Chili Red Cooper S 2006

Been seeing a bit of a range regarding trade-in and selling.
- 58,000 original owner miles
- Mechanically and cosmetically sound - car needs a good mop inside and out
- Have all repair records; well-maintained
- Classic small paint chips on front hood
- One bb-sized small ding/dent atop of driver's-side fender
- One bb sized small ding/dent by driver's-side door
- Fluids recently changed

Can anyone recommend a location to sell within northern virginia? Haven't tried carmax yet, but might this weekend. AutoTrader spat out a $4,600 trade-in value (I don't think so) while KBB and NADA spat out around $8,000.

Thanks!
Greg

 

I would keep it, it's too much fun plus no car payments lol

I think that you can ask for 9,000 but the dealer will not give more than 5,000

 

I'd guess you're looking at a $3K+ difference between the best price you can get selling privately vs. trading on a new car at the dealership. Assuming a the car is basically stock/unmolested, has a clean title and no accident history, detailed as well as humanly possible with great paint/interior, is one-owner, and properly marketed (perhaps after the weather breaks in the spring), you might be able to get $10K or even a little more for the car. (Your car is in a "good color", is the most desirable year for the 1st gen, has maintenance records, and has very low miles.) Aggressively negotiated against the discounted cash price for the new car, I doubt you can do much better than $6-7K on a trade - on an older car like this, the dealers are probably not going to value things that a private buyer would find very desirable (like your maintenance records).

I doubt you can do any better than trade-in value for you car selling to a dealer or wholesaler. If you're buying a new car anyway, I wouldn't split the deal by selling to one dealer and buying from another - find a couple dealers for your new car and work them for best trade value. Depending on how your state handles sales tax, there may be tax advantages to trading that work in your favor too.

If you do decide to sell privately, I'd market simultaneously with enthusiast web sites like this, Craigslist and perhaps another site like autotrader.com. But this is a fair amount of work - you have to get the car properly detailed, you have to take good photos, and you have to deal with all the tire-kickers. If your time is valuable or you don't like dealing with the hassles of selling, I'd just trade and move on.

- Mark

 

1. A used car is worth what you can find a buyer willing to pay and NO MORE. If you THINK it is worth $10,000 and don't sell it for a year ..... guess what ... it ain't worth $10,000!

2. CARMAX is gonna give you KBB trade in if the car is in 'decent' shape .... that's my experience having dumped two cars on them (estates). (They gave me low KBB for a Caravan with a bad tranny and no a/c ... I was trying to avoid a tow away charge!)

3. I just 'released' my 07-S ... exceptionally clean and very desirable IMO: BRG and white, Tuscan Leather, Wood Grain, barely 50,000 miles; no dings and a Florida car. Tried a self sale for 2 months ... had someone very interested - but need to sell my car first - for 30 days. I traded it ... tired of waiting. Was the private sale offer MORE - YOU BET .... but I never saw $.

4. In a trade you are still SELLING .... just to a very astute buyer who buys low and sells high.

5. NO BUYER - dealer or when I've sold private - has EVER asked to see my maintenance records. No dealer has ever lowered their offer because I had "not MINI glass". Latest round they DID not like the fact I had regular tires and not runflats and I noticed that when they listed the car for sale on their website it had NEW runflats

just offered as food for thought . . .

 

I looked to trade mine in too the other day, pretty similar to yours (mileage and color, condition). Autotrader's estimate was about $9,800, local BMW/Mini dealer only offered me 7,000. Other places were a little higher.

I will probably try to sell mine privately, because I've got the time and I can probably get a little more for it than trade in. The only thing for trade in is that you often get a sales tax advantage if you buy a car at the same place, because you're paying less. But I'm not sure if that's worth it.

 

One shop i heard back from said they base their price on NADA or KBB "rough" trade-in value. I suspect most shops would support going that route based on reconditioning and warranty costs.