How do you determine the car's value?

Recently I ordered a 2015 P car and bargained on the basis of info gleaned from Kelley Blue Book. (CONFESSION: It's a Cayman S, not a 911, but my question here is not specific to any particular model, and you guys have THE most popular site on the forum.) Later I found out I way overpaid. In other words, KBB out-the-door prices for a new Porsche were too high. Right now I'm selling my old Porsche on consignment and the used car dealer lists it ABOVE KBB price (for a 2011 base model cayman). He says, unlike the new car prices, used Porsches go for MORE than KBB prices. I'm confused! If KBB is as misleading as Zillow prices on real estate, how do you determine value, whether wholesale or retail? (I've learned that the "completed sales" section of eBay motors doesn't help, because buyers are usually not willing to pay full value on buying a car they won't get to see, let alone drive or have inspected, before purchase.) Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

congrats on the new car! Surprised KBB had it priced too high new. Just out of curiosity, did you look into that truecar.com site? How does that compare to KBB? But as far as used cars...you know the old saying; it's only worth as much as someone is willing to pay for it. I don't think there really is a gold standard for how much a car is worth, it varies so much on so many things. Age, mileage, service, records, condition, accessories and some even factor in upgrades and preventive maintenance. I would take a good look at kbb, ebay, craigslist and cars.com, see what similar cars are going for and have gone for and decide a price you want for it that is reasonable in your local market, and one price that is your lowest acceptable. When I was looking for my 996 I was going through craigslist and I decided on a price range I would accept for certain mileage, condition and maintenance records based on the cars listed and cars that I had seen on the site that was now gone. And then I negotiated down 2000.

I like truecar.com

Thanks for the truecar.com lead! Regarding the Q about truecar prices vs Kelley Blue Book . . . KBB said my new (special order) Cayman S should only be vaguely $1000 less than MSRP--what I offered and the dealer accepted. Truecar says it it should have been $2,200 less than MSRP, so I don't feel quite so bad. (Rennlist posters have suggested even a special order car should have been 6% below MSRP, which would have been $4500 below MSRP. That put a frown on my face.) Regarding my mint 2011 base model Cayman that's for sale on consignment (see: http://www.grandprimotors.com/detail...-MTU1OA==.html ), given the very low (9.5K) mileage, KBB says the dealer should sell it for about $40,500--less than what they're asking. Truecar, in contrast, says the dealer should list it for $48.9K and sell it for $44,300. This fits with the dealer's claim that they generally sell used low-mileage Porsches for beyond KBB prices. They now have an asking price of $42,500, if you're curious. I paid $43K for it 5 months ago before the financial planner yelled at me for buying a "used car that wasn't the S. . . You say you want to die broke," he said, "but you're doing a lousy job." That's when I ordered the new S and put the flawless mint 2011 base model up for sale. Thanks again for the truecar lead!

Truecar uses actual regional sales data I believe. Regionality does play a role. I remember when the Audi TT came out. In the Bay Area, where I lived at the time, local market dynamics and short supply meant that cars were going for well above MSRP, which is quite insane for a depreciating asset!

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BAL--are you in PDX, Seattle, or elsewhere?

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Seattle Eastside - Bellevue.

BAL: Thanks. The reason I was asking is I was hoping that if you were here in PDX you might have suggestions about places to take the car for work. When it arrives (2015 Cayman S) in August, it will be garaged one block from Heckmann Thiemann Motors in southeast Portland. One poster has very recently said he had a bad experience with them. My limited contact with them has mostly been good, but they've only done little stuff for me so far. (The mechanic literally did a house call with the previous car, a 2011 base model Cayman, and somehow successfully got the overhead button to operate the garage door. He didn't even charge me. After working on it and calling the dealer and the garage door manufacturer I had given up on trying to get it to work myself.)

KBB, Edmunds, and NADA are all affiliated with dealers and manufacturers - so follow the income stream to see their bias. As far as used car values go, looking at the asking prices of similar cars in your area is about your best bet.

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Thanks for the tip about KBB, Edmunds, etc. I didn't know that. Is truecar.com so encumbered? Several posters suggest it beats KBB. Under normal circumstance I'm coming to think you're right--to look at what's available locally. Even ignoring that the car is mint and has almost no miles on it, the problem is that right now, I appear to have the only 2011 base model Cayman for sale in the state of Oregon, so there's no comparison. Portland,OR is perhaps the most aggressively anti-car city in the U.S., so driving a nice car here is considered by some to be a mark of shame, just as riding a bicycle is a local mark of pride. Having lived in L.A. and outside Houston, I understand where they're coming from, but things have gotten so ideologically extreme that the city is LITERALLY committed to destroying 10% of all parking spaces and is actively carrying through on this threat. As a result of all this, I suspect it's harder to find a buyer for a Porsche. The big sellers here are Prius and Subaru. There must be more Subarus here than in Tokyo. I guess what I have going for me is that if there's one buyer out there, I have only car for sale (-:

I don't know about Truecar. I personally found it to be reasonably accurate when purchasing a Mazda5 and F150, as in within a few hundred of the price I was able to negotiate. Are they marketing it nationally? Hopefully they are, because it helps to negate the local anti-car culture.

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I'm confused. You say on one hand that you don't know about truecar.com, but go on to say that you have used their data and the data were accurate. 'Sounds like you do have at least some faith in truecar . . . or am I reading this wrong? Also, how would the marketing of truecar negate the anti-car culture in Portland? It has become so strong here that besides destroying 10% of all parking places, they put speed bumps every place, keep taking out lanes and replacing them with bike paths, and increase the area covered by parking meters and even charge on Sundays. In addition, they have green painted areas at the very beginning of lanes at many stop lights where cars are not permitted to go when the light is red. These green areas are reserved for bicycles and their purpose is for the bikes to get in front of cars so they obstruct the flow of traffic when the light turns green. They also encourage--not just allow--developers to build apartment houses with zero off-street parking. The purpose of all this is the same--to make the driver as miserable as possible in hopes that one of two things will occur: either the driver will take the bus instead of driving OR they'll at least suffer for being a bad person (because they have a car). It doesn't appear that they have a particular preference for either of these two events. The hypocrisy of their war on cars is evidenced by the fact that they all have cars themselves. That said, by shooting even themselves in the foot they feel morally superior. Unless I'm missing something I don't see how truecar advertising in the area could overcome this tidal wave of ideology. To set the record straight, I am not an extremist on the other side--I had as hard a time in Texas with the extremists on the right as I have with extremists on the left here in PuddleTown.

You asked me if I knew about truecar having dealer or manufacturer affiliation, that was the question that I answered - no idea. I have two data points checking it out of curiosity, I don't know that I'd swear by it. You're mixing my response regarding marketing. Is the consignment dealer actively marketing the car nationally? Autotrader, Cars.com, EBay, etc? If they market it nationally then the local anti-car culture is far less important, as your buyer could come from anywhere. If they put it on their lot with a for sale sign in the window, it sounds like your market is limited.

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Thanks for the clarification. Gotcha. Good question. (Now I understand what you were saying.) They ARE marketing nationally. Is there a way to guess what % of cars like a used Cayman are actually bought by people out of state? I have no idea. In any case, they are using autotrader and cars.com. However, they are NOT using eBay. Frankly, I agree with that decision, after checking how remarkably few cars (percentage wise) of past eBay Motors auctions actually sell. If you check, at least 90% of eBay Motors cars never sell! While I suspect this is because bidders are understandably reticent about paying full fare for a car they may never drive or have inspected before committing to purchase, that's just a guess. Bottom line remains the same--eBay motors generally fails to sell your car--check it out!

A car's value is determined by the marketplace, i.e., whatever someone will pay. KBB and other car pricing venues are only a guide in my opinion. You have to think of it like real estate. Market value and comps to other listings only give you a starting point. What you pay after that is up to you. The value of my car as far as the enjoyment goes is priceless. I know it has a market value, but the sheer pleasure of owning/driving such a great car makes that seem moot. Happy Driving!

After writing about the poor showing on eBay (see above) I got curious. . . Of the last 77 closed Cayman auctions on eBay, 71 of those cars never sold. Truth is of course I haven't a clue what the batting average is for autotrader or cars.com, but a failure rate of 71/77 sounds bleak enough to me so I remain in agreement with my consignment dealer (who IS selling my car on autotrader and cars.com and elsewhere, but not on eBay).

Ebay sales statistics are misleading. Many, many cars on ebay are sold outside the system. Nearly every time I advertise a car for sale on ebay, it does not meet reserve. But, as soon as the auction is over, I get several calls or e-mails with offers on the car, oftentimes greater than what my reserve was. It seems people just don't want to bid and be "bound" by that - they want to do their due diligence before committing. And no wonder - if you look at many of the ebay auctions, the sellers put all kinds of scary language about the bid being a binding contract and that the seller will pursue all legal remedies against a non-paying bidder. That's complete BS - nobody in their right mind pursues a non-paying ebay bidder because it is too difficult and it is not cost-effective. I put in my auctions that I give all of my bidders the right to cancel the deal at any time for any reason - even it is just that they change their mind - and that I will never try to force someone to buy a car from me that they don't want. I've probably sold 25 cars on ebay over the years.

'Just checked another interesting tidbit on eBay Motors. Of the 6 cars out of 77 that sold, every one was old and inexpensive. Of the 24 Caymans (base or S) that were from model year 2010 or newer, NOT ONE CAR SOLD--zero out of 24. I've seen this before on non-exotics/non-antiques in eBay Motors--of the few cars that do sell, most by far are relatively inexpensive--a situation in which the bidder is risking less by purchasing a vehicle they won't get to drive or inspect before committing.

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Absolutely. Markets may vary(east coast/west coast) but the buyer will be the one to set the final price. We always regarded 'value' publications like KBB as benchmarks to help you determine a value for your car, but not specific sell or trade-in pricing. Go to sites that have your Porsche model and year listed for sale, you'll most likely find some other examples to compare your sell price with. GL Any pics of your Cayman to share?

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Interesting post! This raises questions: If people are afraid of the language of eBay entanglements and you put language in your eBay ads that erases this concern, how come you rarely get the reserve during an actual eBay auction? What percent of your successful after-the-auction sales would you say are local to you (vs people who, eBay or no eBay, are agreeing to buy a car they may not be inspecting because they're at a distance)? Finally, as you know, eBay does what it can to keep buyers and sellers from dealing outside of eBay. How does your contact info successfully get to these potential after-the-auction-is-over buyers? Thanks in advance for a reply. Ya know, the fact that you have successfully learned to use eBay despite not being able to directly sell on eBay might explain why sooooooo many sellers (including dealers) keep advertising on eBay when none of their cars sell on eBay.

I recently sold a pickup on Ebay as soon as it reached my reserve. $ was wired, truck was shipped out of state. I had a telephone # included in my ad, so I also had some conversations with potential buyers. No inspection was done by the buyer in my case.

I think many just don't like to mess with Ebay. Personally I don't, I prefer a good old fashioned face to face deal. My '88 Targa was found by the buyer from my Ebay ad, but he didn't buy it through Ebay. I'm on Porsche #8, and have owned countless other cars. I have car ADD so tend to buy and sell a lot, more often than not my cars go out of state. Of the 7 Porsches that I've sold, only one has sold to a KS buyer.