Selling a Used Vehicle (Car/SUV/Truck) (1 Viewer)

*Searched a ton and didn’t find anything close. 

What are some of the best practices for selling a car nowadays? Mainly dealing with money. $20,000? $10,000? $5,000?

Meeting the buyer at the their bank and cashing their cashier’s check there? 

What are you private buyer’s doing to close the sale?

The last two times I bought non-dealership cars were out of state purchases.  The first one, I drove over to Ohio with a bank check, test drove the car (93 300ZX) and I paid full asking because it was a very good price plus I could tell the guy wasn't going to move on it (this is like 15+ years ago I think.)  We went to his bank, handed over the check, seems like it took forever but eventually he handed over the title and that was that.  Second time (this was damn near 10 years ago now I think) I drove up to Michigan, (09 Corvette) it was pretty much an identical process.  Handed over the bank check, waited around for a bit and the guy handed over the title and I drove off into the sunset.  I sold the first car to a friend from Ohio, actually he lives in Cincinnati (which is where I picked up the 300ZX from so that car was meant to be in Cincinnati apparently) and I just deposited his personal check, I've known the guy for 30 years.  I still have the other car.

I’ve sold two vehicles for cash ($8-10k) and signed over the titles. One I sold for a credit union check ($11k). I got the credit union info and checked in on the validity of it. All 3 went smooth with no issues. All 3 folks were normal so I wasn’t worried about any issues and I didn’t have any.

Johnny Rock said:

*Searched a ton and didn’t find anything close. 

What are some of the best practices for selling a car nowadays? Mainly dealing with money. $20,000? $10,000? $5,000?

Meeting the buyer at the their bank and cashing their cashier’s check there? 

What are you private buyer’s doing to close the sale?

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don't take a cashiers check.   Personal check or company check only.    Get 25% upfront as cash before you give them the keys, don't send title until their check clears.

I list mine on Craigslist and usually the pros start making offers immediately-  the general public is the 2nd wave.   Get the car detailed, take some nice pics and put that in the posting.  Will sell within one day usually, assuming priced right and car in decent shape

tommyboy said:

don't take a cashiers check.   Personal check or company check only.    Get 25% upfront as cash before you give them the keys, don't send title until their check clears.

I list mine on Craigslist and usually the pros start making offers immediately-  the general public is the 2nd wave.   Get the car detailed, take some nice pics and put that in the posting.  Will sell within one day usually, assuming priced right and car in decent shape

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What's wrong with a cashier's check?

Cash talks, bull#### walks.

arrow1 said:

What's wrong with a cashier's check?

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if it bounces  from being a forgery.  YOu have no recourse.

if its a personal check or company check-  you can go after the bank for the funds

I have sold my last few cars to carmax.  Pretty easy and they always give more than KBB

tommyboy said:

if its a personal check or company check-  you can go after the bank for the funds

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No, you can’t.

I sold my truck a few years back for cash.  I think around 15k.  A nice older couple came up from Mexico to get it.  I remember my wife sitting at our patio table with them counting money and checking it with a counterfeit pen. They paid in all smaller bills, 10's and 20's as I recall and it was a huge pain in the ###.  But I did like having plenty of cash in the safe to pay various trades, etc.  You'd be surprised how much cheaper big jobs get when you can pay in cash. They love no trails and no cc fees.

Everything since I've done by wire transfer. The title changes hands when the money hits my account.