For dealers
How to show out-the-door pricing on a dealer website
An out-the-door price is the number the buyer will actually pay: the unit, plus tax, title, registration and every fee, calculated for where they live.
Most dealership websites still show a price the buyer knows is incomplete. Showing the real one is a pricing-engine problem before it is a design problem, because the total has to be computed per buyer rather than typed once.
What goes into an out-the-door price
- Vehicle price
- The advertised price of the unit, kept in sync with your own site so the number a buyer sees is the number you are asking.
- Taxes
- Calculated against the buyer’s jurisdiction rather than the dealership’s, which is what makes an out-of-market quote either right or useless.
- Title and registration
- The state filing costs, itemized rather than folded into a single administrative line.
- Dealer fees
- Every fee shown as its own line. Fees that come to nothing are left off the order and its paperwork entirely, so the buyer is not reading zeroes.
- Coverage
- F&I and aftermarket products appear only when the buyer selects them, from one menu even when the dealership runs several coverage providers.
- Promotions
- Dealer and manufacturer offers are priced into the deal rather than mentioned beside it, so the total already reflects everything the buyer qualifies for.
How to put it on your website
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Calculate for the buyer, not for the store
An out-the-door number computed against your own jurisdiction is wrong for anyone outside it, and out-of-market shoppers are the ones most likely to ask. Tax, title and registration all key off where the buyer lives.
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Itemize instead of aggregating
A single "fees and taxes" line reads as something to be negotiated later. A broken-out fee list reads as a total. Ekho’s checkout shows a clear fee breakdown for exactly this reason.
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Drop the empty lines
A fee that comes to nothing does not build trust by appearing as a zero. It adds a row the buyer has to interpret. Zero-dollar fee lines are left off the order and its paperwork.
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Price the offers in
A promotion listed next to the price makes the buyer do arithmetic. A promotion applied to the price makes the number credible. Every offer a buyer qualifies for is priced into their deal at checkout.
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Show financing as its own comparison
Cash out-the-door and financed out-the-door are different questions. Each lender’s offer appears as its own card with a price and payment breakdown, so a buyer compares real offers rather than one illustrative figure.
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Put it where the shopper already is
The number belongs on the vehicle page and in the checkout, not behind a form. A price a buyer has to request is a price they will go and find somewhere else.
Go deeper
Where dealers actually get exposed under total-price enforcement, and why the same patterns extend across every titled-vehicle segment.
Questions dealers ask
The total a buyer will actually pay to take the vehicle home: the price of the unit plus taxes, title, registration and every dealer fee, less any promotion they qualify for. If a number is missing from it, it is not an out-the-door price.
The vehicle price, sales tax calculated for the buyer’s jurisdiction, title and registration costs, and all dealer fees. Optional products such as F&I and aftermarket coverage are included only when the buyer has actually selected them, and any promotion the buyer qualifies for should already be applied rather than noted separately.
Total-price disclosure is being enforced case by case rather than through a single blanket rule, and the FTC sent warning letters to 97 auto dealership groups in March 2026. OEMs in powersports, marine, RV and LSV have advised dealers to revisit how they advertise. Treating disclosure as a design decision rather than a compliance task is the practical way through it.
The buyer’s home state sets the tax basis, not yours. Ekho computes tax, titling and registration against the buyer’s jurisdiction across all 50 states and the District of Columbia, so an out-of-market quote is accurate without your desk looking anything up.
The comparison a shopper is making is not between your out-the-door price and your advertised price. It is between your out-the-door price and the one they can get elsewhere in a few seconds. A buyer who has to ask what a unit really costs has already been given a reason to ask somewhere else.
Yes. The same disclosure patterns extend across every titled-vehicle segment, and Ekho processes tax, titling and registration for every titled vehicle type it supports, including off-road classifications.