Is Kelley Blue Book realistic?
 

When I bought my Civic, KBB said that my Forester was worth $2,500. Less than two years later, it is saying $1,681. Seventeen percent depreciation a year on a new car seems steep. Before I joined the Army, I paid $2,500-3,400 for my cars, each was around thirteen years old, and around Blue Book. Bacon is in better shape than some of those were, but when I came home from Germany, used cars were selling for much more than before I shipped out.

Apparently, Cash for Clunkers influenced that, but also, I expect most people to ask more than they actually want, to allow room to negotiate down, but I doubt that anyone would plan on negotiating down a full third.

I tried to look into it and people seemed to think that individuals trying to sell cars grossly overestimated what their cars were worth--most of these comments were insulting, calling them greedy, dishonest, and stupid.

Whenever I look for first- and second-generation Foresters, people always ask $3,500+, for cars with more miles.

My car has been up for a week and I expected to have a couple people offer well under Blue Book every day. I had the one guy ask why I did my own repairs and another said that he would not offer me much more than KBB estimated.

So, maybe all Forester owners, and everyone else is wrong, and our vehicles are worth half what we think they are. I do not know about anyone else's vehicle, but mine works perfectly, although if the the car needed a medium-sized repair, somewhere between the new half-shaft and replacing the head gasket, it might not be worth fixing.

One comment that I liked was 'I'm not selling this car to KBB"

By the way:
NADA Trade-in $1,800
Edmunds $2,464
VMR $2,500 (Consumer Reports recommended consulting them)

No, KBB is useless on anything older than 5 years. Go ok craigslist and see what everyone else is posting them for. Then go on eBay and look for the vehicle and mark the 'finished listings' or 'recently sold' (forget which one) and see what they have been selling for lately. Price accordingly.

FWIW, AZ bases our cars Value Laden Tax (VLT) on an assessed value of 60% of the MSRP reduced by 16.25% for each year since the vehicle was first registered in AZ.

Yea, kbb isn't great at anything old. When i sold my 2001 Nissan Maxima 2 years ago, KBB was $3000, as was our list price. We had a buyer the first day, didnt work out (grandparent bought a car without telling anyone before). Second day we had 2 more people, a neighbor and a lady who sight-unseen offered $3500.

Neighbor got first dibs at $3k. As she was getting ready to leave, the car suddenly wouldn't start. :O Told her to turn AC off and it started right up. Hasn't had any problems since as far as i know. Kinda scary, but atleast it was a neighbor.

I use the NADA Guide. When I bought my Superbeetle a few years back mid-book was $6,555. I just checked and it's $7125.

Used Classic, Collectible, Exotic and Muscle Car and Truck Prices, Values & Specs by Manufacturer

Hagerty's has it at $7798.

https://www.hagerty.com/valuationtools

Old Tele man -- MSRP is $1985 :thumbup:

...in what year? Gotta account for IN-flation, while the fat-lady (Gooberment) sings.

I've bought and sold quite a number of cars, primarily on Craigslist.

I notice a lot of cars that are posted for sale significantly above KBB prices... and they sit there for ages, not selling until they eventually drop the price. In my experience, if I take KBB's and Edmunds' private party prices (with accurate info, no "Excellent" condition prices for a salvage title beater) and average them, that's pretty darn close to what I'll get. If I price it significantly higher, it sits forever and I can eventually sell it for a little higher, but not much.

Absolutely right. KBB was valuing my Jeep Liberty CRD at less than $6000, I sold it on eBay and got over $7000, plus the guy flew out to drive it home.

So much data! :D I had not seen anything in my area, but they show seventeen sold Foresters between 1998 and 2001!

Two of them were somehow sold twice, eight days apart, with the same picture and mileage.

Several times, it did not show the sale price and at least half were not in good condition, with two needing new head gaskets:

2001 107954 $3435 9 "dins and scratches" "This vehicle runs fair and drives fair.
1999 104000 $3200 9
2001 100931 $2800 9
1999 97006 $3500 9
2001 213740 $2550 ? Will need an exhaust system soon, but drives well.
1998 184000 $1800 7 Minor accident, some rust and dings

I was surprised that four had fewer miles than my car. I do not know why the third sold for hundreds less than the others, perhaps minor problems came up, but the last one is an outlier; discarding it, the average sale price was $3,097 for a 2,000.2 Forester, with 124,726.2 miles.

I am hoping to negotiate to three thousand, although it is possible that someone could convince me to go lower.

That first car sold later for $835 less "This vehicle runs rough, but driving is not recommended." They said that fuses were missing, so I am not sure what happened there. One with 156k miles said that it just needed connecting rod bearing replacement and a tune-up, but only sold for $850. One car with moderate body damage sold twice for $730 and $760.

One had 215,000 miles, needed head gaskets, and sold for $995. Another also needed a head job, had 121k miles, and sold for $1175, so I might have been able to sell my car for that amount.

MSRP was $19,995 and the car is sixteen years old, although I do not know if it has always been in Arizona.

So:

$19,995 * 0.6 * (1-.1625)^16 ?

That gives me $703.

Old Tele man -- 1971 (a very good year)
http://www.dollartimes.com/inflation/inflation.php?amount=1&year=1971So I guess the car is holding value better than fiat currency?

A 1964 dated silver quarter was worth 14 times face value (melt value), until recently it dropped to about 10 times face value. When minted the silver value was 75% of the face value.
It benefits the govt to under report the inflation rate, kind of the fox guarding the chicken coop syndrome.

regards
mech

I used to have (maybe still do) an oval 'license' plate that says


It all goes back to Jekyll Island and 1914 (right after the Titanic went down). Here's an inflation calculator that goes back that far:

Inflation Calculator

It offers:

• Inflation Calculator with U.S. CPI Data
• Forward Flat Rate Inflation Calculator
• Backward Flat Rate Inflation Calculator

:eek:

Of course that assumes that the value (and/or price) of silver is constant, which simply isn't the case. Probably a good bit more demand these days, from a larger population wanting silver jewelry & ornaments, industrial uses, &c. Not to mention what happens when people try to corner the market. Well, just have a look: Historical Silver Prices - 100 Year Chart | MacroTrends Going from (inflation adjusted) $107/oz in 1980 to under $6/oz in 2001?

Will asteroid mining crash the value of metals, or will it be neutron transmutation?

Einstein’s Lost Hypothesis

Sold! :)
 

I hope that Bacon serves the new owner well.

CONGRATULATIONS !!!!!!!!!!!

At least you don't have a wife telling you it sold too fast and you should have asked for more! ;)

regards
mech

Time = money

You can usually trade one for the other. In other words, if you want to sell something quickly, the likely outcome will be a lower sale price than if you take the time to show the item to more buyers and wait for the highest offer.

Same goes for purchasing a vehicle. When you need one quickly due to lack of any other transportation, then you will probably pay more. If you shop for a vehicle over a longer period of time, then you have a much better chance of getting a better price.

As with most things, you get more out when you put more effort in, with the law of diminishing returns in playing into the equation.

As far as pricing a private party vehicle, I usually check KBB, Edmunds, and Clearbook to average the price, and see if there are any outliers. Then I check Craigslist to see what people are listing comparable vehicles for in my region, and then check Ebay to see actual sales prices.

Taking an old and cheap car to the mechanic for an inspection is a waste of time because a laundry list of items that could be in better shape will certainly tally to more than the car is worth. The main thing is that it drives without any noticeable issues, has no concerning visible fluid leaks, and has no CELs or pending codes. An OBDII reader that connects to a smart phone is less than $10, so everyone should have one, and most people either have functioning eyeballs, or know someone that does.