Two options for selling your car quickly

Life can be hectic. Sometimes you might feel like your time is a far more valuable commodity than money. So, when it comes to selling your car, the thought of putting it up for sale and then handling all the tyre-kickers, the negotiating and the pre-sale logistics can be overwhelming. But what can you do? Well, here are a couple of time-saving options.

For the busy car-seller, a trade-in at the dealership sounds like a gift from heaven. The dealer will take your car off your hands with no questions asked, and you don’t have to lift a finger. Trading your car in at the dealership does come with both pros and cons.

The pros

• It saves you time – No posting your car for sale online, no waiting for potential buyers to call around, and most importantly, no time wasted.
• It doesn’t matter how old your car is – You won’t need to convince a dealer to take your car as you might a private buyer. Unless it’s a complete rust bucket, they will take a car in any condition as a trade-in.

The cons

• You won’t get a great deal on your used car – Dealers need to make money too, and once they buy your car they’ll need to sell it on at a profit. This means that you’re unlikely to get as good a price as you would if you sold the car privately.
• You may not get as good a deal on your new car – Dealers often assume that a buyer trading in their car has more money to spend and so they are a little more reluctant to offer a discount on the sticker price or throw in extras.

If your car is equipped with lots of features, has low kilometres, has its logbook up to date and is a popular model then trading it may not be the best option for you. If your car isn’t any of these things but trade-in doesn’t sound like something you’d want to do there is another quick-sale option that is relatively new to the industry.

If you're looking to get the best bang for your buck, our partners at carconnect will take care of your trade-in and obtain a minimum of 3 independent valuations, so you're in control. If you choose to source your new car with them, they'll pick up your current vehicle and deliver the new car to your door with a complimentary full tank of fuel and floor mats.

Not to be confused with getting your car on a car sales website!

Some car sales websites now offer to put their sellers in direct contact with wholesale car buyers. Not all sites offer this free service but one that does is carsales. Once they have the details of your car, they’ll make you an instant offer on behalf of the buyer. You then bring the car along to an inspection point, and if the car is in good shape, the buyer arranges payment.

The pros

Using an instant offer service has the same advantages as trading-in to a dealer. It saves you time and hassle by cutting out all the time-consuming processes required for a private sale, but that’s not all.

• You get a fair price – Most sales websites use data from Redbook to price a car according to its year and model. This means that you should get an offer that is pretty close to its true value and almost certainly more than you would get for trading in.
• You know immediately how much you will get – With a private sale you’re not always sure of how much money you will make on the sale. This can limit your efforts to buy a new car as you don’t want to overspend. With an instant offer, you know right off the bat and can start car shopping immediately.
• You don’t need to negotiate – Some people aren’t good when it comes to buying and selling and prefer to avoid negotiations at any cost. For them talking to a dealer might be something they really don’t want to do. Sell your car this way, and the price is set before you even meet the buyer.

Those are some pretty good advantages in our opinion.

The con

• An instant offer has limitations – If your car is ten years or older or has over 150,000kms on the clock then you won’t get an instant offer. It’s simply too hard to appraise cars in this condition without first inspecting them.

So if your car is older or has a ton of kms on the odometer, then you should go with trading in. Otherwise we highly recommend opting for an instant offer from carsales. For the busy person with no interest in losing their weekends, it’s a no-brainer. The instant offer is the hands-down winner when it comes to selling your car quickly, without fuss, and for a reasonable price.

Oh and by the way, if you’re on the lookout for a new car, speak to our new car specialists over at carconnect and make sure to read our article on dealer finance vs. car loans. And if you’ve got any questions, drop us a line or give us a call on 1300 787 288.