Are Online
Car Auctions A Waste Of Time Or A Hidden Gold Mine?
Which is the
better bargain, "site unseen" online auctions like eBay,
or the dealer only wholesale auctions?
To find out if
there is money to be made selling cars through Internet online
auctions I am going to test the market by selling 20 cars
ranging in price from $2000 up to $100,000 + through eBay.
Of the 20 cars I will try to cover as many different models as
possible from an economy subcompact import to a luxury or
"high-end" car.
To give our
eBay / dealer only wholesale auction price comparison a fair
chance I will list all 20 cars through eBay and will continue
to at a rate of 1 or 2 a week until I loose money on all 20
cars or a total of $20,000 (which ever comes first).
I'm saving the
"high-end" car for last, I think it will be either a
1989 Porsche 911 Turbo Factory Slant nose Cabriolet or a 1987
Ferrari Testarossa.
To accurately
get a feel for the online used car market we need to keep as
many variables as possible the same for all 20 cars.
1. I will use eBay
to list all 20 cars. eBay
is the largest online auction source with the most buyers (and
sellers). As of writing this eBay
has 76,989 cars for sale, I found car listings for a
rusted "clunker" with a high bid of $47 to a
"very sweet" Ferrari F50 for $750,000.00. This looks
interesting, I am starting to get excited!
2. I will post
pictures of each car. This is the only way the buyer can see
what they are bidding on so the more the better.
3. I will only
list cars that are mechanically sound and will provide a short
term (90 days or less) warranty/guarantee to reassure the
purchaser of the cars excellent mechanical condition and
clean/clear title.
4. I will
disclose everything about each car. I will post each VIN# so
anyone can run a CarFax
(vehicle title/history search). I will also run a CarFax
and post the results (for those that are lazy) on a link (URL)
that I will list in each auction for additional pictures and
information. I am not going to hide anything about these cars,
we want the results of the this market comparison to reflect
the true value of the online eBay market and then determine if
it is worth pursuing.
5. All cars
will be listed with NO RESERVE (no minimum bid). If the
highest bid is $1 I am prepared to accept the loss and sell it
for that amount. I will NOT have anyone bid up the
price of the car or manipulate any of these auctions, the
purpose of this comparison is to find out if there is a market
for making money by selling (or buying, we will cover that
later) cars through eBay.
Making a profit is not our goal at this time, if the eBay
online car market looks strong we will focus on making $$$
after we "test the waters" with these first 6 deals.
6. The final
determination of the selling price will not be considered an
accurate reflection of the market until we have been
paid in full and the deal is final. I have heard there is a
large percentage of people on eBay who will bid on an item and
never follow through with the actual purchase. If this happens
the car will be re-listed and the final value will be
determined from an actual sale.
BIDS MEAN
NOTHING UNTIL THE MONEY CHANGES HANDS AND THE DEAL IS
COMPLETE!!!
Our first
auction listing is a 1988 2 Dr. Honda Civic with 116,500
miles. I bought it a while back and let a friend borrow it, I
forgot I owned it (woops). I can say it won't hurt too much if
I lose money on this one LOL :). I will post the receipt
of what I paid for the car at the dealer only auction and how
much I made or lost after the auction has ended. I do not want
it to influence or disrupt the actual bidding process...
Remember, we are doing this LIVE! The bidding activity has
been slow with 14 bids and a current high bid of $1397.00 (to
low). This car would retail for around $3000 - $3500 at
my dealership. I have noticed most of the bidding activity
happens in the last 15 minutes of the auction.
eBay,
Success Or Failure?
Complete
results are published in my manual.
"As I
bought and sold my first few cars without
any guidance or help, sometimes I made money,
other times I made mistakes. Whenever I made a
mistake, I learned from it. Now as I look back, I
can see that while I made a little money on those
first few good deals, the knowledge I gained from
the bad deals has made me far more."
