5% fee for a piddly home demo time? Or any kind of fee in general?
I’ve been in this hobby for 50 years and shopping from dealers in the high-end strata for over twelve+ years, I have NEVER been set up for a “fee”. And you cannot make a proper assessment in just an hour.
MY TAKE
Most likely:
DEALER has already pegged you - either fairly or grossly unfairly - in his own mind already, as an unlikely guy to close the deal post auditions. So he floats the time clock and egregious penalty fee terms to further test the waters with two more cash outcome options for his pocketbook.
option 1 :he sees you as really eager to close if you agree to his terms upfront regardless and especially if you eventually agree to buy it after the time clocked audition
if you ascede to his bizarre request upfront , then he likely brands you as a ripe sales target likely to pay a lot closer to his asking MSRP, and you will likely fritter away most - if not all- of any sales discount he may otherwise offer you.
option 2: If you agree to his bizarre terms upfront but somehow still manage to resist his time clocked sales pressure tactics,
he still hedged his bets and collects a windfall return on a WTF sales call for a piddly time spent out of shop salescall.
TAKEAWAY
He is a must to avoid for me. There are plenty of other audio shops and other peer or better brands to choose from.
