Auto Trade Helper

If you are looking at the new car advertisements and clicking on websites on the Internet to find that perfect car, then you may have a decision to make as to whether you want to trade in your old vehicle. A trade-in could possibly get that great deal you are searching for and help to secure financing for that vehicle that you have always wanted. Trade-in-value.com is one of the best Internet websites that you can use to find out the value of your old vehicle so that you will be prepared to negotiate for a great price on your new automobile.

The Trade-in-value.com website allows you to enter your vehicle information to determine the value of your vehicle that you wish to trade-in towards the purchase of your new vehicle. Once you have inserted the information at this website, providing information about your old vehicle and the replacement vehicle, you can get a quote on what the cost will be for your new purchase. You will then be contacted by local car dealerships in your area that will likely have great offers, particularly during these strained economic times. The new car dealers are suffering since very few consumers are making decisions to purchase vehicles.

Having a vehicle to trade in towards the purchase of a new vehicle saves a little out-of-pocket expense when you decide that you must buy a new car or truck for yourself or for the entire family. Make sure that you do the research and use the online trade-in websites so that you are aware of the value of your old vehicle. In addition to Trade-in-value.com, try other sites such as my-car-value.net, and valuepricing.com. These are excellent sites that will give you the information you need to negotiate your price of your new vehicle. These websites are similar so you will get the same type of information as well as the telephone calls or flyers from your local area dealerships.

You should make every effort to detail and repair any small maintenance or parts issues so that you will receive a fair price for your auto trade-in. Make sure that you gather the maintenance records and any service or parts warranties that you have available for your trade-in. The new buyer of your old vehicle will be pleased to have a history of their new purchase. The dealership will likely give you a great price for your trade-in if it is in excellent condition and will likely sell quickly from their used car lot. Be ready to negotiate to get a fair price for your trade-in.

Look for more tips, great information on green cars and more on Auto Trade Helper.

You’ve driven your old car down to the dealership in hopes of trading up to a new one.

Hopefully you’ve prepared the car well – washing and detailing it, and fixing minor problems that could turn off an appraiser and cause him to lower the car’s value. And hopefully you’ve prepared yourself for the experience by determining your used car’s worth in its current condition, so you know what trade-in value is fair to expect.

Now it’s time to negotiate the most for your trade.

Most dealerships are going to prefer working your trade-in and new car purchase as one deal, with a resulting value known as the “trade difference.” Step 1 to getting the most for your trade-in is to separate these transactions, because they are not one and the same.

Reaching a fair trade-in value for your used car must be kept independent of the price of the new car, so that you can accurately determine what you’re really being offered for your trade-in. You might already have negotiated the price of the new car, or that negotiation might follow the trade-in talks, but you don’t want to deal with these two values at the same time. It just confuses matters for you, to the advantage of the dealer.

The trade-in negotiation will begin with an evaluation of your car by the used vehicle sales manager at the dealership. He will check for functionality of lights, horn and signals. He’ll probably take the car for a very short drive to see if it has readily apparent power, ride or handling problems. And he’ll look at the car’s paint and body lines to see if there are telltale signs of a prior accident. Then, he will refer to a publication – usually the NADA guide, Kelly Blue Book or the “Black Book” to nail down his initial offer.

Your job is to know all of these values prior to driving into the dealership. If you have pre-assessed your own car – its mileage, features, condition, etc. – and compared that to these sources before you visit the new car store, then you should have a very good idea of what the sales manager is about to offer you. Have those figures (from each book and from online resources) written down and in your pocket or purse for quick reference.

If the sales manager makes you an offer that is right in line with these figures, congratulations, maybe this negotiation won’t be that difficult after all. You probably can’t expect to get more than Blue Book trade-in value for your car, so if the dealership has made an offer equal or very close to that, and if you’re comfortable with the price of the new car, don’t feel like you have to fight the dealer for more money on your trade-in.

However, if they “lowball” the trade, stand your ground. You’ve done your research. You know what your old car is worth, and if you can’t get that price here, you can probably get it somewhere else.

There’s no need to be rude, but tell the sales manager that you’ve studied the value of your trade-in, and you won’t be trading this car today if you don’t get that fair market value.

It usually doesn’t feel like it, because buyers are much more uncomfortable with the process than sellers. But in this game, you hold all the good cards – you have both the money being spent for the new car (either in cash or probably via loan) and you have the used car that the dealer might be able to resell at an additional profit. If you are uncomfortable with any aspect of the transaction, then it’s no sale. Tell the used car manager in no uncertain terms that you’re willing to shop around at different dealerships until you get the deal you want; not only a good price for the new car , but fair market value for your trade.

The sales manager might give you numerous reasons why the car isn’t worth what you want for it. From his perspective – maybe he has too many SUVs already, or in his neighborhood Saabs are hard to sell – he might even be right. Be willing to listen. But that doesn’t mean you need to let him have the car for what he wants to pay for it, especially if you’ve used these sites to do your homework and know the full value.

Be prepared to take that used car home and drive it a few more weeks or months, if need be. Or to buy the new car without a trade-in and sell the used one yourself – it’s usually worth more in a private sale than it is in trade, anyway, although there’s some hassle involved in selling.

You should never feel like the dealer has you “over a barrel.” You can always drive away in the car you drove in with, and with your new car-buying money safely tucked in your pocket.

And that’s negotiating power.

When buying a new car, a lot of factors go into determining whether you might be better off trading in your old car at the same time, or selling the used car yourself and applying the cash to your new vehicle purchase.One costly component of the transaction that many car-shoppers fail to consider when making this decision is the impact of sales tax.

In many U.S. states, the sales tax a new car buyer pays on his vehicle purchase is not calculated on the overall sticker price of the car, nor even on the final cash price paid for that new vehicle. Rather, sales tax is paid on the price that remains after the buyer’s trade-in has been figured into the deal – a value known as “trade difference.”

(Find out right now what your used car is worth as a trade-in!)

In other words, if you are buying a $20,000 new car and getting $5,000 for your trade, you would pay sales tax only on $15,000, and not on the $20,000 that the new car actually costs.

For a hypothetical example, a car-shopper buying that $20,000 new vehicle in Liberty, Clay County, Mo., would pay $1,470 in state and local sales taxes on the total purchase price. But the sales tax would be only $1,102.50 after receiving $5,000 in credit for his trade-in.

The difference here is only a few hundred dollars, but it becomes much more as the price of your chosen new car escalates, or the value of the car you’re trading increases, lowering your trade difference. For instance, trading-in a $10,000 used car on a $40,000 new truck at a Liberty, Mo., dealership would result in taxes of $2,205 rather than $2,940 – a savings of $735. And trading-in a $20,000 used Mercedes on an $80,000 new one in the city of St. Louis, on the other side of Missouri, results in state and local taxes of $4,944.60 instead of $6,592.80, saving the consumer $1,648.20.

This is valuable information to know when deciding whether to trade in that old car or sell it yourself, because if you can’t sell your old car privately for its trade-in value plus the amount that your trade can save you in taxes, then you’re losing money.
Find out right now what your trade-in is worth, and start deciding whether it’s smarter to trade your old car than to sell it yourself.