Get your trade-in valued before you fall in love with anything
The trade-in is where a good deal quietly becomes an average one. Not through anything improper — simply because two numbers moving at once are much harder to evaluate than one.
- Filed by
- Dale Wexler
- Head of standards
- Published
- Length
- 1 min read
When price and trade value are discussed together, a generous-sounding allowance can be offset by a firmer price, and a keen price can be offset by a thin allowance. Both can be presented as a concession. The remedy is procedural rather than adversarial: find out what your machine is worth to someone who is not selling you anything.
Establish an independent floor
- 01
Get two or three outright purchase offers
Other dealers and buying services will quote to buy your machine with no purchase attached. That gives you a cash floor that owes nothing to the deal in front of you.
- 02
Check what comparable units are actually listed at
Look at asking prices for the same model, hours or mileage, and condition in your region. Retail asking prices are not what you will be offered, but they bound the conversation.
- 03
Document condition before the appraisal
Photographs, service records, and receipts for recent work all support the number you are asking for, and take arguable deductions off the table.
- 04
Settle the purchase price first, in writing
Only once the price is fixed should the trade be introduced. If the price moves when the trade appears, the two were never separate.
One caution specific to equipment and RVs: outstanding finance on the machine you are trading complicates every part of this. Get the payoff figure from your lender in writing first, and confirm who is responsible for settling it and by when.