I am trying to sell our 2007 Lexus ES350....its been a great car and almost a year since I got it CPO but drove it too much for one year. (16k miles). And want something newer.

Has about 43k miles. Is under factory warranty/CPO warranty/Lexus Platinum warranty. For 3 years/100k.

I am looking for 2010 TSX/2008 TL/2009 G37/2008 3 series. Whats the best way of selling a car? This is the first time I am ever selling a car privately.

Should I list it online? KBB trade in value is 22k for my car how much can I expect a dealer to match that price? What if I want to trade in my more expensive car for a less expensive car...? What happens then?

 

craigslist

 

^ yup, list it on craiglist. And always list the price like $500 more then you want for it, so when they try to talk you down the price, you drop it to your liking and you get what you want. And the buyer will feel great cause he/she drops $500 and then pats himself on the back, lol.

 

interesting. never heard of such a technique...please elaborate? haha, just kidding.

IMO, when it comes to selling a car its really up to how you value your time, and how capable you are of trusting others.

personally, i would not try to sell a car myself. i dont trust ppl, and i dont want to kill multiple weekends sitting around. you dont know who is coming to see the car. are they going to come back and steal it overnight? is the payment going to go through smoothly? you have to sit with them while they drive your beloved machine. its just TOO MUCH. i would just trade it in.

P.S. this is why i lease cars, not buy. i dont like the selling process, and i dont want to be subject to an unfair trade-in value.

 

I'm sorry you're a retarded orange.

 

When I was younger I had good success selling low priced cars to high school kids just looking for any kind of cheap transportation. But in your case its a very expensive used car. So I think the odds of someone coming to your house with a cashier's check is highly unlikely. And you also have to deal with all these Certified pre owned deals out there.

I would probably just get the car in top shape and do all the mainteance-show the records to whatever dealer you trade it in for and ask for top dollar.

 

I just sold a 2006 TSX on Craigslist.

Super easy.

Get Google voice number and set up email like "Black2006TSX@gmail.com"

Use the email and telephone for the sale, ditch them when you are done.

Post ad on CL. Use 2 astericks before and after the title. No joke.

I got no hits for my first ad for over a week. I reposted and really the only change was the ** before and after and my phone/email blew the eff up.

Meet somewhere public. Bank parking lot is good. If they want to buy, walk inside and have them get a cashiers check IN FRONT OF YOU and exchange it for the title.

Done.

 

Or use your regular email and cell #, which has always worked for me just fine. Craigslist is the free one that everyone uses. Even when I'm not really shopping for a car i'll sometimes "shop" for cars on CL for fun to see what's up on the block. You can tell which reply's are genuine and which one's are simply trolling for email addresses. Ignore any email that has an IP address from a foreign country. (You don't want to sell them your car anyway.)

Personally I hate trading cars in. To me that's "okay I give up, I'm a loser" type of thing, because you're never getting top dollar and just making the dealership rich. I've done it a couple of times and usually it ends up being a regrettable experience even though I know how it works. If you're a newb at it like the OP, that's a recipe to lose your shirt by some slick talking sales guy who's absolutely going to take advantage of you if they can.

An ES350 should be a piece of cake to sell if you've managed not to trash it. It's basically an upscale Toyota Camry for christ's sake, and lord knows nobody ever buys those But seriously, get it cleaned up at a quicky detail place that will wash, vacuum, dress the tires and wipe down the interior. Price it fairly, or maybe $500 high so you can allow some room for them to go jew on you and feel good about it. Take advantage of the fact that the majority of people loathe going to a dealership to buy a used car, where as you can sell them a very nice clean car with a little history at a price that looks pretty fair right off the bat.

 

Small thing, but when selling a car, I wouldn't want to go for the "freshly detailed" look. By that I mean clearly shined tires, and basically anything that looks like it's been recently treated. IMO this makes the car looks like it's covering something up, or that it's been intentionally done up for sale (which it has).

I still would get it professionally detailed, but make the car seem like it's been clean in and out all along. Matte tire shine, or none at all, and no shiny products on the interior or engine bay.

The trick is to make the car look like it's been new all along.

 

except for the leasing part. But selling a car is a pain sometimes. Especially when you can only meet people on the weekends...fucking retarded.

 

I like the Craigslist idea, and though I haven't sold a car that way (the last time my parents sold a car was in 2002) it seems like the modern way to go.

I would clean it up, prepare the maintenance records, perhaps get it checked over to make sure the brakes, tires, etc. are in good shape. If they're close to needing replacement, you could go ahead and replace them, then advertise the car as having a new set of brake pads or tires (though I've also heard of people wanting to put their own set of tires on a used car, so this isn't really necessary)

Then I'd list it for a little over KBB "Excellent" private party value (if it's in excellent shape) and wait for buyers.

At least where I am from, used luxury cars are a hot commodity and go fast. Few people where I live like to lease or buy new, so that pushes up the price of good used luxury cars really fast to the point of ridicule on some models.

You could also take it to CarMax and see what they'd offer you, then use that as a reference point when taking trade-in offers.

 

Always practice something like this.
I keep a email for online classifieds and contests.
Never know who might be behind the other keyboard.

 

these are all great ideas. especially the google voice feature. but again, its a very time consuming process with no guarantees. if youre a busy guy, make sure you know the value of your time. it may be worth it to "pay" / "lose" a couple thousand to do a hassle free trade-in. think of it as a broker fee.

personally, i would give up trying to sell it myself after the first potential buyer said no...that is, if there is nothing wrong with the car, and there are no surprises. i have zero tolerance for indecisiveness. to me, if you travel to go check out a car, its only to confirm that you want to pull the trigger. dont waste other ppls time. the fact that you may need to show the car multiple times without a sale would just piss the hell out of me. weekend after weekend blown due to indecisive strangers...screwwww that.

 

Stogie gets reps+

 

***********

 

** craigslist works **

 

 

I've sold a ton of cars on Craigslist. It's free and very effective. Just be ready to get a bunch of scam e-mails and make sure you filter through them.

 

FWIW, I find cars.com to be better as its much more direct and you don't get scammers, etc. A person who is looking for a Lexus ES350 will specify that in the search and see your listing. My family has sold multiple cars on there for their KBB value, and they sold within 2-3 weeks. And every single used car my family has ever purchased (mine included) was found via cars.com. It seems they have more listings than other sites such as vehix.com, etc.

Dammit I sound like a cars.com advertisement. Sorry. But its a great site. That said, when you do your listing, the more pictures the better.

 

x2 on the pictures. I hate seeing one-liner craigslist ads for cars with "good condition, some wear and tear" with no pictures. WTF is that supposed to mean?!

Check out kijiji.com as well. Kinda like a more organized Craigslist.

 

Thanks for the insightful replies everyone! I listed the car Wednesday on CL and NOT a single email. I can't even see my own ad on craigslist.

I have it listed at $21500..I think that's MORE then fair because I see several ES350 with 80k miles with NO warranty going for $23k. I already set up a google voice number ...and the email is also just being used for spam stuff so that's no worries. Just can't believe I have not gotten a SINGLE email or call.

 

I sell a lot of cars through CL, but in my area it seems to work best for the 5000-15000 price range. Your car may be out of the budget of many CL shoppers.

 

That's because you're trying to sell a vehicle for over $20k...People lurking CL and eBay are looking for deals..Your asking price is not "a steal of a deal". IMO for a car like this, you need to advertise it on autotrader, cars.com, etc...The kind of buyer for a car like yours wouldn't be shopping on CL. Just my

For all the car's I've ever bought or tried to sell on CL or eBay, people are looking for wholesale pricing...You're at retail, and won't get the bites..

I can also buy your car from you, but I don't think you want to know what I would offer you... :wink:

 

Try Autotrader-- it was worth the small charge when I listed a Civic and received 3-5 real calls on the day the ad came up on the internet: the ultimate buyer was one of those calls.

 

OK, chill out... It takes some time for it to get some responses.

Also, did you do the two asterisks? I am not joking... Listen to me now and believe me later...

If you created a CL account to post your listing, log in and see if it is in your account. If not, you screwed something up and you need to re-post the listing.

I tried Cars.com (they charge a little money) and got nothing, so YMMV.

 

Yes I made a CL account. Can you explain the ** in more detail? I might list it on Autotrader. Trying to see what some dealers are giving me on trade in.

VW dealer offered 17k LOL.

 

That's what the car is worth wholesale..And when you PM'ed and asked me what I would offer, it would probably be in-line to that number...



Vehicle

2007 LEXUS ES 350

Description

Engine Type: 3.5L V6
Body Style: 4 DOOR SEDAN
VINCODE:
Standard Features: DUAL ZONE AUTOMATIC AC STD
MOON ROOF STD

Base Price: @ 51000 miles 16500
Mileage: 43000 miles



Adds and Deducts

As Equipped Price 16500
Mileage Adjustment 525
GALVES TRADE-IN VALUE 17025

 

Shoofin - can you explain the differences between Galves/NADA/KBB...etc.?

It seems that if we try to negotiate the value of our cars at a trade in, the dealers are always playing the "well we don't use..KBB" (or fill in the blank) argument.

In other words, it seems, we are always taking a bath for thousands of dollars because we can't get on the same playing field.

 

in some states when you trade-in a car you do not pay sales tax on the amount of the trade-in. Figure that in when trying to sell the car. 16,000 miles in a year is not much for me-I drive between 25,000-30,000 miles.

 

Retarded orange,

Does your ad appear in your list of ads for your account? If so, it's up there. Give it some time.


I know this sounds totally idiotic, but this is what I mean about the asterisk:

 

Thats how it is in NJ. The only real incentive to trade the car.

 

Also, it took about three weeks for the phone to blow up.

Two weeks of the first ad, then I ran the second one on CL and got calls that week abot the car. Had it sold the third weekend.

 

KBB is a guide for the consumer. It isn't accurate at all to wholesale or trade-in prices. I have no idea how they, or Edmunds for the matter, estimate their prices. NADA and Galves, among some other companies (Black Book too) base their wholesale or trade in prices based on the actual prices that the cars are wholesaling for in the auctions, and what the dealers are paying for the cars.

See, when I take a trade in, I try to buy it as low as possible. Not because I plan on making $5k on the car when I flip it (I'd love to but that 'aint gonna happen anytime soon). Most of the money goes into conditioning and repairing the car. And flame me if you want, but like people never trust dealers, the dealer HAS TO trust the customer, right? I bet all of you who ever sold a car may have had a secret about a problem they might have had on the car that they conveniently neglected to tell the dealer or buyer. For those of you that say no are full of it. We are ALL guilty! Even myself (before getting into this business - I can't and won't do that now because I stand by everything I sell). I want to buy it low and try to sell it as low as possible, while making sure I am able to make some money. Think it's easy when you have to stand by a product that you know nothing about? A satisfied customer is a returning customer, and a referring customer. Most dealers rarely make a whole lot of money on used cars (though we usually do make more selling a used car than a new car), the money isn't in the car. It's the aftersale. That's why they are so high pressure in that finance manager's office. That's where the money is. I try to make as much as I can on a unit because I have to warranty it. What happens if a week from now a customer I sold a car to calls me up and says the transmission is gone? It's going to cost at least $1,000-$1,500 to rebuild, where does the money come from? It comes right out of the profit. It's really a tricky business. A car can be running perfectly today and can die tomorrow. How can I predict it?

Example: A neighbor of mine was making me crazy for an '05 Escalade. He had a trade in. This went on for about 6 months until he finally started to REALLY bother me. I ended up giving him more for his car than I should have because the car was clean. I couldn't retail it, so I wholesaled it and took a small loss. No big deal. Now the car I got him, I agreed to mark it up $500 for profit, and sell it to him after all other expenses put into the car. I pick up a car from an auction in Indiana. The seller wasn't exactly truthful to me on the condition of the car, and I got a small discount on the price after the agreed on price. I have it cleaned up and repair anything that we notice is wrong with the car. Everything seemed to be fine. Than 2 weeks later he starts complaining about some suspension noise and differential noise. I had to change the lower arm bushings on the front end. Guess who's pocket that came out of? Not his! And then he's complaining about a differential noise that I spoke to a half dozen people that say it's a normal noise on these cars with this kind of mileage. He won't accept that for an answer to he goes to shop after shop asking all of them. Most say that it's normal, some say that there is something wrong because they want the job. It's going to cost probably anywhere from $1,000 to $2,000 to rebuild. Whose pocket is that coming out of? Certainly not mine! I did him the favor for the trade and lost. I did him the favor in the sale and lost. And this is a neighbor that I have to see every day. He is somewhat cool, but his wife is crazy. She thinks I'm going to pay for it. I explained to him that I did him a real solid by working so short on this deal and he appreciates it, but his wife is making it really difficult.

In my business, with both the new and used cars, there are no F&I managers here. Just me and my other sales people. I do offer some things to add to the deal, but I mention it once, and if they say no, that's it. I don't bring it up again. In a used car I would offer an extended warranty or a wheel and tire warranty. In a new car (lease), I would offer the wheel and tire warranty or a damage waiver at the end of the lease. Does it make me a lot of money? Not really. But it makes a customer happy when they know that their tires and wheels are covered, that they can return their leases without getting hit over the head with damage charges from the banks. I only offer these kinds of things that I know a customer will definitely benefit and appreciate to have. A retail franchise dealer usually makes a lot more on a unit than I do, as a new car broker. I just make a commission and move on. They benefit in a whole lot of other ways. When they broker a deal for me, they don't make nearly as much as they want to make as opposed to a retail deal. So then why have us around? For volume. So they can hit their numbers. That's it.

When cars come off lease and back to me before I have the banks pick up, I look over the cars and assess the residual and condition to see if it pays to buy. One car I will never understand how the residual comes into play is the Accord.
Example: I just took back a 2008 Honda Accord LX-P lease return with 3,700 miles on it. 3,700!! To me it's a no-brainer to buy, because they car was essentially mint, needs nothing other than a detail, and the miles are stupid low, right? Wrong. The residual value from AHFC is $15,793. I checked the wholesale values in the auction and the lowest mile car (12k miles) is wholesaling for about $15,000 to $15,500. To wholesale the car makes no sense, and to retail the car at, say, $17,000 to $18,000 makes no sense, because you can get a brand new 2011 LX-P for like a grand more . I can't understand this. It hurt me to return the car because it's gold, but generally, nobody in their right mind will want to buy a 3 year old car for the same price as a brand new one.

I talk too much, and I can keep going on and on and on, but I won't anymore..

 

And New York. I know a bunch of states that do this..

 

Not to continue hijacking this thread, but Shoofin, I never understand the prices on used Hondas either. They are just absolutely ridiculous that it's rarely worth it to buy the late-model used one. I normally just tell people to go and pick out whatever new one they'd like.

Sometimes, CarMax asks more for the used one than the new one...

 

<- Isn't complaining about used Honda prices...

 

Shoofin, Thanks so much for your thoughts.

So to avoid trade in shock I should check out Galves or NADA before I go to a dealer. Although...do you have to be a dealer to use Galves?

You're right about the used late model Honda prices. Why buy used when for another grand or two you could have new.

 

I believe you do have to be a dealer to have access to Galves. I don't pay it monthly, I pay annually, and it's something around $400/yr for my access.

 

You can use NADA online for free.

www.nada.com

 

I don't know if the consumer listed pricing is the same as the dealer wholesale pricing. I don't use NADA so I can't compare the two..