Trading in your old car - what to expect

OK I have a quick question with regard to changing your car. What is the “general” plan of action here. Do most people trade their cars in against a new one? Sell them privately to try and get a bit more cash? How often do you change you car? The reason for asking is we had hoped to trade our Audi in against another and got the shock of our lives when we were told what they would give us for it. Its lost €16K in 2.5 years. I am getting the impression that people buy a new car drive it to its death and then start all over again. Any words of experience would be helpful.

A dealer will always give you the "Schwacke Wert" A guide price for all dealers that buy secon hand cars. That price enables them to add on 2000 EUR throw the car onto the forcourt and sell it so someone again.
If you are buying a new car the you should barter with them. Dealers don't earn much on a new car anyway, but where they do earn their cash is with your custom for servicing the vehicle.
If they won't give you the price you want, then go an look elsewhere. Most Dealers can't afford to let you leave the premises w/o satisfying you.
You could always try and sell it privately, then you will get more for the car. But NEVER pay the price written on the price tag !!!

And yes, a car will loose up to 40% of its value in the first year. that is why alot of people buy so called "Jahreswagen" Most employees from car firms get huge reductions on the cars they make, and can afford to sell them after 9-12 months. Even with a profit.
Ford offers it, Audi do in Neckarsulm and Ingolstadt VW in Golfsburg ( Car park on a Suturday )
Alot of DC workers offer their cars in the local papers ...

I run mine to the ground...

@ Tue

you can find out how much your car is roughly worth here DAT vehicle evaluation page
I say roughly because mileage and overall condition of the vehicle will have an influence.
Most dealers will also try to go way below the DAT guideline.
However, its a very good base for you to at least know if the dealer is a cowboy (like
the Ford garage in Friedberg/Hessen who tried without success to claim that my prospective trade-in 306 was only
worth 30% of what it really was worth)

I ended up selling the 306 to an Autoankäufer, and then buying a Tageszulassung Mégane from this crowd here Intercar
The car had 4km on the clock when we picked it up from the Renault dealer, full Renault warranty, and it cost 30%
less than buying it direct from the dealer.
Intercar are the middlemen for a lot of car dealers of many different marques, and I would highly recommend them.

Bob.

I've done both (traded-in and sold 'privately').

It depends on your situation. If you can buy another car without having to trade-in or you can sell the car first and use that money to buy a newer one then you'd get more money by selling it privately.

Whatever you do... go and ask a 'private' buyer how much they would offer you first. The easiest kind of 'private' sale would be to a 2nd-hand car-dealer. You see them advertising a lot, saying that they buy cars.
I wanted to sell a Volvo estate a few years back. Went first to a Volvo dealer...they offered DM 1000. Asked one of these small-time dealers that lived a short distance away and they offered DM 4300. Needless to say, I sold it to Arthur Dailey and ignored the Volvo dealer.
The advantage of selling it to Arthur is that he will usually do the Abmeldung for you. If you sell to a private citizen, you've got more hassle. If you belong to the ADAC they have some really useful forms which you can use as a contract for this kind of private sale.

Well I was offered €2,700 as trade in for my old car and sold it privately for €8,600.
To get an idea of how much your car may fetch in a private sale look at adverts in the local papers and ask ADAC for the average value taking into account age, condition and kilometers. The ADAC also provided me with a sellers pack including a sale contract and a list of do's and don'ts.

If you sell it to someone privately the buyer needs to Abmeld you and hand in your number plates when they register the car to themselves. Up to this point the car remains registered to you. To cover yourself you need to make sure the contract is signed with the date and time of the handover.

Didn't quite come out as intended.

You know what I mean. The private dealers with their 'An- und Fair-kauf' adverts...

A couple of other places you could look to get a very rough idea of how much your car is worth is by scanning the used ads at:

http://eng.autoscout24.com/index.asp?language=ger

or

http://www.mobile.de/
English option at bottom of the page.

Actually I bought my current car which was a Mercedes Jahreswagen via http://www.mobile.de
Only had 6000km on the clock so was practically new. And am still happy with it.
(At the time I had no car to trade-in)

@ Jay

This is the problem, we are seeing cars on autoscout which have double our mileage and they are going for a reasonable price, which we would accept if we decided to trade it in. When my other half threw these prices at Mr "Audi" yesterday he said that they were overpriced and would never sell. But it appears to us that they are selling as we check quite regularly.

Thanks for all your advice and if you know anyone who wants a nearly 4yr old Audi S3 ask them to PM me.

Several things which will influance the value of the one is it a German brand, as they really hold there value, Japanese\Korean on the other hand lose value quicker. The other is if you have all your dealer stamps for all the inspections. When we sold our Toyota we had to lower the price a bit because we had no dealer stamps, we also sold it for less than what most were listed. 5000€ vs six to 8 most other places. As well Germans are real picky on the condition of the car, regardless of age, they expect show room condition, the people noticed several flaws scratches etc that i never noticed when i bought it.

I put a folder together with all the bills and documents which seemed to go down well. Also cleaned it up a lot and checked that the stone chip on the window wasn't going to be an issue when TÜV became due.

It wasn't nearly as much hassle as I expected it to be and I didn't get time wasters. If your German isn't up to it ask someone to help.