Originally Posted by hallstevenson
Originally Posted by BMWTurboDzl
You would be correct however the "trade in" value or "time to sell" and resale value might be impacted by the lack of maintenance.
I'm afraid you are giving that too much weight. How many times have you or anyone seen this actually apply ? If the car is washed, interior vacuumed, has usable tires, etc, 90% of buyers are impressed. Only a tiny, tiny percentage of shoppers pull the dipstick, ask for service records, and so on. Someone that hasn't had the ATF serviced isn't going to get a lower price for a trade-in vs someone that changes it every 25k miles.
People here post about selling their immaculately maintained vehicles and trying to hand the buyer their notebook or folder full of service records, receipts, etc and are told they can keep it, the buyer doesn't want it.
I said "might" and I mentioned "time to sell". For example, which used car with 50k miles on the odometer and priced the same will get more looks and/or sell faster? The one which had the ATF serviced and has all maintenance records or the one which is advertised with none of those? In addition there's more to maintenance than just mechanical. It's also cosmetic and general wear-n-tear on interior/paint. It entirely depends on the vehicle one is selling. Is it a run of the mill F150, Camry, Corolla or is it a Audi, Mercedes, Lexus?
Originally Posted by BMWTurboDzl
You would be correct however the "trade in" value or "time to sell" and resale value might be impacted by the lack of maintenance.
I'm afraid you are giving that too much weight. How many times have you or anyone seen this actually apply ? If the car is washed, interior vacuumed, has usable tires, etc, 90% of buyers are impressed. Only a tiny, tiny percentage of shoppers pull the dipstick, ask for service records, and so on. Someone that hasn't had the ATF serviced isn't going to get a lower price for a trade-in vs someone that changes it every 25k miles.
People here post about selling their immaculately maintained vehicles and trying to hand the buyer their notebook or folder full of service records, receipts, etc and are told they can keep it, the buyer doesn't want it.
I said "might" and I mentioned "time to sell". For example, which used car with 50k miles on the odometer and priced the same will get more looks and/or sell faster? The one which had the ATF serviced and has all maintenance records or the one which is advertised with none of those? In addition there's more to maintenance than just mechanical. It's also cosmetic and general wear-n-tear on interior/paint. It entirely depends on the vehicle one is selling. Is it a run of the mill F150, Camry, Corolla or is it a Audi, Mercedes, Lexus?
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