Advice on selling a car?

T

Texas97

500+ Posts
i am selling a car for the 1st time in my life. i gave my last car to my sister and used her car as a trade-in.

i decided on a 2004 nissan pathfinder; found one i like and it looks like i will be buying it today. they offered me trade-in at below wholesale despite having low miles and some good add-ons. not surprised.

so i have a 2003 car with low miles and i am looking to sell it. any advice? i am going to clean it up, take some pictures of it and then store it in my garage and not drive it until i sell.

should i put it in 1) autotrader, 2) statesman and 3) craigslist? any thoughts on how good those are? i am going to list it near the NADA retail price as well as gauge it compared to other cars that i find at autotrader.


Texas97
 
I sold my car to the brother of a co-worker. Worked out well for both of us.

Just spam your company-wide mailing lists.
smile.gif
 
A sign in the car helps a lot. Every car I have ever sold has at least fielded calls due to the sign in the car. Two of them sold that way.

Not just a phone number on the sign, but put together a small flyer with all relevant information on the vehicle. It seems to help.
 
Used AutoTrader to sell my wife's car 2 months ago. Easy process...

..just remember everyone wants to negotiate, so there is no point in listing a price as firm..
 
You need to consider the tax consequences of selling yourself as opposed to trading in. You may actually come out better or at least even by actually trading in. For example, if your new vehicle will cost you 30k and you sell your current car yourself and apply the cash towards the new purchase, you pay sales tax on the whole 30K. If you trade in, you pay sales tax only on the difference. You need to factor that in along with the hassle of selling your own car.

If you have a buyer lined up, the dealer may do an "in and out" where you "trade" the car to the dealer for the price agreed upon with your buyer. The dealer then "sells" the car to your buyer at that price. You get the higher price for your old car and the tax benefit. Good Luck.
 
Sometimes just parking it with a for sale sign is all you need to do. Statesman is somewhat expensive, but reaches a lot of people, and may be worth it for a late model car.
Be sure to pay the $5 and mail in the change of title notification, which is a tearoff form at the top of your title. This protects you in case the new buyer delays changing the title over to their name.
 
i bought the car used so i didn't take the big "new car" depreciation hit.

anyway, i just listed it on both statesman classified for 14 days and autotrader.

the only problem with the sign in the car is i am about to store it in the garage as i got the car washed yesterday at genie car wash and got the deluxe + hand wax. the car is spotless and i am not going to drive it anymore so that when people come look at it they are blown away by how clean it is.....

i work for a big company and spamming the email list is likely not a good idea. i might print up a flier b/c i think there is one here somewhere......


Texas97
 
good luck getting anywhere close to NADA retail. Depends on how long you have to sell it, but if you want to move it in 2 weeks, you should look at all the cars like yours within a 250 mile radius and price it lower than any of them (adjusting for mileage). Things that people really like to see in a used car:
1. Clean
2. One owner
3. All books and records
4. Tires with >50 tread life left
5. Mileage at less than 12K / year
6. Traditional color - white, silver, black, red

Good luck.
 
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