How to: Track your Tundra at the Factory

Has anyone had this process work for vehicles bound for Canada? I'm assuming not, but wanted to double check.

 

Those are the times I'd love to get with the guy who originally had dibbs on it and we'd both go in and tell the salesman to go F himself.
I thought of that.

I have a good excuse though. I would have time to go Friday, but need to visit sick father whose time is limited I think, so its in fate's hands for me.....

 

Family time trumps a Tundra and dealing with idiots.

 

What’s irritating about my situation; I’ve passed up two other tundras that I could already be driving for liars. SMH

 

Any idea if this works for us North of the 49th??

 

This process was working for me all last week with a status of "A" and no eta under the temporary VIN.

Now it says the website is no longer valid, do you think it's cause they switched to the permanent VIN

 

Yes sir

 

I don’t see why it wouldn’t, have you had any luck testing it out?

 

I'm attempting to get my temporary VIN (what they referred to as a "VTN") from my dealer to test out.

 

You should see your truck on dealer website, which would list the temp VIN

 

yep, I will be picking it up tomorrow. Hopefully, the "freedom" convoy won't be on my side of the interloop when I drive it back home. The good thing is they tend to stay in their camp when there's rain or snow, so at least they're thinking about the locals when they make their rounds.

 

From what I've seen Canadian dealerships don't list them that way, just US dealerships.

 

I hear ya. So far the truck I want hasn't sold. My saving grace is the truck is not on the lot. The only way you would know about it is by their web site, and you would then have to call them and ask about it, or by stopping in and talking to a salesman. So anyone mildly interested driving by would just keep going.

But in reality, in my situation, and even in yours, take comfort that there will be many, many more coming down the line and you'll definitely get your shot at one. So if they get sold out from underneath us or even some unethical sales tactics, its all good. You just learn who the slimy dealers are and stay away.

 

I seem to be unlucky as I can't get this to work with the temp or permanent vin I have had since 3/17(3/16 build date). Using chrome but just get a website not found. boo...

 

I'm sure everyone has their own story of how they got to the point they were at but here's mine.

A few months back, I went into a local dealership. Originally, I thought I wanted a Tacoma. Turns out, people who are 6'8 don't really fit in small trucks. So I turned my attention to the Tundra. They had an Army Green SR5 TSS (4x4) Tundra that I LOVED. Test drove it & decided to sit down & talk numbers. Somehow, a $53K sticker price turned into $71K out the door (due to a $16.5K markup, among some dealer "add-ons". Long story short, I laughed & walked out of the dealership. At that point, I had no idea how many dealerships around the US (especially in Texas) did these wild markups.

I used that MARKUPS.org website & started contacting different dealerships that didn't have markups. I was also watching boatloads of YouTube videos on the various packages. Long story short, I figured out exactly what I *thought* I wanted (which was an Army Green TSS 4x4). I had three different dealerships put me on their waitlists. 2 of them made lofty promises, none of them delivered. I started getting somewhat impatient (because that's how I am) & started searching autotrader, cars.com & TrueCar. I finally found exactly what I wanted but it was on the East Coast. After putting some serious thought into it, I decided to do it. I've put a deposit down, agreed to final numbers, etc. Just waiting on the truck to ship & arrive.

I'm not sure of anybody else's experience but I learned that depending on where you are in the country, it'll have a large impact on the packages you are able to get in any of the Tundras. Colors are can also fall into that category as well.

 

Where in Texas? So from my experience and numerous lists I am on in Texas... I have found that DFW/San Antonio/Houston Areas are the dealerships with "Market rate Adjustments". Your West Texas Dealerships won't budge off MSRP and Austin/Round Rock are your dealerships charging Non-Refundable Desposits.

 

Awesome thanks! I got the permanent VIN and it is already marked "F" with an ETA of April 12-15

 

I primarily shopped in the DFW area. Here were my findings:

No Markup & no deposit for waitlist:
- Longo Toyota of Prosper
- Toyota of Denton
- Family Toyota of Arlington

No Markup w/ refundable deposit:
- Family Toyota of Burleson ($500)
- Jeff Hunter Toyota in Waco ($500)
- Cavender Toyota in San Antonio ($500 deposit that has to be done in person)
- Toyota of Cedar Park in the Austin Area ($500)

Freeman Toyota in Hurst had a $1,900 markup & also did a $500 deposit.

The rest of the dealerships all had ridiculous markups. I think I read about one in Houston that actually doesn't do any sort of markup either.

It's been a NIGHTMARE doing the extra research & finding the right dealership, though...

If you don't mind me asking, what are you on your waitlist for? I had a very specific set of wants, as I'm sure you did.

 

My specifics aren't narrow; 1794 or platinum 4WD any color interior, All Exterior colors EXCEPT Turd Brown. I aint an old man yet.

 

I'm in NE PA, and we've got a mixed bag of that here. There's 4 Toyota dealerships within about an hour or so from me. All but 1 are doing markups. The dealer not doing markups is doing non-refundable deposits. I'm on the list at two of them. The 3rd one was putting something together for me an emailing it to me. That never happened so they lost right off. Like I said in previous posts, one has the exact truck I want in transit. I'll go put a deposit on it on Saturday (non-refundable) as long as they don't sell it by then (not sure how long its been on their web site but its made it this far and I've got just tomorrow and probably going to the dealer Saturday morning about 11ish). All 3 of the dealers with markup have the "that's the price take it leave it" attitude and I'm talking 2000-3000 markup too. I was going to pit one dealer doing markups against the one not doing markups (because he's a shorter ride for me) but they're so lousy responding to emails I doubt they'll respond before I go put a deposit on the one available. So I would say they are about to lose out because they're so terrible at responding to emails.

I fully get it that its supply and demand, and as long as someone will pay it charge it and all, but at a time when prices for everything is just disgusting, I don't get the need for extra greed in making extra thousands just to gouge people is particularly ethical.

My only thought (and I'm fairly certain this is not particularly true) is buying at one dealer but getting it serviced at the closer dealer will hopefully not be an issue.

 

Gotcha. That will likely help you remain flexible. I basically forced myself to either wait multiple months for a maybe or simply pull the trigger on a one that is 1,300 miles away. So I decided to get exactly what I wanted 5 states over lol. Sometimes I hate how my mind works...

 

The temporary VIN changed to a permanent VIN this morning. The dealer confirmed that my SR5 TRD Sport CM 4x4 was in production. Should see an ETA date posted soon. The Ann Arbor dealer had 17 Tundras on the website when I was able to tag the last one available. It has been fun watching all seventeen change from the temp VIN’s to the actual VIN’s over the last 2 weeks. All of a sudden they started shipping and arriving at the dealer. The Tundra that switched two days ago has a delivery estimate of 4-9 to 4-13. So, I’m looking about two weeks out for mine…hopefully.

 

It's funny because I just found this forum/thread today. Earlier today, I was able to track things using my temporary VIN. Went to do it again earlier to look at something else & I can't access the site. Looked on the dealer's website & it has a real VIN (that still can't be populated as a VSpec quite yet).

Starting to get antsy!

 

Mine shows tomorrow as it's birthday. Still using the temp VIN. Hoping by Monday I can stop worrying about when it will be built and start wondering when will it be delivered.

 

Just got VIN from Dealership...will give this a try.

 

No love...Page not found !

 

Change the VIN in the URL to your VIN and it should work. It's not working because OP likely purchased the vehicle, thus removing his VIN from the system, so the page for his vehicle doesn't exist anymore.

I just did it with my truck and it still works.

 

Did that; does not appear to work so could it be a CDN issue?

 

I've been trying to use random VIN numbers from dealer websites and I was able to get to the main page then after right clicking on the page and trying to paste the VIN number in the search box, I get nothing. I am in the US

 

Hit F5 after you do the search box and the page will reload. Should be able to see it then.