CelticNut

Man, timing is everything! Sorry to hear about your car being stolen. Who gets it now that the insurance money has been paid? I guess it's the insurance company's car now. Maybe they'll auction it and you can get it back for a song!

Badsnke98

Just a word to the wise here for you and everyone else.

Be very carefull on the type of payment you receive, especially from someone willing to pay asking price or more on a vehicle, or buyers that never see the vehicle. Cashiers Checks are no longer even considered safe today. Local stories of people looseing their vehicles this way. The best way today is to call the bank the check is issued from and verify it during banking hours or ask to go to the bank with the purchaser and see the teller issue the check.

Good Luck

68ShelbyGT500KR

Make sure the title gets transefered to the Owner that day. I will even give a good Bill of Sale to the buyer to help compensate for this. I will take the buyer to a Title Service and make sure that the sold car is out of my name! It is well worth it. In Texas, maybe all States, the person on the title is still liable for any accidents, camera tickets etc.....

r22tech

Yeah, I know about the cashiers check deal...I was a little concerned. I talked to his bank, and they are going to issue a cashiers check made out to me and my leinholder, give it to me, where I will then send IT and MY check to my lienholder for payoff with instructions to send the title to the purchasers Bank. It seems legit, and even it is not, my car is worth more stolen than I sold it for. Hopefully he'll steal the darn thing and I'll make out on the deal, at least on the front end. Insurance will go up on the back, I guess.


BTW: [B][I]THE PURPOSE OF THIS POST WAS TO INFORM PEOPLE THAT THE USED CAR MARKET IN THE PRIVATE SECTOR WAS STILL ALIVE, SO DON'T BE SO QUICK TO TRADE AND LOSE HUGE CHUNKS OF CASH TO THE DEALER!!!

ChrisM

Wow! Thanks for the suggestions. I really appreciate it. This board is starting to feel like an extended family to me! I value the knowledge of my peers, and enjoy sharing what I know whenever I can.

I'm going to heed your advice. I have to break out my calculator and work up some hard numbers. Unfortunately, fate may decide this whole affair for me. I simply won't be able to get a Mustang until I sell my car. I'd hate to order one, then have it come in before I find a buyer for the Audi. I'd kiss my deposit goodbye (even worse...the car I've been pining over for months!).

I just bought the A4 in February, so I really don't have much equity in it. We'll see. I'll do what I can on my end! Like they say, "where there's a will, there's a way..."

In the meantime, thanks for sharing your experience. [/b][/quote]
Celtic,

Iwa sa little better off in that I had a deposit in hand when my 2005 came in so I could wait to sell my '69 Mustang afterward.

There is one other tool on eBay that may help your selling. It's called the Reserve Price. When you set a Reserve, nobody sees that number but you and you're not obligated to sell if the bids don't reach the Reserve. That way you can start with a ridiculously low price to start bidding. In my case, I started didding at $499, set my Resrve at $12,000, and set a Buy It Now at 13,995. I was fortunate enough to get a guy to Buy It Now but got lots of other bids in the process, too. You can check my results by looking at eBay auction 4505351145.

Good luck!

CelticNut

Hey Chris, thanks for the input! I'm still taking eBay 101. I've heard about eBay for years but have never used it, so all of the features are completely new to me. I have heard good things about it though, from both buyers and sellers. It always seemed to be one of those services that everyone else used except for me! Now I'm a user and any advice y'all can give me is greatly appreciated. :worship:

I'm also going to run an ad in the local paper, the Richmond Times Dispatch. I've sold two cars there to the first caller, but they were considerably cheaper than the car I'm trying to offload now. I thought I'd wait to place that ad after the holidays.

I've got a reserve on eBay now; it is the figure I need to get to pay off my loan. I'm not interested in making a profit, just getting into a Mustang. If I make a profit, great, but I'm not counting on it. The funny thing is, the Kelley Blue Book says a fair trade in value for my car is $26,300, but I haven't even had one bid and I'm asking far less!

Kluski

I shy away from Reserve Auctions. I do not understand why people list an auction as reserve. Why not list it at the price you actually want instead of hiding the price you are looking for? Especially since you pay the same price for the listing. To me it is saying, guess how much I want to sell this for.

I am not trying to flame you, but if you can explain the philsophy behind it, I would appreciate it.

CelticNut

Hey... another Chris! No offense taken, my friend. As I said earlier, this whole thing is new to me. eBay can be a little intimidating to the uninitiated. I'm learning as I go. I'll end the suspense: I want $25,500 for my Audi. That's about what I owe and it's $800 less than what Kelley Blue Book considers a fair trade in value. And that figure doesn't even account for the $500 extra it cost me to install the satellite radio receiver, so I think $25.5K is a fair price.

Honestly, all I want to do is satisfy my loan on the A4. It's an awesome car, but I really am looking forward to getting into a V8 equipped Ford again.

Insofar as going the auction route, I wasn't aware that you could use the "Buy It Now" feature right away. I have since learned that I could do it, now that I have verfied my ID (for an additional fee). If I list again, I will change my listing to a fixed price. I was really just testing the waters, guaging the market and all. I hope to get a Mustang some time in the Spring, so I still have a little time to part with the Audi. I only hope I can literally wait that long... It's murder seeing all of these fine cars find good homes on this site! Hats off to everyone who has already taken possession...