I recently had a query from a Glass’s customer who had found it difficult to get our suggested Private Sale value for his car. He noted that other online price guides had priced it lower, and stated that he had eventually taken a lesser offer, just to get rid of it. As someone who loves to sell, I found this slightly defeatist attitude a bit disappointing.
To get the best results, you have to work for them. Yes, the car market is currently quite busy and yes, good cars are sought after, but the world has not suddenly become populated by mind readers. “This is a good car and I would like to sell it” is a message that must be properly communicated to have the best effect, particularly when advertised online.
The car in question was a Skoda Octavia 1.6, 2003 on a 53 with under 50k miles, in a good metallic colour and excellent condition, with full dealer service history. Another online source gave a private sale value some £500 lower than ours, but their valuation was at 60k miles, with no options and assumed average condition.
Valuation rule one: compare apples with apples. Adjust all prices for the principal variables of age, mileage, condition and options (note that there is a degree of condition adjustment inherent in mileage adjustment). While Glass’s online values do adjust for mileage, condition and options, there are other factors which will influence the selling price. Perhaps chief amongst these is where and how you choose to market your vehicle.
I’ve been buying and selling on eBay for many years, and am a big fan of the trading environment. In theory, eBay auction sales are highly convenient. They promise a quick sale – time limited auction means you know when it will finish - and don’t necessarily involve the phone calls and tyre kickers that many sellers claim to be a real deterrent when it comes to private sale via classified ads.
One downside to online auction is that it is subject to perfectly reasonable human caution. You the seller know you are perfectly trustworthy, but does your buyer? Getting past buyers’ natural defence mechanisms must be the primary objective of any seller keen to achieve best results.
Detailed sales tips and tricks are a subject for future blog posts, but in short, my three top tips for using online channels effectively are:
1: Good text. Make a note of every positive thing about your car and ensure your text covers them all. Note that this should not require overly wordy descriptions. Proofread the text and get someone else to read it too. Pay attention to reader criticism! Find every spelling mistake and correct it. Use paragraphs and punctuation, they were invented to help you make your point. Trustworthy primary school teacher or volunteer charity worker? Say so in your text. Use the text to sell your item and to build trust – remember you are trying to get through those natural defences.
2: Good pictures. For God’s sake, wash the car! Clean the interior and then put some good pictures up on the site, in focus and in a moderately detailed size, preferably not featuring the bins or a broken-down fence in the background. See the first picture below for an example of an awful eBay picture of quite a nice item. The second picture below is what I would consider the minimum acceptable quality (though the ad size should be bigger). I took both pictures with a camera phone - not expensive equipment. The photos should reinforce the trustworthy impression presented by your text. I tend to use tidy, neutral locations for pictures, as they allow the car to speak for itself without “demographic baggage”.
3: Simple appearance. When it comes to layout, less is more. Don’t ruin great content with huge formatted fonts, coloured text or some of the other html parlour tricks that so many people use incorrectly. I would struggle to show you one eBay ad with nice formatting that will add value to the car, but could easily find you ten bad ones that will definitely cost the seller on the finish price. If you don’t know what you’re doing, keep it nice and simple.
The Skoda seller made some classic mistakes. There were three small pictures, none in focus and no real detail shown. Text was a basic “12 month’s tax, full history and 6 months MOT”. There was no mention of the good colour, spotless interior, Volkswagen-like build quality, proximity to train stations for viewings, the reason for sale (inherited a car) or the fact that they had just spent £500 on a full brake overhaul. The seller knew all this but, after taking the time to read the ad text, the buyers did not. It was all worth mentioning, and would all have made a difference to the price.
How and where you decide to sell your car is your business. The advice to private sellers is simple: make an effort. The rewards will always outweigh the cost.
