I was lucky enough to put a deposit on a 350h a few weeks ago, with a delivery date in early May. The dealer said they can only give me a trade in value for my car (16' RX) at that time. I had him run my VIN, just to see what I can expect. His estimate was $4K less than what multiple appraisal sites (trade in value, not private party) are reporting for my RX. Even with the sales tax savings (~$2K) it makes sense to try & sell to a private party. My worry is that I'll be given a delivery date, sell my RX, there is some issue, and I'm without a car for 2 months. I'm ok Ubering around for a week or so.

For recent buyers of an NX, I'd like to know how much lead time did the dealer give you before your car arrived. Anyone else out there getting lowballed like me?

Thanks, Ralph

 

If you hold onto the RX until you are absolutely certain about the delivery of the new NX, you should be able quickly to sell the RX to Carvana or to Vroom for a price that is significantly higher than what the dealer will be offering for the trade-in.

Last summer, when the used car market started to yield prices that were amazingly high, I sold my 2017 ES350 for about $4000-5000 more than what dealers were offering as a trade-in or what local dealers were offering to buy the car outright. From the point when I solicited the offers from Carvana and Vroom, the entire deal was completed within 3 or 4 days, and everything went very smoothly with the transaction.

If you were to sell your RX to Carvana or Vroom, it would just mean that you would have to go a few days with an "extra" car.

 

first..any website like KBB are garbage in terms of value if that's what you're using

why not go get an actual offer from like carmax, carvana etc..and get a value from them? then you can use that as leverage against your dealer to up their offer. That's what i did (though im in canada so i used cardoor, clutch, canadadrives) to get offers from those places that will give you firm offer and take your car and got a 50% increase in their lowball offer. Though i told dealer/sales from their oriignal offer..thanks but no thanks and told them i can schedule pickup right now from those other places.

 

When you trade-in you only pay tax on difference. Here in Texas it is 6.25% new car tax, 4K$ would make $250 difference. A 25k trade-in would save you $1,562,5 in taxes You need to factor potential tax savings into selling outright.

YMMV,

MidCow3

 

Agreed. My tax savings in CO would be ~$2K, so if I get a Carmax/ Carvana estimate, it would have to be at least $2K more than the dealer was offering me. I've done estimates on both, and they are no where near as high as the trade in values from KBB/ Edmonds. As written above, KBB might be crap, but I'm seeing really high prices for used 16' RX's on cars.com & craigslist. Seems dealers & car buying companies are giving pre-pandemic trade in offers, but are turning around & selling them at top prices. Really sorry your NX deal fell thru. Has me worried about mine!

 

Carvana and Vroom both offered me $3,500 LESS than KBB/Carmax and my local Lexus dealer for my 2017 F-Sport with just 24,000 miles.

It obviously depends upon the market, and apparently today's seller's market can vary,

 

For me (in Southern Calif) CarMax seems to be giving out the most competitive pricing. On 12/27/21 they offered me $27,000 for my 2015 NX 200t (F-Sport) with about 45K miles. I didn't sell. On 2/14/22 they offered me $25,200 for the same car and about the same mileage. I also used KBB to help me find some dealers around me that were interested in buying my car and ended up selling it to the local BMW dealer for about the same price as CarMax (and I only had to drive 2 miles). I sold it the same day as the offer and went home with a check. Very quick and painless. The local Lexus dealer didn't even come close to the CarMax offer.

 

Carvana, Vroom, and other national buyers use complicated algorithms to determine what their offers will be for particular car models and model years. Those algorithms take into account their current inventory of the particular model and year, the current market demand for that model and year, and what the anticipated demand for that model and year will be in the near future. What they offer can vary significantly from one buying company to another and from one day/week to the next. Today, for example, Carvana's offer for a particular car might be $2000 higher than what Vroom will offer. Next week, the opposite might be true.

To get the best offer, one needs to be requesting offers from multiple potential buying companies. Also, if you don't find the offers to be acceptable, make a new request a couple of days later, and the offers could be better. Then, when you do get acceptable offers, it is time to pull the trigger.

Also, as was pointed out earlier in this thread, offers from Carvana and Vroom can be used as leverage to get the dealer to boost its trade-in offer.

There us no question that the emergence of companies like Carvana and Vroom have affected and changed the ways that people can use to get the best offers when they are trading in or selling a car. To get that best offer, one needs to put all of the potential buyers into competition with each other.

 

Did your dealer actually run your car on an auction site or are they selling it themselves? Running a VIN is one thing but there should be pictures as well. If he ran it on an auction site you would not know right away what you would get...It takes about 24 hours to get a decent price. Demand, supply, mileage, options, condition, extras.
I've done a few private sales, and wouldn't risk it anymore. Calculate your tax savings, and your time, safety, etc.

My Dealer gave me 5K more for my vehicle than the GM dealership (GMC truck) in fact it was only 3K less than I paid for it 15 months ago. I guess trucks are in demand?

Make sure your dealer is doing the best they can with your trade, not just guessing what they will give you for it.

Prices fluctuate almost daily, so till your are ready to let it go, you won't get a real price anyway.

Best of luck, and like others say, shop around.

 

You might want to check and make sure your state allows this credit for sales tax on your trade in value. Not all states do. I found this, which is admittedly a couple years old.The only states that DO NOT currently give a tax credit as of February 2019 are:

California
District of Columbia
Hawaii
Kentucky
Michigan
Montana
Virginia

If you live in one of these states, you have more incentive to sell your car to a private party.

 

location is critical...denver isnt the same market as DC or LA for example.

 

The dealer said they use KBB; certainly not the KBB site I'm using! I hope to get an accurate lead time for arrival of my NX, so I can at least have a week to try and private party sell my RX.

 

you're smart. sell it on your own. i recommend Cargurus.

 

Thanks for the tip! CarGurus gave me a listing price of $32.5K (dealer's offering $27K) and just $5 to list the car on their site for 30 days. I'm definitely won't be using CarMax or Carvana. They give the same lowball dealer offer, because, like dealers, they want to flip your car and pocket $4-$5K.