Used in 2006
“How many cars do you think we sold today?”
We got a call from Kristin in January, 2006. She was in an accident while driving the 1993 Honda Accord. It was not drivable and was totaled. We had it for 10 1/2 years and ended with 142,000 miles. So, it served us well! We had just bought Karen a new car in 2005 and weren’t ready to replace Jeff’s 6-year old car for about 3 or 4 more years. So, we began a search for a used car.
I created a spreadsheet with possible vehicles, their list price, the KBB trade in value and the KBB retail value. It included Honda Civics and Accords with years from 1994 to 2000, mileage from 62k to 134k and list prices from $4,995 to $9,998. I looked at some of them and called some of them. The lowest priced was $4,995 for a 1994 Accord with 130k miles. The next lowest price was $7500. A 1998 Accord with only 53k miles and listed for $9,500 sold in only an hour (I was told).
Then I found a 1997 Accord close by priced 2nd lowest of the group at $6,999 with 118k miles. The miles per year on this (13.5k) were comparable to the 1993 Accord that we had. The KBB trade in value on this 1997 was $2,375 and the KBB retail value was $6,775. I decided to go to Jeep Eagle and look at it. It was close to closing time (6pm) on January 28, 2006.
I asked to see the used Accord and the documents they had on it. They had title check reports, vehicle information and documents of the work they did to it. They had it since about Jan 16 and had made some repairs. It was first a rental vehicle in Cleveland, OH for 7 months and got 18k miles during that time. Then it was owned by a (local) woman in Olathe from Nov 1997 until Jan 2006. She traded it for a new Jeep. Jeep Eagle made some repairs to it: New tires $300, axle shaft repair and oil change $400 and other initial inspections (frame, etc).
I took it on a test drive and made my own inspections. I noticed that it had dents and when testing each of the power windows, some of them were very slow and noisy. I looked at the salesman, laughed and said, “That doesn’t sound very good.” I was ready to talk about pricing. I asked if they had any admin fees and he said, yes, $189. I probably said something like, “that’s disappointing.” I was hoping I could buy this car for $4500.
I reminded them about the window work that needed to be done. I told them I know you gave about $2400 for trade in on this, spent $300 on tires, $400 on other repairs and I figured $600 on misc inspections and updates. I told them, “after adding $500 for a reasonable profit margin, I’m willing to give you $4200 cash right now for this vehicle.” He said he has to talk to the manager, who was the only other person in the office now since it was after closing time. He came back and told me that they can’t sell for $4200, but they can sell for $5000. I right away asked, “So, that would be $4811 before the admin fee, right?” He smiled, shook his head and replied, “No, that would be $5000 before the admin fee.” I told him I’ll take that deal. He told me that, at that price, they won’t be able to make any more repairs. I said that’s fine.
After everything was written up and finalized, he asked me, “How many cars do you think we sold today?” I said, “One?” He said, “Zero.” So, apparently they really needed to sell a car that day, and so stayed 60-90 minutes after closing to make the sale. I told him, “Well, I paid $500 more for this car than I wanted to pay.” He said, “Well, we sold this car for $1500 less than what we wanted to sell it for. So, who do you think got the better deal?”
Jeep Eagle had the sales agreement from when the previous owner purchased it in 1997 (she must have given it to them). I ended up with a copy of it. Maybe they included it when I asked for any documents they had on it. Maybe they were aware that they gave it to me. It had the owners name and address. I was only aware of the prior owner from my first (1973) purchase and this one. No other dealer shared this before or after this one. All pricing info was included too. This woman paid $20,999 in Sept 1997 for this 1997 Accord with 18k miles. The original MSRP for this was $18,190 nine months earlier. Hmmmm.
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