Hello e550 aficionados!

Have any of you ever sold this model as a private seller ? Or have you ever bought one from a private seller?

If so, in either case, did you pay or sell for the amount you wanted or was it markedly lower? Did it come with an extended warranty or just residual factory warranty (or no warranty) ?

For sellers : how long did it take you to sell the car? Where did you advertise?

I'm interested in knowing if these cars sell well when they're sold by a private seller vs. a dealership...

Do people buy these cars from private sellers?

 

There is a recent thread with a private owner selling right now.

1) It's very difficult to sell any expensive car as a private seller. Most people don't have the cash or are not savvy enough to get credit union financing on their own for something costing over $20K or even less.

2) When I look for used cars, I don't care if it comes from a dealer or private seller. The Carfax report or similar will tell you whether it has dealer service records, accidents, or any other issues. I'm mechanically inclined enough to inspect a car for defects on my own, such as painted panels, hidden damage, or general state of care and maintenance. If you're not, then find a friend that is to come with you, or take it to a dealer or shop to get a "pre-purchase inspection". On a more expensive MB, I would probably take it to my local MB dealer for this. They will probably charge about 1-2 hours of labor and provide a full report of any possible defects. If the seller has nothing to hide, then they should be fine with a PPI.

3) I'm one who does not care about warranties, as I have never used a warranty for anything, and only had 1 new car with warranty in my life that I never needed. Balance of factory warranty or even previous CPO warranty should transfer. There are many after-market warranty sellers, because they make big profit on selling you warranties that cost thousands and never get used.

4) As a seller of many used cars in the past, I previously advertised with Autotrader, but now I get minimal responses from that paid advertising, and I get much more response by listing on Craigslist. The only issues there is that you have to bump your post about every 2 days, and weed through responses from tons of scammers or people just trying to collect your data. Cars.com is also free to list as private seller, and seems to have all the same postings as Autotrader.com. Again, the cheaper the vehicle, the easier to sell. Cars in the sub $10K range will sell rather quickly if in good condition and desirable, anywhere from 1 day to 1 month or so. More expensive cars int the $10K-20K range might sell privately, but take longer, like maybe 3 months, unless the price is just set really below market to sell quickly. I've never even attempted to private sale anything over $20K per reasons stated above.

 

I bought a 2010 E550 from a private seller. He had the car on sale for 1 year before I came along. No warranty - not too worried and hope nothing major happens to my car -lol. As JonUF02 mentioned, it's hard to get a buyer that wants to pay over $20K. The primary benefit of buying from a private seller is NOT having to deal with a dealer (hidden fees, selling tactics, and so on). IMO.

 

Those two posts above capture it all. The dealer always has the upper hand because of the financing angle, which a private party does not have on a high value car.
There is a reason that every street corner has a pop up auto sales business with a lot full of questionable cars. People on the low end of the spectrum need transportation and they can finance with these guys all day long.

 

JonUF02 great post!

I am also sceptical that buyers would buy from a private seller when the price is high... Ergo the post. Why would they when they can get financing at a dealer. Thanks for letting me know that is pretty factual.

My experience as a private seller is selling my cars privately when they were worth around 5k$ (bought new and sold years later). So nothing close to being 20k or more.

Also, I have never traded in my cars when buying a replacement car because I think they get you back on any reductions they give you on the new car.

All that said, if I buyback this E550 4Matic I may not be able to sell it privately unless it's way down the road where it's value is less than 20k$... I may have to keep it longer then, so that means it would be better to purchase an extended warranty... Or sell it before the manufacturer's warranty ends (1 year away) to save on buying that warranty or simply take a chance with no warranty and keep it.

As for warranties, especially for a luxury car that is known to be expensive to fix, wouldn't be better to buy an extended warranty?

 

Didn't you just buy one?

 

Congrats on your purchase. The e550 is a great car.

As for warranty : aren't you a little worried about costs on major repairs down the road? I know that for luxury cars it's more expensive to repair than "regular" middle class cars.

 

Hi CEB

No. I have yet to buy it... But I did convince the dealer to keep it out of the system until next Thursday.

I'm still not done weighing the pros and cons lol... I know I know...


For those who don't know what I'm talking about, please see my 1st thread on this forum.

 

I looked up your old thread. You're going to buy this from an MB dealer right?

I'm not sure what happened in the previous thread, but in the US you could have gotten the extended warranty from MB and they sell a 7 year/100k mile warranty which could be bought from any dealer. I'm guessing it's the same in Canada. That would have avoided all the CPO problems. The US rules is that if you buy it from an MB dealer, it has to be a CPO in order to buy a couple extra years otherwise it won't qualify. If it's not an MB dealer, you can buy the extended warranty. The $3500 CPO is to make sure it qualifies, there's things they have to do like put new tires on if the current ones are below a certain tread depth, brakes, etc.

As for your original questions, in the US we have nadaguide and KBB which are used for pricing. Most sellers and dealers will quote KBB so KBB tends to be on the high side. The car is really only worth what the book says it is, the classifieds are filled with ads from people who are looking for more than book because they always feel their car is pristine. But it won't come with any service or support that you would get from a dealer and there are certain things that even a warranty won't cover, but you can get the dealer to do as part of regular negotiations like getting them to do brakes or tires if needed. A private seller probably won't do those or have the resources to get those done.

What it really boils down to is that these cars have great depreciation and you won't have much luck trying to minimize it when you're trying to sell it. You have to charge less than the dealer or no one will be interested. Because of the sales tax in the US, many owners end up trading the car in instead of selling it privately which is why there are few private sales. For instance if you trade in the car for 30k and buy a new one for 60k, you just pay the sales tax on the 30k difference instead of the entire 60k. So in some states, you'd have to get at least 2k over that as a private seller to match what a dealer offers. Maybe they also can't be bothered trying to make a little extra over what the dealer offers.

 

The true benefit from buying Private Seller is because there is NO Tax in the US, if you do not have a business license, why would you pay tax, when transferring a vehicle there is no requirement on the transfer documents that require a receipt or invoice, just the signatures of both parties concerned to make the transfer document legally bound.

 

In states that have a sales tax, you're required to pay the sales tax when you register the car. If you don't drive it on public roads, then you wouldn't have to pay the sales tax. There's just a few US states that don't have a sales tax. If you use a fake number on the sales document, the registry will use the book value from a guide like nadaguide to calculate the correct sales tax.

 

There is sales tax on private sales in Illinois where I live. It is capped, but you still need to pay the tax man.

 

I would never buy a car from a dealer. But you have to be careful when buying off hands too, I got mine from original owner. You have to put some time in to it and find the car you like. that doesn't have any accident records and been cared for well.

Yes, it is harder to sell a pricy car like that. Most people want to make payments on it. But if you buy it at the dealer, its probably $500 just in there doc fees, that you throwing in to the hole.

 

With a private seller you have little recourse if the car turns out to have an issue. In most states a dealer is required to provide some sort of warranty and you generally have some assurance that there will be no title issues.

With most cars you can't really be sure if it is as described. The car you are looking at has a history that is known to you.

 

The doc fee is just part of the price at the dealer. It used to mean more, but all dealers have them and if you ask up front what it is, you will know what the total price is out the door.

I would love to buy from a private party too, but most cars in this range are sold by dealers, very few private party. And the private party ones tend to want as much as the dealer or more, but don't offer any services which you would get at the dealer.

 

Most states don't care where you bought the car (dealer or private party) and sales tax is due whenever there is a title transfer. There are special rules for transfers within families but the state always gets their money.

 

I'm not worried about the warranty. I only drive about 6000 to 7000 miles per year so I can take some chances I guess. The warranty would probably be over before I notice an issue.

And, if you buy from private party you will save on taxes at the dmv versus the dealer. You don't need to write exactly how much u paid for the car if it's a private party buy.

 

Try again. The DMV will check the NADA guide to check if the stated sales price matches the values in the guide. If it isn't close then you get congratulated on the good buy and pay taxes on the fair market value of the car. If the value is too far off then you could be charged with falsifying an official document.

Is that worth saving a few bucks on taxes?

 

g4benz..... SSSSHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!

 

Lol you guys are funny

 

What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas!!!

 

Form RUT 50 (if anyone wants to look it up) establishes the tax due on private party sales in Illinois. As I said earlier it is capped. The maximum tax is $1,500 no matter how valuable the car.
If I buy a $50,000 car from a dealer I will pay approx. $5,000 in tax. Same car from a private party is a $1,500 tax bill.

 

Here in Ohio we pay %8 off the car value no matter where you buy dealer or privet

 

Unfortunately, in Canada, even for private sales, unless it's between family members, the buyer has to pay provincial tax on the book value or the selling price, whichever is highest.

 

My thought exactly : the dealer can offer financing that the private seller cannot, therefore the dealer can sell higher-priced cars...