Used Car Pricing

[unDummy]

CPO = beat to [censored] with minimal maintenance...

For that money, shop around and buy a new car.

 

[Hokiefyd]

Originally Posted By: unDummy
CPO = beat to [censored] with minimal maintenance...

For that money, shop around and buy a new car.


You could say the same, really, about any used car, regarding being used and abused.

Depending on the manufacturer, CPO cars can be good values. I bought one once a few years ago. The car was 14 months old at the time, and had 1 previous owner (a private party). They bought it from that dealership, and the dealership had all the service records on it. I paid $2,000 less for the CPO car that I would have for a new model. However, with just 1 year and 16,000 miles on the CPO car, I still consider that "new" anyway. Plus, with a CPO car (from this particular manufacturer), the powertrain warranty is extended out to 7 years or 100,000 miles. If I bought a new one, it'd have been 5 years or 60,000 miles. So I traded 14 months of age for 2 more years of powertrain protection, plus pocketed 2 grand.

It can be a fair deal, but it all depends on the situation.

 

[CROWNVIC4LIFE]

Originally Posted By: unDummy
CPO = beat to [censored] with minimal maintenance...

For that money, shop around and buy a new car.




My 88 Town Car was a CPO car...I got it with 15K miles on it and paid around 15K bucks for it when it was about 11 months old...I kept it for 11 years and it had over 300K miles on when I finally sold it to some lady for 1500 bucks...Everything worked in it perfectly when I sold it to her.

All our Panthers are COP cars...We saved an average of 10K bucks on each car and they came with a extended warranty.

 

[rpn453]

That Camry is worth about 81% of new value in my eyes. If you can get a new one for $19k plus tax, I'd value that used one at $15.5k.

I determine used car values by discounting in the range of 13% to 17% per one year or 12k miles. I would discount much more for a used vehicle in or from a rust-prone region, but that probably doesn't apply to you. A one year old car with 24k miles, a 2 year old car with 12k miles, or a 0.5 year old car with 30k miles would all be discounted 1.5 years. So a well-maintained car from a trustworthy source that is desirable on the used market would be worth up to NewValue*(.87^(1.5)). If it costs more than that, I'd go new. 13% annual depreciation gives the first owner five years/60k for half the cost of the vehicle, and the second owner pays half the cost for the rest. It wouldn't seem fair to let someone have the best years of the car's life for less than that. I usually consider cars to be "born" when the model year is released, which is usually early fall, unless more details are known.