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Trade in
- Thread starter Wrekd
- Start date
Daddywolf
Member
Traded in my 2015 Q50 a week ago today. They sat in the car, wrote the mileage down from the dash and that was it. They never started or drove the car, it was INSANE! I saw someone post of photo of their pickup from the same showroom 3 days later and the car was still parked where I left it. I've never experienced anything like it all my car buying years (approx 15 cars). Delivery was fast and easy. She had me look the car over, express and concerns, showed me the basics, signed 7 sheets of paper and we were on our way. The entire process probably took about 45 mins.
I'm trading in a car that I've done performance upgrades on (forced induction, header-back, wheels, ECU tune, etc.) and I was planning on spending some of my time undoing all of it. Now I'm wondering if I should just take the easy stuff off (to sell as parts privately) and revert to stock, but just leave the complicated stuff (like the Supercharger).
One of my concerns was at trade-in time they'd nitpick the upgrades and say it'll be harder for them to sell, so they'd offer less.
One of my concerns was at trade-in time they'd nitpick the upgrades and say it'll be harder for them to sell, so they'd offer less.
Daddywolf
Member
Mine had upgraded aftermarket 19" rims and tires and I was afraid of the same thing. My suggestion would be to take off the easy stuff and sell it. You probably wont get much for it, but you'll get nothing if you trade the car in with it attached! I really wish I would have bought an old set of stock rims/tires and put them back on my car before I traded it in. Same bolt pattern as the 3 and I would have a nice set of wheels/tires to run in the summer. Oh well!
GGTK
Member
Very easy they don't really check the trade in. If carmax is reasonably close I'd get a appraisal from them as well.. Tesla was offering 9k for my 2015 prius.. carmax 12500. Huge diff
They're not going to look at your trade-in with a fine toothed comb. They're essentially just sending them all to auction and only really care about things like the odometer reading, and whether there's any major damage they weren't previously aware of. Most of the critical information is already gleaned via the VIN.
Traded two car with them. All they do is note the mileage and transfer the license plate. I think the trade-ins are just sent straight to the auction. When Tesla converts an ICE vehicle to EV its a win. If they actually had a used car department they could make a lot of money on those trade-ins...
I will be the first to report an issue with a trade-in. Before buying my TM3 I was leasing a 2017 Ford Explorer Sport. I had 8-9 months left on the lease but due to the low mileage I was not upside down. When I ordered my Tesla the sales person looked at the Ford and gave me a trade-in offer that was $700 more than what I owed on the lease. Fast-forward to 2 days before I was scheduled to pick up my new car; my trade-in was no longer listed on my account. A little digging my my sales person revealed that Tesla will not take leased Fords in trade. A call to Carmax confirmed that they too are not fans of buying leased Fords. Luckily I was able to get Ford to buy back my car for more than Tesla had originally promised to pay.
TLDR: Tesla will not accept leased Fords as trade-ins.
TLDR: Tesla will not accept leased Fords as trade-ins.
Did you ever find out why both Tesla and Carmax do not want to deal with leased Ford vehicles? Were they buying out the lease? Lease end fees, early termination fees?
I never got an answer from Tesla and Carmax said they might be able to buy it; they just were not sure. A call to Ford reveled that you cannot do a third party sale of their leases within the last 120 days (4 months) of your contract. I was 8-9 months from the end so I could have sold it to Carmax. However, since they gave me a better offer, I ended up selling it back to my Ford dealer.
Apparently Ford does this to give their dealers the best chance of getting you into another one of their cars at lease end.
So, I sold my still-in-lease Cadillac back to the dealership. They bought the vehicle outright from GM Financial and it was the easiest transaction ever. I gave them the car + $1500, signed one piece of paper, pulled my plates off, and my wife drove me home. Was fantastic.
I took the $1500 "loss" because a) It saved me the $700 lease-end fee; b) It saved me from replacing the tires which I knew I'd need for lease end; and c) I was able to take advantage of the $3750 tax credit before it dropped to $1875.
They never started it, test drove it, or anything. Last I saw, they were selling it on their website for $1000 over what they were into it for.
I think I timed it pretty perfectly.......
Made my Tesla deal even easier. Walked in, handed them a check from my credit union, signed on the dotted line, drove the vehicle home. Couldn't have asked for a better delivery experience!
LunkHead
Member
My trade was a bit messy.. I had 2 quotes from Carmax. One was as it sat (modified Jeep) and the 2nd was if I removed the aftermarket items. I was told by Carmax that they can't 'front lot' a vehicle with modifications so they offer less as they'd just auction it. The quote with the aftermarket items removed was $3K higher.
Tesla used the lower amount for my trade even after I removed the items. Took a Tesla general manager to get involved for it to be corrected to the higher amount but once that was done the trade was a breeze.
On delivery day they didn't even really inspect the trade. Wrote down the milage and walked around it for 10 seconds..
On another note, I picked up my M3 and traded on Thursday last week and when I logged into my bank this morning I see the trade in loan has already been paid off by Tesla...
Moral? If you have aftermarket items on your trade remove them before you go to Carmax. I was told by them that they offer less for vehicles with modifications because they are unable to offer a modified vehicle for sale on their lot...
Tesla used the lower amount for my trade even after I removed the items. Took a Tesla general manager to get involved for it to be corrected to the higher amount but once that was done the trade was a breeze.
On delivery day they didn't even really inspect the trade. Wrote down the milage and walked around it for 10 seconds..
On another note, I picked up my M3 and traded on Thursday last week and when I logged into my bank this morning I see the trade in loan has already been paid off by Tesla...
Moral? If you have aftermarket items on your trade remove them before you go to Carmax. I was told by them that they offer less for vehicles with modifications because they are unable to offer a modified vehicle for sale on their lot...
WilliamG
Hinge Fanatic
This is 100% true. I'm friends with people at my local Tesla showroom, who confirmed. The trade-in is thrown on a semi and sent to auction. My Golf R trade-in was no different.
I traded in a 2013 Camaro LE last week, @Daddywolf said the guy just got in the car updated the mileage from what i originally reported and off it went... that was the most insane car-buying experience ever.
I traded a C7 Corvette convertible. All they did was take a picture of the mileage and transferred the license plate. You can tell they clearly want noting to do with the used car business but they need to be careful as I am sure they get burned quite a bit on these trade-ins. They don't go over them well and then when they go to auction they get caught by surprise and lose some money of some of them. The good thing for Tesla is by selling direct they cut out all the margin for the dealer and keep it for themselves.
i traded in an Acura MDX 2005 with almost 190,000km not in good condition. Tesla gave a quote of C$2500. I was able to drove it to a Tesla center safely. I waited about 20 minutes for the lady with my key to reappear, handed me the old license plate, signed every document, and presented the new Tesla T3 to me. After a while I figured out why it took so long: the old license plate screw was rusty and not easy to take off.
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