Here are some car selling hacks that sgCarMart Quotz has devised from selling more than 15,000 cars in the past 10 years, to help you achieve the maximum value.
With over 15,000 cars sold to used car dealers, sgCarMart Quotz has a wealth of experience (10 years’ worth in fact) and knowledge in the used car industry and we’ve decided to impart some ‘selling-your-car-hacks’ that dealers usually look out for and will even offer a higher bid price than what you might expect to receive!
Backed by ten years of data and sage advice from our vehicle inspectors, you’ll catch a used car dealer’s eye if:
1. You drive a Toyota or Honda
Toyota and Honda are ranked 1st and 2nd respectively regarding dealer popularity (based on our 2017 transactions with dealers).
“Japanese cars are more attractive to used car dealers because of a couple of factors. They are easy to maintain, more affordable, can fetch a higher resale value because of their popularity with Singaporeans and are easy to service” – Billy, Senior Vehicle Inspection Officer, Quotz.
If you don’t own either a Toyota or a Honda, check out where your respective brands are on our ‘used car popularity chart’.
With Toyota ranked as the most popular brand, it would come as no surprise to know that the most popular car for dealers in 2017 was the Toyota Altis (The Altis made up 18% of Toyotas sold with Quotz in 2017).
2. Your car is in Pearl White, Black or Grey/Silver
Unless you have a brand that produces cars in iconic colours, like Ferrari’s Red (Rosso Corsa) or Lamborghini’s Green (Verde Ithaca), you might want to stick to popular and safer colours like Pearl White, Black or Grey/Silver colours (sounds like my wardrobe colour scheme). Oh, and the occasional red for festive occasions like Chinese New Year!
“The safe colours are Pearl White, Black, Grey or Silver. Dealers also like these colours because they are very sellable. You can have two same car models, but one can be pink/green/yellow while the other is black or silver and 100% of the time, dealers will give a higher bid price for the black or silver car” – Billy, Senior Vehicle Inspection Officer, Quotz.
3. You do not have unorthodox modifications
Performance modifications might have been a factor for resale value ten years ago when they were all the rage (remember the EVO and STI rivalry?). However, at present, if you want your car to give you the maximum resale value, it would be best to keep it as stock as possible.
On whether dealer’s preferred stock or modifications, Jeremy, another one of Quotz’s Senior Vehicle Inspection Officers said, “dealers are less interested in how much you’ve thrown into ‘upgrading’ your car as opposed to how much they can sell your car for. $10,000 sound system? No thanks! They would rather you uninstall the sound system and reinstall the original one.”