Honestly, it's only sort of worth my time to try to sell it. It's looking more like it'll take a dozen or so hours of effort, and at that point, my time is worth more than the money I'd save. So we'll probably just go trade it in and wash our hands of it.
As an aside, when you trade in a $18000 car (say the dealership will give me $15k, or something) and get a $10,000 car (the most I could imagine ever spending), do they just write you a check on the spot? Or does trading down to a cheaper car cause problems and we should assume we have to find something of equivalent value?
-W
First - if you're trading it and buying another car at the same time, several states subtract the trade from the purchase price for the purpose of sales tax. So you can subtract that difference in sales tax from the the "profit" of selling privately. But of course you could
buy privately, too and save money there.
I once traded in a 2 year old SUV for $16k, and bought a car that was $10k (after all fees). They didn't actually write me a check
on the spot, but if I did it again, I'd insist on it. They mailed me one like 5 days later. Which was fine but I was stressed out in the meantime, just because, you know?
The loan isn't necessarily a big deal. A lot of banks provide checks and forms for this purpose. The seller gets the check and the notary submits the form (the lien paperwork) for the bank. The state sends the title to the bank instead of the buyer. I've even sold a car with a loan on it (the sports car above) but again, I was probably lucky. The buyer gave me a check and I gave them a Bill of Sale. Then I paid off my loan, got the title, and met up with the buyer a second time to transfer the title and give him the car/keys. Some buyers might not feel the BoS is sufficient for their money, and having to wait 7-10 days for the title/car. In my case, I had a low-mileage, excellent condition car that couldn't be easily obtained elsewhere. You might have a high volume car with "normal" trim that might not be appealing enough for private buyers to jump through hoops. But if that's the case, there's tons of
data out there on what your car is really worth
and dealers have to concede that they'll have zero trouble selling your car because it's very common and popular. So you can use that, stick to your guns and argue for a worthwhile trade value.