Considering selling my 5th gen

Dealer will always low ball you. Trade-in is sacrificing thousands of $s for a little convenience imo.

Edit: That tax argument is pretty solid though. Had no idea they took that out.

 

I always have good luck with trade-in. Of course, use Carmax to have them beat or even then tax break. Trade it in is best for me. Even I make $1000 selling private, not worth it.

 

Keep in mind the initial offer a dealer makes for your trade-in is rarely (as in never) what the used car sales manager actually appraised it for. They will always "hold" a certain dollar amount off the actual appraisal price to give them room to negotiate. Let's say the average wholesale value for your trade-in is $30000. In this case the dealer might offer you between $27500 to $28500 on the first pencil, and then after they peel you off the ceiling they will eventually come up to $30000 on the 2nd/3rd or 4th pencil. This makes you feel like you worked them over and got a great deal, when in actuality you ended up getting wholesale value = fair value for a trade-in.

This is why I always suggest that people should run their trade-in by a Carmax, because they will offer you average wholesale value up-front, whether you buy a car from them or not, and you can take their print-out with you to other dealers to use as leverage. At the very least, this gives you a better understanding of what your trade-in should bring.

Yes, I worked at a dealer once, a long long time ago. Worst. Job. Ever.

 

When you are ready to sell, I highly recommend using Auto Trader. I sold my vehicle in Dec. using Auto Trader. $100 for a 30 day listing, that includes Carfax report and more photos than you will need. Also, Auto Trader made very easy to reply to inquiries without giving out my contact info. I also took out a Craigslist add for $30 in my area, and just provided the link the Auto Trader site. Car sold in 3 weeks and I did not need to negotiate.

 

LOL this made my day; here I was thinking how nice it is in Oregon, no sales tax (13% here in Ontario) and then BAM, California strikes again...so you don't get the tax break, you pay for the new one full tax, high gas prices, weird laws when it comes to emissions...now i start to understand the exodus towards Texas and Florida.