

Question
Hey Mr. Loftin,
We're looking at purchasing an '06 Chrysler Town and Country. Given Daimler/Chrysler's current excess inventory I imagine I should be able to cut a pretty good deal. The buyer incentives that were available at the end of last year have lapsed, but I see from looking at Edmunds.com that Chrysler is making $4,500 cash to dealer available. Does this $4,500 represent the profit that the dealer would make if the vehicle were to be sold at m.s.r.p., or is it money that the manufacturer is making available to the dealer out of their(Chrysler's) cut?
I'd like to use the $4,500 as leverage in the deal and am wondering how much I might expect to be able to keep.
Any other thoughts you have on the subject would also be appreciated.
Thanx, Steve

Answer
From what I know the 4500 is what the dealership recieves for selling the vehicle in question, and is ultimately the same thing as them saying "4500 off the sticker".. You would be more likely using that 4500 as just that, to take 4500 off the price, I would take them down from the sticker first with the usual bargaining, and then bring it up - see if you can get them even lower - but make sure that the 4500 wont exclude you from any financing incentives if you are going through the dealership when it comes to financing.. the lower APR deal or something similar may save you more than the 4500 off gets you.  Anyways, the companies offer such deals on vehicles that arent selling well, therefore you should be able to talk them down from sticker more than usual, and once you have them at a price bring up the incentive... if anything they might go down a few more thousand... but keep in mind what I said about financing as well... i hope this helped, if you have any other questions feel free to ask! thanks!