Trade in price when buying a new (2nd hand) car

[Whitean3]

Hi all,
I was just wondering how good/bad trade-in prices would be when buying a new (but 2nd hand) car from a dealer. Never traded in a car before- either sold privately or had it written off! And my experience generally speaking in Switzerland is that everything costs you a lot more than you were expecting. I'm also thinking that selling privately could be a bit of a nightmare and I can't be dealing with that hassle at this moment in time.

I'm considering selling my 2002 996 C4S for a 997TT- not from a Porsche Dealership- who would pull your pants down more than most. Car is in good nick with plenty of options, fresh MFK, but with highish mileage (112K km)

I've got a range of prices for similar cars to my own from Autoscout (40-55000 CHF), so I know roughly what it's worth; and I also accept that the trade in price won't be anything like as good as the "for sale" price listed here. What are peoples' experiences of Dealer margins here? 5K CHF? 10K CHF?

Any thoughts/opinions would be appreciated (anyone want to buy a Porsche?

[WelshBoyo]

I can tell you my recent experience for my old BMW 330xi. Privately it was worth about 18-20k, I was offered 9k trade-in from a Citroen main garage for trade in against a BMW Z4 M Coupe. Another BMW main dealer offered me 12k, then I bought the R32 off another BMW main dealer and he gave me 14k. However I had an expensive stereo/satnav unit which he didn't want so I took it out and sold it privately, he also offered me 500chf for the winter tyres that had been used for 3 winters.

All these were main dealers, so not too sure on independents, but when trying to by a 330xi when we first arrived in Switzerland, we tried a couple of small dealers and they wouldn't budge on purchase price one bit (not even offering a new free service or abgas etc).

[Whitean3]

WelshBoyo said:

I can tell you my recent experience for my old BMW 330xi. Privately it was worth about 18-20k, I was offered 9k trade-in from a Citroen main garage for trade in against a BMW Z4 M Coupe. Another BMW main dealer offered me 12k, then I bought the R32 off another BMW main dealer and he gave me 14k. However I had an expensive stereo/satnav unit which he didn't want so I took it out and sold it privately, he also offered me 500chf for the winter tyres that had been used for 3 winters.

All these were main dealers, so not too sure on independents, but when trying to by a 330xi when we first arrived in Switzerland, we tried a couple of small dealers and they wouldn't budge on purchase price one bit (not even offering a new free service or abgas etc).

Thanks Boyo, confirms what I'd suspected- as "nice" and "desirable" as I think my car may be, I think a dealer would see things differently- slightly specialized market and high mileage really count against me.

[eyebeebe]

Prepare to have your pants pulled down. I got offered 70k for my turbo in px against a F430 spider at an independent. Similar cars were offered between 95-105k on Autoscout. I was expecting him to offer around 90k. In fairness I ordered a Eurotax report (Swiss equivalent of Glass) and he was pretty much bang on the money for a trade buy. a 20k spread at that kind of level doesn't seem abnormal!

[Whitean3]

eyebeebe said:

Prepare to have your pants pulled down. I got offered 70k for my turbo in px against a F430 spider at an independent. Similar cars were offered between 95-105k on Autoscout. I was expecting him to offer around 90k. In fairness I ordered a Eurotax report (Swiss equivalent of Glass) and he was pretty much bang on the money for a trade buy. a 20k spread at that kind of level doesn't seem abnormal!

Cheers Ian. I shouldn't really be too surprised, should I! Assuming it's a linear scale, my man maths tells me to expect a 10K difference for my 996. Might have to hang on to it for a little while longer...

[Schnellmann]

In my experience, prices in Autoscout are often unrealistic and don't represent the price you can actually achieve (when I sold my 997 CS2 I put it just below the price of other comparable cars but didn't get a single call...only when I dropped the price substantially did I manage to move it on).

Even in good condition, you might struggle selling the 996 privately. At least, you might need quite some time to do so. Have you thought about having a dealer/specialist selling it on commission (if you can finance the 997 without having to sell the 996 first)?

Sometimes I have been puzzled by Swiss sellers' attitude to price i.e. their reluctance to drop even slightly from the listed price. I almost bought a 997 4S a couple of years back. The car was over priced and I know the dealer had had it for ages but he wouldn't drop to a market price....a year later he still had it and had only dropped the price slightly...

[eyebeebe]

Whitean3 said:

Cheers Ian. I shouldn't really be too surprised, should I! Assuming it's a linear scale, my man maths tells me to expect a 10K difference for my 996. Might have to hang on to it for a little while longer...

Your best bet is probably to invest 14 chuffs in the Eurotax report and that way you will know whether the dealer is taking the piss with their offer.

Schnellman I agree about their attitude, but from what I've heard the Swiss are the same about most things including houses. The working capital requirements of the average Swiss car dealer must be horrific!

[AndrewD]

Bought my 997 GT3 3.8 in Feb 2010 for 172, from Amag who had it up for, I think, 180.
Sold it in Jun 2010 (yes, I know) for 135, part ex for the 16M.
It went on via one of the Porsche dealers for 155.

[Schnellmann]

AndrewD said:

Bought my 997 GT3 3.8 in Feb 2010 for 172, from Amag who had it up for, I think, 180.
Sold it in Jun 2010 (yes, I know) for 135, part ex for the 16M.
It went on via one of the Porsche dealers for 155.

Did you try selling or just part ex? At 135 I would have been very tempted...

[AndrewD]

Schnellmann said:

AndrewD said:

Bought my 997 GT3 3.8 in Feb 2010 for 172, from Amag who had it up for, I think, 180.
Sold it in Jun 2010 (yes, I know) for 135, part ex for the 16M.
It went on via one of the Porsche dealers for 155.

Did you try selling or just part ex? At 135 I would have been very tempted...

Wish I'd known at the time! Couldn't be arsed to sell it privately. Did get CHF 100k off a brand new unregistered 16M though

[Schnellmann]

AndrewD said:

Wish I'd known at the time! Couldn't be arsed to sell it privately. Did get CHF 100k off a brand new unregistered 16M though

CHF100k discount! Wow. No wonder you were keen to sign the contract.

Still...if you get bored with the 16M or the GTO (ok - not that likely!) and get offered a low trade in price then perhaps you can post it on here first, to give us all first refusal

As an aside...didn't you like the GT3? Or was the attraction of the 16M too much?

[Whitean3]

Thanks for everyone's replies, much appreciated. Might pop across to the dealer in the next week or so and see what's what (assuming the wife will let me!). Quite fancy a test drive of a 997TT, even if I can't do a deal- will be good to know if this is the car for me or not. 997GT3s are around the same price point and are very attractive from a pure driving perspective, but I reckon it would be too raw for the wife to cope with, and a bit of a pain being so low at the front. Plus i like to take my car to the ski resorts in the winter and a GT3 on semi slicks wouldn't really be too clever, would it!

Incidentally, I bought my 996 privately from a complete Porsche nut purely because the OPC in St Gallen were offering such a crappy trade in against a new 997GT3. I found it amazing, given that the seller was a very good customer of the garage, having bought his previous 13 Porsches from them- you'd think they could have offered him a better deal!

I'll report back if I do manage to do a deal of some sort...
Cheers guys.

[Whitean3]

Schnellmann said:

post it on here first, to give us all first refusal

I seem to recal Andrew did post on here offering his GT3 (or maybe English Forum Switzerland) at the time- and the price was significantly below the market rate on Autoscout- I just couldn't afford to make him an offer!