To start, I've been tracking the sales of 2000 CLK430's on ebaymotors for a couple weeks...and have to say I am surprised at how low many of the sales have been closing at. I have a couple theories on this:

(1) people are bypassing the ebay thing so as to not have to pay the fees to ebay, and having ridiculously high reserves so they don't 'sell'...or

(2) the market for the cars is so depressed that they aren't selling for what bluebook is calling for.

I am leaning more towards the first, but does anyone out there with a bit more insight into this market have any ideas?

Thanks! I am still working on acquiring one of these beautiful cars, and have been tracking the selling prices in ebay to try to get a gauge of what I should be paying.

Brian

 

I don't think ebay is a fair priceing engine for cars. Just like you said the dealers aren't as interested in paying extra money to ebay to close a deal so they set ridiculous high reserves.

When I was in the market for my car I approached many ebay dealers to ask about the car. Most of the time the dealer just named a price over the phone and offered to close out the
auction. I have also seen a lot of the dealer relist the cars many times.

When buying a car across the country you should be aware of the locale of the car. For example in the costal and snowy states rust can be of a problem. The salt used to melt the snow can do a lot of damage to the underside of the car. That's why cars from NY are much cheaper than cars from California.