Yeah, it is pretty ridiculous how much the prices vary according to NADA and KBB.
My Jeep is like:
Trade in: $1250 (I said $850 but that was a rough estimate without adding in additional factory options)
Private: $2565
What the Dealer Would Turn Around and Sell it for: $3890
Basically, if I used those exact dollar amounts and don't take into account anything else (strictly the sale), I'd lose approximately $1315 of possible cash selling it to the dealer.
If they sold the Jeep the day they bought it from me, they'd be gaining approximately $2640.
I'm not trying to bash dealers and how they work, but the point I'm trying to make is this: When you plan on buying a car, sell your car privately first so you get more cash then go to the dealer and find what you want. That's the difference between having a big down payment...therefore lower payments or even a shorter car note if the down payment is big enough (or some extra cash in your pocket with a smaller down payment) and having the dealer say that your vehicle is "barely worth enough to cover a down payment on another vehicle." Hell, better yet, just wait until you can pay cash money for the vehicle.
Another thing that bothers me is that by signing over the title, you're required to buy a newer vehicle that gets a certain amount of gas mileage (aka. any poorly-built, small sedan you can get your hands on), and not anything you may actually want that gets decent gas mileage. Also, by signing it over, your car is required to be scrapped (read: sent to the crusher). This may not affect 99% of you (well, it's not gonna affect any of you because in the 6 years I've been here no one I've talked to has shown any interest in cars...fascinating), but for some cars that people are throwing away there is a sentimental aspect to it. It offends me a bit that some of the cars that will be crushed were probably cool or had a lot of character...or they were built really well & rugged, and they're gonna be crushed just because "it got 18 mpg or less."
It's just the fact that out of those possible well-built, rugged, good cars that will be crushed, what's gonna come out of it? More [dukar]ty foreign (or foreign-made) vehicles that boast high mileage just because they have a small 4 cylinder in them and they're built with shoddy material because it's lighter and more cost-effective. See how long your brand new, little sedan is gonna last you with how they're built today. My old Cherokee was an '86 model with 288,xxx miles on it and it fired up every time and ran fine with normal maintenance. My '97 Cherokee has 167,xxx miles on it and it runs like it came out of the factory with normal maintenance. These poorly-built cars? I doubt if they can last 170,000 miles without some major mechanical work needing to be done to it. I know that my Jeep could run half a million miles if it wanted to with routine maintenance only. Sure, it might need $200 worth of an engine rebuild and $250 worth of new clutch after that long, but after that, it'll be good for another half million miles.
I guess this thread is going to die quickly because the CARS program is ending today at 8PM.
