<Cars FS, WOB>

[chrislb@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx]

In the past couple of days I've seen posts by sellers and buyers.  How bout
going to a place like www.KBB.com (Kelley Blue Book)  BEFORE you post here.
The cars in both posts (not what I would consider special or high demand)
were asking 20% over RETAIL!!!!  Who's gonna pay that much?  If I was gonna
pay retail for a car, well, I'd go a buy new one (but I prolly wouldn't
really pay retail, hehe).  Use my car as an example:

95 M3  40k on the clock (no allowance for JC, B&B, K&N, BL/SS, and 1 set of
mounted R1's):

KBB Trade in: $27.1
KBB Retail:     $34.6
Retail + 20%:  $41.5


What are my chances of selling my car for $41.5?  Er, zero.  A friend of
mine is buying a 95 M3 with 25K miles this weekend for $28k from a dealer,
and...lemme see, the M Coupe I drove on Monday was $42.2 DEALER RETAIL
(asking)....(who cares what they look like, go DRIVE this thing)!!!!!!  See
whut I mean?  Nothing wrong with wanting to get the most for your car, but
let's use a bit more common sense, k?

Then there is the garage monarch I sold last Saturday:

85 911 Carerra Coupe 63k (no allowance for Fuchs 16" wheels, brace, momo
wheel, 10 disc CD player, and extra 1 extra set of tires):
Asking:           $21.9
KBB trade in:  $13.6 (ouch!!)
KBB retail:      $20.5 (retail was $22k last Fall when I started)
Sale price:      $21

Aha!, you say, over retail!!!  Caveat emptor. The market for this car is
very difficult and extremely small, at best.  And the car was pristine.  It
took me 11 months to sell it.  The actual buyer was the only prospect who
was serious.  The deal was fair.  I had plenty of cowboys who drove this car
who had no intention of buying a Porsche (I think).  I even had 2 guys look
me in the eye and tell me they were gonna buy the car (handshakes don't mean
much anymore).  Never heard from them again.  I've prolly sold 20 cars
(private sales) I've owned and this sale, by far, was the most difficult.
And price was NOT the greatest hurdle.

Moral of the story: use common sense unless you are willing to wait,
possibly forever.

For new cars try  www.edmunds.com

Any other good sites for this kind of thing out there?

Chris Brennan
BMW CCA  #19577
95 M3 68 1600

Worst example:  87 L6 25k miles $21 has been on www.cacars.com  for well
over a year.  This is a $10-12k car!!

I was born at night, but, not last night.

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