Old may be the clichéd gold but when it comes to selling something which has been used before, specifically cars; they don’t get sold like gold. People always prefer the new and glossy cars, with everything in its perfect shape. However, there still exists a market, interested in buying used cars, despite that, sellers still fail at some point in selling their car. Some people sell their used car out of hobby while others do so because they want to buy a better car; whatever the reason is, there comes a time in almost every automobile owner’s life, where they either have to sell their beloved vehicle or at least look for a better alternative offer. However, most car sellers complain they don’t usually get what they expect when they put their car on sale. Why? Here are a few common mistakes that people make when selling a used car.
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Selling the Old as New:
What used car sellers tend to forget is that they are selling something not as flawless as new so exaggerating in order to increase the resale value is just the biggest sin. No matter how much you’ve spent in order to make this used car as good as new, it can never be sold as that. You need to be practical about selling a used car. The over exaggeration might put off potential buyers who are obviously aware of the re-painted and repaired glitches. So sell your car for the right price rather than wasting yours and the buyer’s time over unnecessary bargaining.
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Put Up The Best Picture:
If you’re selling your car through an online advertisement or an online car dealer, your car or the equipment you’re selling sometimes don’t get sold at the price it deserves. Online buying and selling is usually done through picture; the better the picture quality, the better price it gets. It’s what they see, so rather putting up a sloppy image of the dented front of your car, you make sure you put the best image of your car or equipment.
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Selling it to scammers:
Whether you’re selling it online or through any other tangible source, you’re never safe from getting scammed and non-serious, time wasters. So beware of the red flags you encounter while selling your car. Don’t accept offers from out of state buyers, even if they agree to mail you a cheque for an amount higher than what you agreed. Make sure, they are not hesitant to pay through normal payment methods like cash, cheque or PayPal. You might come to know buyers who would insist on getting the vehicle shipped before they make the payment. DO NOT, I repeat, DO NOT! Hand over the vehicle before the payment is cleared and has been transferred into your account. Never trust the winning bidder until he sees and agrees to buy your car in person as there can be possibilities where the buyer might change his/her mind due to any reason.
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Advertise to The right market and through the right Channel:
Sellers are often seen complain about their for-sale advertisement not reaching to the right kind of people. There may be two reasons contributing to that; one, you may not be using the right channel to reach out to your market and you don’t clearly know your market. We All know how putting a for sale card on your car parked in your garage won’t sell it. You have to utilize multiple channels and resources to put the word out there. If you know your market then there are particular online dealers where you can place an ad and wait for people to bid.
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Your Limit to negotiate:
Don’t be too flexible or too rigid to negotiations, you should know till what figure can the price be negotiated. Don’t get irritated if people are bargaining to much or are wasting your time with useless questions and concerns. Be mentally prepared to deal with all kinds of buyers and better talk to a professional dealer to know about the kind of buyers and get tips to handle them differently.
So if you or anyone you know is going to sell a car or any other vehicular, what tips do you think can be useful?
Many of us already know how matters unfold in the used car market : If you’re looking for a Mitsubishi Lancer 2005 and find it parked in a showroom, it will be classified as the ”most reliable car” and “drive pleasure is unmatchable” and since it is ”total genuine”, hence priced at 1 Million. However if God forbid, you visit the same showroom to sell your Lancer 2005, you will be greeted with remarks such as ”Out of market” “Maintenance too expensive” “re-painted hood”, and since it is such a pain, the dealer will offer to ”do you a favor” and buy it off at 0.7 Million, which is unreasonable, and so is the 1 Million tag.
A leading automobile classified company in Asia’s essence was to diminish the huge dealer’s margin. A seller would post an ad of his Lancer 2005, price it reasonably, the potential buyer would inspect it and they would bargain to a deal.
However, this essence was lost somewhere. Sellers started to overprice their vehicles, and buyers started to make ridiculous offers resulting in frustrated sellers and disappointed buyers. This post is to address the common mistakes buyers and sellers make on classifieds and tips to find better deals.
No matter how much you may love your present vehicle, eventually the time will come when the cost to repair it will be more than the vehicle is worth. This typically occurs when a vehicle is maybe seven to 10 years old and suffers a major problem like a transmission failure, a leaky head gasket or a blown engine. These kind of repairs can easily cost thousands of dollars, which is usually more than your vehicle is worth.
So you have to make a difficult decision: Do you keep the old clunker and keep pouring money into it, or do you get rid of it and buy something else?
Nobody likes to make car payments, and nobody likes to spend money on car repairs. By the time you pay off a new vehicle, the repair bills start going up. You can’t win. The unfortunate truth is that all cars and trucks eventually wear out no matter how much car maintenance we give them.
Automatic transmissions should last upwards of 150,000 miles, but some may fail at 70,000 or 80,000 miles in some vehicles.
Most engines are capable of going 200,000 or more miles without any major problems but others may fail sooner if they develop a serious problem such as a leaky head gasket.
Tires and brakes and mufflers and batteries and clutches all have a limited service life. If you get 80,000 miles out of a set of tires, you are doing well. If you get 60,000 miles out of a set of front disc brake pads, you have done well. Four or five years is about all you can expect from a car battery. So maybe, eight to 10 years for the original equipment exhaust system and muffler.
Add to these things all the electronics on today’s vehicles, and the odds of problems and repair expenses multiples exponentially. Some electronic modules can be very expensive to replace, and even more difficult to diagnose.
Then there’s the body and the interior. If you vehicle is exposed to a lot of road salt in the winter, after 8 to 10 years, you’ll likely be finding some patches of rust here and there, and certainly underneath where you can’t see it. Your vehicle will also accumulate little dings and scratches and scrapes from the abuse that occurs in parking lots. The interior will suffer normal wear and tear that comes with daily use, which can be accelerated by kids and dogs and sun exposure.
So the older you vehicle gets and the more miles it accumulates, the more “used” it becomes, and the more you will have to spend on maintenance and repairs to keep it running. And eventually you will get socked with a major repair that will be a budget breaker, Guaranteed.
There are many good reasons why a glossy, flawless and brand new car is something you would want. However, before going out ogling and inspecting the newest lines in the market, there is one thing you need to do without much fanfare: Dispose the outmoded car sitting in your garage for some cash that you can use to partly finance the unit you are planning to buy.