Trade-in valuation
Author
Discussion

ha03274

Original Poster:

108 posts

136 months

Tuesday
quotequote all
Found a used approved BMW X5 I like the look of and made an enquiry explaining that I would need to trade my current car in. Currently have a G21 M340i with all available options bar M-sport seats and carbon fibre trim. It’s low mileage and a 73 plate.

Get given an offer for £34k which seems extremely low. Gone back to the sales guy to say it s too low and now he s asking what I would want and he ll see if we can work something out. Motorway and Carwow seem to suggest 43k is doable and there are comparable cars in the dealership network that are more than this (retail pricing I guess). Would the price suggested on Motorway etc. be around what I should expect for trade-in or would the trade-in price usually be less? I m thinking the difference is too much for them to up their offer so probably a waste of time but curious to know how people would approach it as I ve not got much experience of trading in.

Thanks!

Edited by ha03274 on Tuesday 28th July 22:14

Chimune

4,210 posts

250 months

Tuesday
quotequote all
Every time I've asked the answer has matched wbac regardless of significantly higher auto trader equivalent.

paul_c123

2,266 posts

20 months

ha03274

Original Poster:

108 posts

136 months

Tuesday
quotequote all
Chimune said:
Every time I've asked the answer has matched wbac regardless of significantly higher auto trader equivalent.
Yeah I did plug my car into WBAC and it came out with a similar figure to what they offered but Carwow and Motorway seem much higher and from what I understand those are dealerships bidding on the car?

ha03274

Original Poster:

108 posts

136 months

Tuesday
quotequote all
paul_c123 said:
Thanks, however this doesn’t take into account specification but only condition? Surely that can’t be what’s used in valuations?

SFTWend

1,404 posts

102 months

Tuesday
quotequote all
Unless the dealer is very keen on your car for stock, their px offer will be poor.

Motorway and Carwow should achieve more because only dealers that want your car will be bidding for it. That said, don't expect to achieve their initial valuation; they have recently both started over estimating in a competitive effort to gain your business.

ha03274

Original Poster:

108 posts

136 months

Tuesday
quotequote all
SFTWend said:
Unless the dealer is very keen on your car for stock, their px offer will be poor.

Motorway and Carwow should achieve more because only dealers that want your car will be bidding for it. That said, don't expect to achieve their initial valuation; they have recently both started over estimating in a competitive effort to gain your business.
Thanks, so probably best to sell mine on one of those platforms and then buy the new car I want from a dealership I guess

loskie

7,020 posts

147 months

Tuesday
quotequote all
Yes
Or better still take it to one or two local suitable car sales places and ask them if they want to buy it,

Glosphil

4,845 posts

261 months

Tuesday
quotequote all
A car on which 3 dealers offered me £9,000 trade in I took to WBAC and received £10,570. A dealer then had the car on Autotrader for £12,450. I doubt he managed to get that as he hadn't even replaced the broken rear light (£350 retail) or re-furb'd the one kerbed wheel.





Dean4200GT

6,364 posts

272 months

Tuesday
quotequote all
So for the OP the difference is 9k... explain why, ask him if he'd take 9k off the car you want to buy, and start from there.

In other words, if he drops 4k, and adds 4k to your trade in, you're close to the "difference to buy" that you're looking for.

E-bmw

13,129 posts

179 months

Yesterday (08:19)
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Surely, the simple answer is to take it to Motorway & just get on with it?

55palfers

6,340 posts

191 months

Yesterday (09:26)
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paul_c123 said:


On a 10 YO G 350?

Trevor555

5,358 posts

111 months

Yesterday (09:32)
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EAG specialist cars near St Neots might give you good money for your car.

They specialize in performance Bmw's.

If not, as said already, put it on Motorway.

croyde

26,100 posts

257 months

Yesterday (09:34)
quotequote all
CarWow got my attention with the best by far offer for my 1 year old Bigster.

The top bidder was well below that figure and then I started reading about when the car is collected even more is knocked off.

I've managed to off load cars to WBAC for a little more than the dealer was offering as part ex, but a few hundred not several thousand.

PoorCarCollector

263 posts

47 months

Yesterday (09:34)
quotequote all
E-bmw said:
Surely, the simple answer is to take it to Motorway & just get on with it?
Do you mean WBAC? You can't take it to Motorway, they are an advertising platform

If it were my car, I'd list it on Motorway, CarWow and try WBAC. Then accept the offer I was happy with




Bonefish Blues

36,004 posts

250 months

Yesterday (09:39)
quotequote all
ha03274 said:
SFTWend said:
Unless the dealer is very keen on your car for stock, their px offer will be poor.

Motorway and Carwow should achieve more because only dealers that want your car will be bidding for it. That said, don't expect to achieve their initial valuation; they have recently both started over estimating in a competitive effort to gain your business.
Thanks, so probably best to sell mine on one of those platforms and then buy the new car I want from a dealership I guess
This echoed my experience - the car I tried to sell into the trade via one of them is very different to yours, TBF, but the dealer who 'won' was already well shy of the site's estimate and then came along to pull the (very very well photographed and scrupulously honestly described) car apart and bid me down 'what do you want for it mate'?

I'm now going to sell privately, armed with a local specialist's inspection report giving the car a clean bill of health biggrin

Wills2

29,224 posts

202 months

Yesterday (10:02)
quotequote all
ha03274 said:
Found a used approved BMW X5 I like the look of and made an enquiry explaining that I would need to trade my current car in. Currently have a G21 M340i with all available options bar M-sport seats and carbon fibre trim. It s low mileage and a 73 plate.

Get given an offer for £34k which seems extremely low. Gone back to the sales guy to say it s too low and now he s asking what I would want and he ll see if we can work something out. Motorway and Carwow seem to suggest 43k is doable and there are comparable cars in the dealership network that are more than this (retail pricing I guess). Would the price suggested on Motorway etc. be around what I should expect for trade-in or would the trade-in price usually be less? I m thinking the difference is too much for them to up their offer so probably a waste of time but curious to know how people would approach it as I ve not got much experience of trading in.

Thanks!
Does it still have any warranty on it if so an independent used dealer will want it, they love buying cars with factory warranties as it removes lots of risk from the sale a BMW dealer it doesn't matter so much as they have to apply an AUC warranty depending on how much is left and that is all part of the prep costs, the BMW dealers want lots of money in the deal they buy at 34k it's going up at 43k and they will have the same in the X5 so you're going to lose on the way in and on the way out call it £15-20k loss to swap. (pop in the reg of the X5 into WBAC to get an indication of the spread)

Motorway's quote will look great but they aren't buying your car a dealer is and the dealer has to also pay Motorway and will chip you on collection so that's less for you, WBAC sell on internally to Cinch and BCA so again that effectively comes out of your pocket.

You've got the selling dealer quote and the buying platform quotes you now need to take it a few decent local used dealers to see what a direct sale will be (they welcome this)







TTB

14,086 posts

261 months

Yesterday (12:20)
quotequote all
I sold my 22 plate M340i with poverty spec (no HK, HUD, Electric seats etc) via Motorway a couple of months ago to these guys for £31k - https://www.davidjameslimited.co.uk/
Might be worth giving them a call (Kylan Miller is their buyer - 07856 427384) to see what they say?

ADJimbo

891 posts

213 months

Yesterday (16:17)
quotequote all
ha03274 said:
Yeah I did plug my car into WBAC and it came out with a similar figure to what they offered but Carwow and Motorway seem much higher and from what I understand those are dealerships bidding on the car?
The difference being that the Dealer who has actually offered £34k and in turn WBAC, actually get their cheque books out and buy cars with their own money.

Carwow and Motorway do not buy cars. They advertise them.

The two are intrinsically different concepts.

Wilmslowboy

4,735 posts

233 months

Yesterday (17:23)
quotequote all

I sold a 3 year old BMW via Motorway, sold for £26,500 (around 95% of what they said it would), other than needing two tyres it was in retail condition.
The garage that bought it listed it for £34k, in my case motorway achieved around 75% of retail.