Tactics for selling used vehicles
 

Inspired by hondaracer's thread tactics for buying used vehicles I've decided to start a new thread on selling used vehicles.

I'm looking at ordering a 2018 Tundra TRD Pro, but it looks like I may need to sell my current Tundra privately. The dealer wants to give me peanuts for it, and I could make upwards of $5-8k if I sell it privately even after taking taxes into consideration. If it was a few g's, I'd say it's not worth the trouble. But $5k is equal to a really nice canopy, and some subwoofers. That's worth it to me.

The problem is that I haven't sold a used vehicle since my STi about 4 years ago, and that was to someone I knew and trusted. Prior to that, the last used car that I sold was in the mid-2000's.

What does a seller need to be aware of when selling a used vehicle?

What are the best forms of advertising and payment?

Any insight, as I know we have some wheeler/dealers on here that are very familiar with the used car market.

:fullofwin:

ahhh yes.. the "fun" of selling your vehicle privately. I swear its little wonder why so many people just throw it to the dealerships.

1) list it on everything.. crags/kijijijijijijiij/autotrader/wechat/forums

2) wash it and clean the inside.

3) take GREAT photos of your NON messy car to show how anal retentive you are.

4) post up more than just whats standard features on the car. more like the reasons why you are selling it, what has been done to it, and if any accidents/claims on it.

5) Put up a fair price, just ignore all the low ballers. Look for other listings that are similar to yours and price accordingly. If you think its worth more than others, tell them why.

6) payment is always cash for under 10k, if not do it at the bank right next to a auto plan dealer. Watch the guy make the bank draft.

this is 100000x worse if you try and sell an exotic/sportscar/rare car. Much easier selling a CRV w/ 100,000kms on it to some soccer mom than it is to sell to some other "enthusiast" whos expecting a brand new car for 10% of MSRP.

Ive sold all the families used cars on craigslist so ive met all kinds of "fun" people. thats why i leased my sportwagen...

7) in the ad, keep it shorter and sweet. I hate it when I click on an m3 and it’s a copy paste essay from Wikipedia about the heritage and history of the m3 etc etc

8) always say there's someone else interested and willing to pay your asking if the viewing party doesnt wanna buy.












:troll:

Legit: remove aftermarket parts if you have them. They add little value to cars when sold with them but can be worth more sold individually

9) If you can provide maintenance receipts, a recent carfax, and/or a recent mech inspection ... you get bonus points.

Look into selling it in the USA, it's super easy... I did it with my RSX almost 2 years ago and I got about $6,000cdn for it when the most I could get in the lower mainland after months of trying was $4,500cdn. That's a pretty significant difference % wise. And that was with Honda USA being complete fucking pricks about the letter the buyer needs.

Toyota (not pricks about giving out info) + Built in USA already = easy sale.

Not sure what year or the details of your Tundra are, but take a quick look on Seattle Craigslist and see for yourself if it's worthwhile.

How much for Tundra. Revscene discount. Less then 2 million KM?

Keep in mind that you can do an "in and out" at the dealer and still get a credit for your trade-in.

i.e. sell your vehicle privately, but do the transaction at the dealer. The dealership owns the car for 1 second and then sells it back to your buyer for the same price.

This way, you get the price you want AND the tax credit.

Before I bought my last new car, I also had to get rid of my higher mileage car and I got $5K more (i.e. $5K dealer offer vs $10K private offer + tax savings) by doing this. Dealers don't want to deal with cars older than 4 years with more than 100K on it...it just goes to auction and that's usually a loss for them.

There's always people who indicate that you don't HAVE to sell and could keep it if they wanted to. And "Negotiations will be ignored".

Also cliche "Wish I could keep it but need to make room for another project" aka "I'm abandoning this project for one that I think that I can make work. GL HF"

Thank you all for the info. This is something I'm not looking forward to, but at the end of the day car sales is better than prostitution. I'm not pretty enough to make a couple thousand in prostitution.
:fullofwin:


That's a good call. I have wheel/tires, a canopy, aftermarket exhaust and stereo, side steps, etc. Everything combined is worth a couple thousand, plus I want to keep the tires. They're big and new.


+1, good call!

That's a heck of an idea.
I will look into this too.

2010 Tundra, 4x4, SR5 quad cab, 182k, clean title. Seats 6, with column shifter (special order from Toyota).

They're ranging from $17-$22k, and the dealer want to give me between $9k and $12k.

But I hate dem craigslist flakes.....
:ahwow:

I've never heard of this creative move, would most salesperson/dealers do this for you? Seems like a lot of paper work on their side with no benefit, other than the sale of the new car to you. Maybe this gives them something to actually do for the $295 documentation fee.

lessons learned from selling various vehicles and particularly me e46 330i 6mt which i showed to probably a dozen people and took months to sell.

price it reasonably from the get go. instead of starting high and lowering the price every couple weeks.

most people are idiots and will ask you the same stupid questions because they are too lazy to read your ad. just write a generic response and copy/paste everytime one of these idiots texts you. no need to get frustrated

as for flakers i just assume everyone is a flaker. i will not plan my life around people coming to look at my car, i tell them to call me when they want to see it and if im free then they can come to ME and look at it. i will not meet anyone anywhere.

I guess this explains why I can't find a used truck in this city. Crazy.


As for selling. I never negotiate any pricing over the phone or email. My transactions prior to showing are short and to the point, emails more so then phone calls. If the buyer is serious, they will put in the effort. Keeps the flakes away.

Price it a tad higher than your bottom line. You know buyer will talk you down some. Then when you get that number, you are happy and buyer is happy.

Ffs dude, you couldn't get a double cab? That's exactly what I'm looking for right now but need the 6' box.

My buddy is looking for a crewmax. I'll see what he thinks. I know he wanted a TRD or limited though. Is yours 5.7, 4x4?

I've bought and sold a few cars and will share a few things I have learned along the way.

- Selling takes time. If you don't want to spend the time list do price it below market or just trade it in and let tofu deal with the hassle.

- Clean the car and take quality photos. Make a solid ad with key items such as mileage, any accidents and if it is local or not (out of province). Highlight any maintenance that has been done.

- Like vitaminG I assume everyone is a flake and don't waste your time meeting someone at a mall or half way (unless they are flying in or taking the ferry they are likely serious buyers) I have picked up buyers at the ferry a bunch of times and only once it did not result in a sale.

- Ignore the low ballers and try not to let them bother you. Plenty of people looking out there looking to buy low and sell high.

- Get two transfer papers and have one filled out as much as possible. This saves everyone a little time so why not. The 2nd is in case someone makes a mistake. The seller does not need to go to an ICBC insurance broker.

- Generally I accept or use cash or cashier cheque/draft if I witness them getting it at the bank. I had someone attempt to give me a fake draft once. Bonus points if you both use the same bank and do a transfer in a branch.

Haven't you learned anything from the past? lol

only thing I disagree with is the time thing

if you know the market and price appropriately, a sale tends to happen quickly. I've sold multiple cars within 2-3 days of posting.

finally the big one - confidence. if you get a blow hard buyer that thinks they can push you around, tell them to pound sand.

I promise you that if you write a detailed ad, take excellent pictures, pre-address in your ad any known issues (real or internet BS) that sellers will bring up to try and low ball you - the car will sell fast.

Only time I ever got myself into trouble in a sale was a car that I didn't know enough about myself. lesson learned.

I guess most of this applies to the buying thread too - I adopt the same attitude, and I'm always willing to walk away (cliche but true)

What do you guys do for allowing test drives because if anything happens it’s under your insurance and you get screwed. Do you drive it and they ride shot gun? I can understand it will be hard to buy without test drive. So is that a risk the seller just have to live with?

^^^ Good question and on top of that what do you think about letting buyers test drive a manual car?

most will do it for the documentation fee

of course you will have to do the calculation to see if its worth the tax savings (in most cases its yes, but some dealers like to charge $295, some $500, I've even seen $800) - and you'll be eating the documentation fee 99% of the time unless the buyer is willing to split (very unlikely)

but this also means that the seller will be paying more tax if he/she was planning on reporting purchase value lower than the actual sale price

however - i have heard that some dealerships are now stopping from doing this in the event that the car is a lemon/has issues

tip:
disclose everything - be honest and up front to the seller
based on their reaction you could pretty much figure out if they are a tire kicker or actually is serious about purchasing your car

never - i've been in an accident where a buyer put down deposit on the car and caused damage to the car then decided to not buy it.
i have no issues with driving the potential buyer around - or even to a PPI place

Test drives are a tough one.

I had a buyer fly all the way out from Toronto to buy my Supra and he did not feel comfortable test driving it. I drove him. It was shipped to him later.

In another case I have seen the seller pull the plate off another car and put it on the car for sale and toss the keys to the interested buyer to drive it. That would be a heck of a mess if there was an accident.

I think that is a risk you need to take when selling a vehicle. If your not comfortable with it, then you are losing many potential buyers. If i'm buying a used vehicle, damn rights I'm driving it. Obviously the more "special" the car is, the more precautions you need to take. If it were a high powered vehicle, i'd probably give them a test drive myself and run the poop out of it, then let them go for a little boot around the block to ensure they aren't noticing any strange driving characteristics.

What I have personally done is driving the darkness around myself a little bit with the looker, and then take it to UVic, where the road is simple, and switch seats. Find an area around you that has simple roads.

Usually, if you are looking to buy a manual car, you would at least have some idea about how to drive it, otherwise, why would you even look at a manual car?

When I was buying a beater Corolla to practice manual in, the old lady seller was really patient with me. We were on back roads, so it wasn't a huge issue if I stalled. I tried to be very slow with the clutch since I was not very good at it. The old lady was very nice and patient, too, and every time I stalled, she would encourage me and give me tips.

When I sold it, the dude who bought it drove his friend's car to see my car, which is also a stick shift. He drove the Corolla with ease.

I'd say that if they look nervous and fairly new to manual, be patient, give them tips, and watch out for the traffic around them and give them a head up if necessary.

Will buy today. Have 43ma cash in hand.


:troll:


Everyone else has more or less given any advice I would have, so I'll just say good luck dealing with the Craigslist asshats. If you're sticking with private, try using Kijiji as well. I've had fewer flakes and more actual sales on there compared to CL.