BrewMaster

Greetings everyone. I haven't been around in a while, but I thought I'd stop in here for some advice.

So I am trying to sell my 04 F-150 and I have placed ads in the LA Times and a few other local newspapers. I had a consignment dealer in Long Beach call me and say that they want to sell my car for me. The cost would be $395 per month plus $500 if they sell it in 30 days. So it would basically cost me about a grand. I really just want to get rid of it and get as much cash out as I can.

Advantages:
1) It is on a used lot with sales people actively trying to sell it.
2) The consignement dealer can finance buyers which I cannot.
3) If they don't sell it in 30 days I can pay $200 for another month on their lot and the $500 fee goes down to $300.
4) Fees are a flat rate, not percentages of the sale price.
5) They claim they can sell it in a few weeks, but who knows if that will hold true.
6) I've had no other calls about the truck yet.

Disadvantages:
1) I don't have a way to research this dealer yet (City Loans & Auto Sales in Long Beach) to make sure they don't skip town with my truck. I will check their insurance and with the factory dealers around them to see about their reputation and all that.

So my question for y'all is have you ever sold through a consignment dealer? Is it a good way to go? I'd really like to get top dollar and places like CarMax have made offensively low offers to buy it.

NOTE: I am not looking for advice or input as to whether or not to sell it. That has already been discussed and you can read all about it here on the 2004 F-150 forum from F-150 online. I am just looking for experiences and/or advice on using a consignment dealer to sell a used car. Thanks.

__________________
respect beer.

ufcrusher

Brew,

I was in a similar situation with my 03 Mustang. I could no longer drive it due to my bad ankle and decided to put it up for sale. I tried the autotrader/craigslist/cars.com route. All in all, I received 1 inquiry in 2 months. When I responded to him the guy didnt even have the where with all to respond back.

Fortunately for me, we were theoretically right side up with the loan. Unfortunately, because of the new Mustang coming out NO ONE was even willing to go anywhere near book. I ended up selling her back to Ford on Saturday and buying an 04 F150, reaping a wonderful $3000 loss (which pissed me off even more since the KBB wholesale/retail were both above or at what we owed).

Personally, I did receive a couple of emails from consignment type places, I wasnt willing to take the chance of getting screwed. Hope you have a better time selling your vehicle.

__________________
Welcome my son, welcome to the machine...Where have you been? It's alright we know where you've been....

Mpowered

If they sell it in a month, they get $900. If they sell in two months, They get $900. So basically, in the first 2 months, they get $900 and more after that. I assume they will try hard to get rid of it in the first month which might mean that they will go as low as possible and the second month try for a little more if its not sold. It could be pretty risky to trust them to sell it for any more than as little as they can get away with because they earn a flat fee regardless. Have you tried taking out an ad in something like AutoTrader or Cars.com. I don't know much about truck prices, but I would assume that being an '04 you should be able to get somewhere in between what a dealer would pay for it and what a dealer would sell it for by selling it yourself. Good luck.

__________________
"Leaders? What leaders? **** these so called leaders! I don't respect them. I respect those who take action without being a leader."
-Tommy Boomfiger

BrewMaster

actually Mpowered the way it was explained to me is that they have to call me with every offer, they can't just sell it cheap and screw me. that is how they explained it, but who knows if it is true. i too am very skeptical. thanks for the responses guys. anyone else have any thought?

ufcrusher, isn't the 04 F-150 great?! damn I wish I didn't have to sell mine...

ufcrusher

I have only had it since Saturday, but so far its great. The ride is much better than my old F-150 and much less road noise. The captains chairs on this one seem to be cheaper than the captains chairs on my old one, as is the material they are made out of. (One of the reasons I was dead set on a Lariat rather than the XLT I ended up with) Overall there are some things which are definitely better on this model than the last one and some that were seemingly better on the last one.

What I preferred about the old style:
I definitely like the old console better (more space), the location of the Therm/compass was better for me (I have to move my head and look down to see it on this model as compared to it being right next to my line of sight), the cloth on the old one seemed nicer and the seats were more supportive, yet less hard.

What I prefer about this one so far:
I love the power rear windows. THe deeper bed is nice. The dash display/hvac system is seemless. The power rails are nice. The auto dimming rear mirror/lights are nice. Lots of little things like that.

Just out of curiousity, couldnt you just step down to a 2x 4.6 XLT, have much smaller payments and keep a truck? If you lease instead of buy, it drops it even further (yes, this isnt the best but in some situations it is useful). I am sure you already thought about it, but it was just something the seems obvious to me.