After visiting two differnt dealers in as many days, both offered me ridiculously low prices for my trade in. It has a KBB wholesale value of 11,125. The best offer I got was 7000. Back in December, the same dealer offered my 9500 for it, but then I didn't have a down payment. Now I have a payment, and I can't get squat for my trade. In a few days I'll have no money for a down payment, and my trade will still be worth squat. What am I to do.

 

IMO, never trade a used car into the dealership...u are much better off selling privately...what are u planning on buying?? Since u cant get squat for ur trade, ur better off doing what i mentioned earlier...this will also give you some time to save up some money for a decent down payment...oh yea, prices drop like mad cuz of the recent 05 releases, which makes ur car that much older on their lots...

 

What kind of car are you trying to trade in? They generally don't go off of the KBB wholesale value, they instead use this system that tells them what your car is selling for at the wholesale auctions, then they base their trade offer on that. Maybe if we know what kind of car you drive, we could give you better advice.

 

Yeah, dealers don't go off of KBB or NADA. Their offer will always be below either of those books listings.

If you sell privately, you will have a better chance of getting a good return on your current car. On the other hand, you'll have to deal with all the work associated with selling your car (which can sometimes be a hassle) and you'll have to get a larger loan from the bank to cover the costs you won't be covering with a tradein (but once you sell the car, you can always walk in and take a huge chunk out of your loan).

 

I don't feel it's worth that much, but it's definatly worth more than 6,000. It's a 99 VW New GTI GLX. Fully loaded, VR6 engine, 63k miles, decent body condition. The only real bad thing is that had a blow out a few days ago and I have the spare on the car. I don't want to trade it in, but I had a very imited window that I had for buying a car. I had 2 grand fall in my lap that I was going to use as a down payment, but now it's gone. Used it to pay other bills. If I had time I would have tried to sell it. Thats what I'm going to try to do now, but I've got to clean it up a bit first.

 

another thing to add. . .whether you trade in or sell private remember that book values drop every couple of months. as for kbb, the books just dropped. depending on your cars value at the time sometimes the value can drop nearly a thousand. ironically this new book a lot of fords jumped in value! so keep that in mind when u are pricing your car to sell. watch your timing when adjusting the value of your car.

aloha from the 50th state