Car Value

[legacy4me]

Had my car 2 years now, just logged onto my.subaru and checked the KBB on my car....I have the 2.5i SE.....it says trade in value is $12,500...and that suggested retail is $18,000, private seller is $16,000. This is the first car I have bought on my own, sad to see how its depreciated. Guess it is typical though, just never fun to see. Wish it would still be worth the amount I financed haha. btw i only have 26,5000 miles, i think that is avg.

[longislander1]

Sorry to disappoint, but your car may be worth less than that. I've found KBB, Edmunds, NADA to be way high. They said my '03 Mazda Tribute was worth $9500-$11500 on a trade and I got $8500, which turned out to be about $500 above typical auction prices at the time. The problem is that the dealers don't use those services. They use Mannheim, which isn't available to the public. (At the same time, the dealers try to say KBB, etc. new car buying prices are too low, so they try to play both ends of the deal against you.) I would go here for the best and most realistic values.

 

Also, I'm seeing new 2008 SEs with a few accessories (mirror, mats, etc.) advertised around my area for $19,995 and that's before any negotiating, so it's doubtful your car is worth $18K retail. Sorry to rain on your parade. I know the feeling, but it's better to have a realistic price going into any transaction.

[gcoonley]

In the past I have gotten good market price estimates from http://www.autotrader.com. You can get a good sample size of what

people are selling their cars for and throw out the high ones.

 

There are always a few idiots who think their car is worth far more than it

really is.

[Jerboa113]

A lot of people here have been asking 14-16 for an LGT limited.. I keep telling them they're selling themselves short but unfortunatley a niche market means that most people wont even know what the car is and unless they just happen upon it on the road somewhere, they wont know to look.

 

Your best bet is to just ask what you want for it and see if you hve any takers, but be prepared to drop the price if it doesn't sell.

 

You may also want to check on trade-in of you plan to replace it just to see what they give, that way you dont get stuck in it.

 

by kbb standards i have 8-10k in the green (in the black never made sense to me.) on my value vs owed. If I were to trade it in tho I'd only expect 5-6k out of it after payoff.\

 

^ this is on an 05 LGT limited 5EAT w/ 40k miles btw.

[mkaresh]

In the past I have gotten good market price estimates from www.autotrader.com. You can get a good sample size of what

people are selling their cars for and throw out the high ones.

 

There are always a few idiots who think their car is worth far more than it

really is.

 

My method is similar. I do a nationwide search and then look for a cluster at the low end. I've written about this method here:

 

Used car pricing method

 

In general, prices look low when I'm selling and high when I'm buying...

[SuperCleanLGT]

The best way to keep a positive value on your car is to buy it right. You need to be a damn tough negotiator. Unless you can buy a car under what it is worth you will always take a big hit. Make multiple offers and negotiate with multiple sellers/dealers and play the game. But I wouldn't buy a car unless it is well under value, unless you don't mind loosing some $$$ on depriciation.

[Jerboa113]

the rule of thumb for me is.. if you leave the dealer as friendly as he started.. you didnt negotiate hard enough.

 

When I bought my car my local dealer was $1000 higher than the dealer in Savannah, so I bought the car in Savannah. The salesman would not even look at me when I brought the car in for service.

[Penguin]

If you want a car that retains value do not buy a Subaru. Stick with Toyota, Honda, BMW, and Lexus.

[rjundi]

If you want a car that retains value do not buy a Subaru. Stick with Toyota, Honda, BMW, and Lexus.

 

If you want to retain value buy a slightly used car of any make that is at least 3 years old. Once the steep initial depreciation occurs at varying rates its the same drop across all vehicles not matter what you own.

[longislander1]

the rule of thumb for me is.. if you leave the dealer as friendly as he started.. you didnt negotiate hard enough.

 

When I bought my car my local dealer was $1000 higher than the dealer in Savannah, so I bought the car in Savannah. The salesman would not even look at me when I brought the car in for service.

 

I'll agree that when the salesperson gets pissed off, you've probably gone as low as possible with that dealership. However, it's usually just an act to get you to back off and accept the deal. I saw this all the time in China, where they bargain for almost everything (except, ironically, for new cars). They start out by telling you that you're getting a very good price. As you go lower, they tell you that you're a good bargainer. Then, they feign anger. I had one guy throwing papers around his desk and a woman tell me I was taking food from the mouths of her children. When you accept the deal at this point, you walk away thinking you've gotten the best of them. Meanwhile, they're laughing (behind your back) all the way to the bank.

 

I think most salespeople go on to the next customer and could really care less about the deals they lost.

[Jerboa113]

I'll agree that when the salesperson gets pissed off, you've probably gone as low as possible with that dealership. However, it's usually just an act to get you to back off and accept the deal. I saw this all the time in China, where they bargain for almost everything (except, ironically, for new cars). They start out by telling you that you're getting a very good price. As you go lower, they tell you that you're a good bargainer. Then, they feign anger. I had one guy throwing papers around his desk and a woman tell me I was taking food from the mouths of her children. When you accept the deal at this point, you walk away thinking you've gotten the best of them. Meanwhile, they're laughing (behind your back) all the way to the bank.

 

I think most salespeople go on to the next customer and could really care less about the deals they lost.

 

hahaha.. I got "man.. me and my kids gotta eat man.. I cant go any lower, I'm not making any money here."

 

I said "you dont have to take them to longhorn."

 

What was funny for me in this situation was I was bidding the 2 dealerships ON THE SAME CAR against one another.. the car was in savannah, I was bidding the local dealer on a DT to bring the car to me for the purchase..

[BoozeRS05]

the rule of thumb for me is.. if you leave the dealer as friendly as he started.. you didnt negotiate hard enough.

 

When I bought my car my local dealer was $1000 higher than the dealer in Savannah, so I bought the car in Savannah. The salesman would not even look at me when I brought the car in for service.

 

Couldn't agree more..

 

I was on the phone with another dealership while waiting to get an offer at a dealership, & they knew it..

 

You have to be stubborn, and you have to know these guys make serious $$$ on ppl giving in too easy.. I spent 14 hours over 3 days in the dealership, talked them down $4k till I would sign the papers, AND I fought for my own bank to finance, which pissed them off even more..

 

Great sense of satisfaction knowing I won one for the buyer.. (likely still made $2-4k on my sale..)

[ViscousSquirrel]

Having spent a few years as a car salesman, with many friends still in the business as high as GM's now ( I'm a Psychologist in training now) I can safely say that a "good deal" is entirely subjective. I had one guy come in and pay a hundred over invoice, he bitched and moaned about being ripped off, while another guy pays nearly 10 grand over msrp and loves life. Why? because it's all subjective. if you go in expecting to pay a hundred over invoice and you pay 200 over you might feel ripped off expecting to buy a brand new zr1 at 50k over msrp and you get out of their at 25k over you feel great.

 

Aside from that, the salesman don't generally get pissed. if their is one thing you have to control, it's your emotions. Consider playing poker, you don't let the cat out of the bag when you have 4 aces anymore than when you have a pair.

 

They talk to so many people in a day, most of the time they won't remember anything but your face. In fact they won't even remember why they know your face, unless of course they go to their black book and try and look you up based on "cues" they wrote down to remember you or make conversation.

 

As for spending 14 hours at the dealership, IMHO its worth a few bucks to not have that kind of hassle. I can always make more money, my time is priceless.

 

I always try to make sure they get at least a thousand profit nowadays, the salesmen need to eat as well as the next man, why it became so common for people to think they have a right to see invoices and pay just above them is beyond me. when was the last time you went to sears and demanded to see the invoice and talk them down? as a percentage, you got screwed the last time you bought anything compared to a car. for the love of god have you seen the markup on jewlery? at any rate, these are big ticket items (cars), dealers have enormous overhead with insurance, land and instant depreciation, I am well aware that it is a "me" kind of world but give them a break.

 

P.S. For the record, there are a large # of bastards in the industry, I don't deny that, but, I do ask that people keep some perspective, and have some awareness of their meta cognition and cognitive process.

[ViscousSquirrel]

Almost forgot to mention... I don't know who misinformed ppl about these massive markups on vehicles, they just generally exist when your talking about invoice to msrp. that number generally hovers around 3 grand or less for just about every run of the mill vehicle. -shaun

[Jerboa113]

I find it hard to believe its costing GM $42k to make a truck.. if it is.. they need to rethink their plan..

 

people feel the need to get the best deal on this because NOT EVERYONE IS RICH AS HELL.. and anything over say $5k is a lot of money to them. Thats why they want to feel like if they're going to spend upwards of $30-150k on something that drives down the road.. that they feel like they're getting a "bargain" compared to the other vehicles in the fleet and pricerange.

 

If you only discount $3k I would not buy from you..

 

I generally dont get pissed at the dealer either. They have to eat sure.. but you either make a sale on my terms, or you dont make one at all. $100 profit is more profit than if I walk out. I understand sure.. there are fees and the manager has to get his cut and the janitor for keeping the dealership clean and the insurance company for keeping the car on the lot and keeping it insured and the maint. department for washing it and getting them detailed prior to being out in the lot etc. etc. etc.. But thats why you have morons that come in and "buy today" the 1st time they've ever seen the car and pay damn near MSRP for it and drive away to their soccer game with their kids and their soccer ball magnets. I am always in a combination of amazement and insulted when someone asks me "what will it take for you to buy today?" I always say "nothing" and then they either walk away "busy" or dont even pay half attention to what I'm saying..

 

I guess the only time I've ever really gotten pissed at a dealer was when they had my trade-in around the corner and refused to give it back to me. I fought with the asshat for an hour trying to get my car back from him. He kept saying "the price of the car is 35" and I kept saying "no the sticker says 33" and he goes back and forth about this first place finish scam. I'm not paying $2000 for a wax job.

 

omg.. I'm sorry op.. we've totally hijacked your thread. uh.. crap. I'm sorry I have nothing to add to your topic at this time

[longislander1]

At the end of the day, if you walk away thinking you got a good deal and the dealership is actually selling you the car (meaning that they're making enough money on it), then everybody wins. That's what bargaining is all about.

 

Getting back to the original posting, I think it's ridiculous that KBB, NADA and Edmunds aren't challenged on the car values they post. They're usually pretty inaccurate. Both the new car prices and trade-in values are too high and often unrealistic, yet the media use these to advise people on how to go car shopping. It's especially galling to see Edmunds post high trade-in values and then offer "real world" prices in one of its forums. I also think that when you go to the dealer with your KBB trade-in value and the salesman is looking at Mannheim, it gets negotiations off on the wrong foot because you think you're immediately being lowballed.

 

You really have to do a lot of independent research today to get true pricing. I used to be able to get good new car pricing through carsdirect.com, but I've notices that their prices have gone up as a percentage of MSRP. You have to wonder whether the dealers have put pressure on them. In researching the Legacy, I went far and wide and found Fitzgerald Auto Mall offering the lowest published prices on new Subarus. I've never used them, but they sure offer a good starting point for negotiation. I did contact them and a sales rep was very forthcoming about the charges for license, tags, etc. There was nothing hidden in their prices. In the end, though, I decided it was worth $1,000 of my time not to have to go down to Maryland to pick up the car and, instead, use my dealer a couple miles away.

[BoozeRS05]

Having spent a few years as a car salesman, with many friends still in the business as high as GM's now ( I'm a Psychologist in training now) I can safely say that a "good deal" is entirely subjective. I had one guy come in and pay a hundred over invoice, he bitched and moaned about being ripped off, while another guy pays nearly 10 grand over msrp and loves life. Why? because it's all subjective. if you go in expecting to pay a hundred over invoice and you pay 200 over you might feel ripped off expecting to buy a brand new zr1 at 50k over msrp and you get out of their at 25k over you feel great.

 

Aside from that, the salesman don't generally get pissed. if their is one thing you have to control, it's your emotions. Consider playing poker, you don't let the cat out of the bag when you have 4 aces anymore than when you have a pair.

 

They talk to so many people in a day, most of the time they won't remember anything but your face. In fact they won't even remember why they know your face, unless of course they go to their black book and try and look you up based on "cues" they wrote down to remember you or make conversation.

 

As for spending 14 hours at the dealership, IMHO its worth a few bucks to not have that kind of hassle. I can always make more money, my time is priceless. I saved $4k on a car listed at $19.9k.. That's $286/hr, 20% of the total cost of the car..

 

I always try to make sure they get at least a thousand profit nowadays, the salesmen need to eat as well as the next man, why it became so common for people to think they have a right to see invoices and pay just above them is beyond me. when was the last time you went to sears and demanded to see the invoice and talk them down? as a percentage, you got screwed the last time you bought anything compared to a car. for the love of god have you seen the markup on jewlery? at any rate, these are big ticket items (cars), dealers have enormous overhead with insurance, land and instant depreciation, I am well aware that it is a "me" kind of world but give them a break.

 

P.S. For the record, there are a large # of bastards in the industry, I don't deny that, but, I do ask that people keep some perspective, and have some awareness of their meta cognition and cognitive process.

 

 

Anyway, I say do whatever you can to get the prices down.. Get the dealerships to fight against eachother, print adds for other cars in your area, use KBB even if the rates seem high (thats to help you), find your own financing, and stick to real numbers like $18k, not $350/month..

 

My roommate bought a new Jeep.. His original offer from the dealer was dropped $2k after I told him to call another dealer and get a quote on the same car..

 

I will continue to call dealerships what they are till I find one that treats ppl the right way.. Fairly.. It's guys like VS that make ppl feel like the dealer is getting the short end, but in reality they are great at lying, manipulating, & pressuring you to pay thousands over the value of your car..

[gcoonley]

When the LGT first came out in 05, I decided that was the car I wanted.

I was being picky, I did not want a limited

(No disrespect to all of the limited owners) as they were almost 200 Lbs heavier than the standard GT. The dealer did not want to budge much.

I got him down to about $26,500.

 

I kept looking and then in 2006 "no more non limited GTs".

I found one with 16K miles on it at a dealer and was able to get the

car for $18,500. Two years later at 35K miles, I should be able to sell it

for $15K - $16K. So I am pretty happy with not to have taken that first big hit. The one year old used path is good option.

[rudy]

It's perfectly reasonable to negotiate the price of a car down to cost, or below even, if a dealer is willing to sell it under invoice. Pretty much anything sold on a commission basis is fair game, IMO. Houses, cars, heck I got 50% off a sport coat at Macy's this week because I negotiated!

 

That said, I'm constantly negotiating day to day and have no desire to do it to save a few hundred dollars if it's going to take more than a moment of my time. If Subaru didn't have the VIP program, I'd have just called up the internet sales people at a few dealerships, got the lowest price, worked that a little over the phone and would be done with it. The constant railing on floor sales people for car prices, I think, is like an amusing hobby, even to those that complain about dealer tactics.

[rjundi]

the rule of thumb for me is.. if you leave the dealer as friendly as he started.. you didnt negotiate hard enough.

 

When I bought my car my local dealer was $1000 higher than the dealer in Savannah, so I bought the car in Savannah. The salesman would not even look at me when I brought the car in for service.

 

In my case I felt fine not negotiating. I was offered over phone a located Legacy GT unlimited wagon with 5MT for invoice - $2000 rebate + $160 doc fee. Gave them my CC # for a small deposit and picked up wife's LGT four days latter.

[sgeorge]

The dealerships also get holdback on new cars only, Not new car transfers from other dealerships, Which is why they want to sell something off their lot. I'm not sure what holdback typically is on subarus, but usually it ranges from 3-6% of invoice. On most new cars, sales reps only get $100 for the sale, used is where they make their money.

 

I have helped numerous co-workers get brand new cars for a good bit less than invoice. Go find the youngest sales rep. Play dumb until you get sick of it. Find what the average price that people are paying for the exact model you want in your area is and start from there. Use the holdback as a trump card if they say we are not making any money on the car. Also, if you are not super picky about color/options find the one that has been on the lot the longest that meets your needs. I sold cars for about a year. I didn't fight new car customers because it wasn't worth the effort, i hit my monthly quotas and made most of my money on used cars. If you are trading a car in, Don't tell them until you have settled on a price for the new car. If they say "I saw you pull up in X car, will you be trading it in?" Lie your ass off. With the economy as bad as it is there are some very good deals out there to be had.

 

Waaayy off topic, i know. I'm sorry.

[ViscousSquirrel]

On most new cars, sales reps only get $100 for the sale, used is where they make their money.

 

Most dealerships, if theres no money in the deal, will pay the salesman a flat 75 bucks. In a typical closer system, you will get roughly a 1/4 of of the gross profit. Generally, there is WAY more money in used cars, you are correct.

 

P.S. If anyone wants to know anything in my realm of knowledge about buying or selling cars I would be happy to share what I know with you. -Shaun

[ViscousSquirrel]

 

Anyway, I say do whatever you can to get the prices down.. Get the dealerships to fight against eachother, print adds for other cars in your area, use KBB even if the rates seem high (thats to help you), find your own financing, and stick to real numbers like $18k, not $350/month..

 

TRUE, when staring at a 4 square only concentrate on the price, which is exactly what they will be diverting you from.

 

Bring your own financing, that way the finance dept. won't screw you for an extra point unknowingly or otherwise.

 

 

It's guys like VS that make ppl feel like the dealer is getting the short end, but in reality they are great at lying, manipulating, & pressuring you to pay thousands over the value of your car..

 

Not at all, your just perpetuating false information. I generally find the best cure for ignorance to be education.

 

Oh yes, people like me that work for charities, and spend 10 years on their doctorates in order to help people are also out to screw you. Contrary to popular belief the world is not out to get you. -Shaun

[Jerboa113]

I have to take VS's side on that one, sure thye're out to run you for a loop, but if you fall for it.. its not their fault. If you come across a high pressure dealer these days WALK AWAY.. because they're a rare breed these days. Most dealers now are much more laid back than they have been previously.. for new cars anyway.

 

now for used cars.. well thats a whole nother story. I've tried to buy used cars and generally they give me this "well we really want sticker for it, but since you're a nice guy we're willing to take off $1k" you try to get more.. they say "I will have no problem selling this car for $1k off sticker, have a nice day."

 

but hell.. they sell a truck worth $12k for $15k... then congratulations are in order to them.

[BoozeRS05]

but hell.. they sell a truck worth $12k for $15k... then congratulations are in order to them.

 

'Congratulations'..? They might make $8k on that truck worth $12k.. It's impressive, but it's not fair to the ppl, and talk about perpetuation of false information..

 

Not at all, your just perpetuating false information. I generally find the best cure for ignorance to be education.

 

Oh yes, people like me that work for charities, and spend 10 years on their doctorates in order to help people are also out to screw you. Contrary to popular belief the world is not out to get you. -Shaun

 

10 years on your doctorate & charities work..? Enough said..

 

Hey, when in Rome..