I ran my tC over to Carmax to check the trade in value, and they offered me $11000 for it. Its an 08 tC (excellent condition) with only 9k miles, automatic, fog light package, upgraded system, window tint, ground effects, and 19 in wheel package. I financed over $22000 on it last July and now its only worth $11K to them. Thanks but no thanks.

 

Should have probably been closer to $15,000 depending on mileage and condition.. just based off of 07 numbers and adding a bit for a newer model (kbb doesnt have all the 08 cars up yet). But dont go off what you financed, that will be WAY more than it is worth.

The only exception was the 05's. The used price on mine was nearly as much as what I paid new (out the door, not sticker) almost 6 months later because of demand But the absolute max yours would have been worth would have been slightly below the sticker price of $16,XXX, and that would be brand new with almost no miles on it. That is why I say $15,000 tops trade in. But I agree $11,000 is pretty low. I think my 05 with 50,000 miles on it has a trade in of about $10,000 or so still.

 

x2^

 

guys it is a dealer, they will never give you crap for it. Dealers are only in the biz to make money. For every 10 cars worth good money that they offer pennies for, there is 1 person that has to sell for whatever reason so the owner gets hosed & they keep the lights on.

One thing in life, no one is EVER in business just to give you good deals *LOL*

 

Yea I expected a low figure, but was shocked at $11K. I kinda expected it to be in the $16-17K range.

 

It was double bend over day at car max! Hurry hurry hurry!

 

I think the 11 is too low but 16-17 is way too high. You have to figure whatever you think they would sell it for knock off 3500 that shouuld be somewhat close to your trade in,.

Car max is generally pretty good though. I just sold them my Tacoma for about 3,000 more than I was expecting last year. WHEW...gas wasnt $4 a gallon then though!

Sell it privatley!

 

you arent ever going to get sticker price for a used car. The minute you left the dealer lot with it, the price was most likely already below 16k. Remember, what you paid is in no way related to what it is worth. Taxes, tags, title, most options, etc are just give away items when it comes to resale. So if the car was $16,500 off the lot with no options, it is worth less than that when you leave with it.

On some cars with very high end options, you can recover some of the options on resale. But you wont with this car.

 

once you drive off the lot your car is worth about 2 grand less. The funny part is that tc's do have a very high resale value.

 

Exactly... what I was told. I partly chose the tC cuz I heard that they were pretty good on resale value. I realize that the car is only 1 yr old, but wasnt expecting such a horrible value from Carmax. Maybe from another dealer would have been closer to what I expected.

 

Also keep in mind this economy were in right now. Car sales arent where they were a year ago, so dealerships are making really good deals, especially on used cars cause thats where they have to opportunity to make there money back.

 

screw carmax!!! I took my wifes 2003 corrolla there the week before moving away. They said, we dont go buy kelly blue book. ($10,995) I said thats fine, expecting maybe $2000 under blue boook, I GOT $6000 for it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I was ____ed but had no choice, I was moving overseas and needed it gone. So one of my buddies lives by there and would check in periodically, and sure enough 1 month later its on the same lot with a tag on it for $9,995. And below it it says. $1000 below KBB.

They dont go off blue book to buy it from you, but they sure love bluebook when the sell it on their lots.
I remember them saying how crappy KBB was and they use grey market sales or something yadda yadda. grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

 

^^^That's fishy comment about the Carmax doesn't use BB value?

I've sold two cars to them. I've bought two new cars from them.

They went with BB both times. They gave me prints out of both values of each car with Blue Book seal on it.

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I'm wondering if its different story if you offered to buy another car or if you been a customer with them.

Since my Saturday is on Friday...You guys want me to do experiement and go to different Carmax? Play along about trading in my tC and go along with buying another car like looking at it & test drive it? I'm personally wondering what they could offer me.

My car's worth $9,1k or $8,3.

 

Yeah I took it in to carmax a little while ago when I was going to trade in my 05 tC for a STi and they told me around 15,XXX. Went to the Subaru dealership, with the Carmax printout, and they said they would match it and add a couple hundred if I bought an STi that day. haha, due to the price of the STi I didn't buy it, but I thought it was excellent resale for a car that I bought for around 18,XXX out the door (I didn't finance, paid cash)

 

Carmax's policy of no negotiating blows. Sure, it's great when their window price is reasonable, but 99% of times, it is way above KBB values. Plus, when trading in, they'll lowball yours and what's worst, you can't negotiate anything. What's printed is final...take it or leave it. Last september, I sold my fully loaded '05 MB c230 w/ low miles to them for $22K. 2 weeks later, it was on their lot for sale for $27K. KBB only have the car listed at $25K. And guess what, it stay on their lot for over 5 months. Some fool probably bought it or it went to another carmax dealer or got auctioned. One great thing about carmax is that it'll buy whatever condition car from you....but that's about it. The rest is just like any dealer....out to make money from you.

 

Yeah you gotta love taking an '88 corolla to them though and watch em give you money for it. My dad took his in and they actually gave him 1100 dollars. I saw the check when he came back and I was stunned. haha

 

I thought I missed something when someone said Carmax sells cars cheap. I sold my 99 Dodge Dakota R/T for them because I didn't want to stick someone else with its problems knowing full well I was only going to get half it's KBB. I would never buy a car from them - their prices are inflated. Their business model is set up to sell a car to someone not interested in shopping around or haggle and are ok paying a couple grand extra to avoid it.

That said - Carmax isn't as big a ripoff as "EASTERNS MOTORS!!!! WHERE YOU'RE JOB IS YOUR CREDIT!!!"
Anyone who has seen their adds: go to their website and look at the ridiculous prices they charge for their cars. Carmax looks like a bargain when you compare prices.

 

If you go on their website, their prices are actually pretty good on used car sales. Most are at or below book value (kbb/nada), and now I know why. They give you way under your cars actual value in order to sell cheap. Out of curiousity, I took my car to 2 random dealers yesterday (Dodge and Chevy). I told him I didnt have a new car yet in mind but wanted to see if my trade in value would be worth it or not. Dodge quoted me $15800 and Chevy quoted $16500. So in turn called Carmax back and guess what they said. The price is still the price offered, take it or leave it.

 

Yeah, the same thing happened to me as mentioned at the Subaru dealership. Damn shame how Carmax is taking advantage of the fact that people get desperate at times and need money and take advantage of those that don't want to go through the hassle of selling their car privately. I guess they do have to run a business...

 

interesting. sell it privately if you're really interested in letting it go.