Trading in vs. selling an old Honda Accord

You basically won't get squat for your car on a trade. The dealer is just going to turn around and sell it for beans to a wholesaler. They aren't going to put it on their lot and sell it. Around here, the dealers use some 'other' rating service besides KBB or NADA (I can never remember the name, believe it begins with a 'G') that typically is MUCH less than the others that we as consumers have access to. A couple of years ago, I was looking to trade out Ford Windstar on a Honda Pilot. KBB said the trade-in value was $3k, the dealer offered me $1500 based on their super-secret book value. Needless to say, I walked. Ended up driving it into the ground and donated it when the transmission went. And bought my van from a different dealership.

Dan D '07 Ody EX Central NJ USA

My tatic on my 96 accord was to tell them initally no I was not going to trade it, get the price on the new car, then said, what will you give me on trade.....I was offered 1,600, my response was huh, guess Hondas DON'T hold their value and got up to leave....I was then offered 4,500, well over it's book value, so , I got the new car, got a trade value & I am happy.

Negotiating Rule No. 1 - whoever can walk away from the deal wins. We tend to forget that there's a lot of pressure on sales people and dealers to move new cars and it counts against a sales rep if the customer walks out without buying a car. I did the same thing, i.e., walked out, when I bought my '03 Accord Sedan. The sales guy called me the next day and said his sales mgr was out Monday and they'd meet my price.

Would CarMax touch a car with that many miles?

I gave up on trades. I sell mine, and usually within a week.

G-Man

The dealer may not want that car. He will probably just wholesale it out. In any case I traded a car in 2 years ago. It was a 15 minute process but mine was low mileage late model. One advantage is some savings in sales tax.