How to sell salvage cars
7 Tips for Selling Frame Damaged Rebuilt Salvage or Branded Title Cars
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Oh what's going on everybody welcome
back to resurrect hopefully all of you
guys watching or well in today's video
we're gonna be going over seven tips on
how to successfully sell a vehicle with
a rebuilt title or a branded title known
sometimes so by extension this can apply
also to cars that have a clean title
that maybe have something really ugly on
a car facts such as structural or frame
damage those cars could be difficult to
sell as well but understand that there
is a difference between a salvage car a
rebuilt car and a clean title car with
an ugly Carfax so for the rest of the
video I might just wrump these all
together and refer to them as salvage
for simplification but in some ways
these cars will be very similar in some
ways they will be very different but all
of them are a challenge to sell so these
are my tips this is stuff that I've
learned in the past through experience
and it's worked for me so some of this
information might be useful to you I
hope it is I'm not saying these are the
best tips I'm not saying they are
correct in every single situation or
that they will even work for you but
they work for me they're a good rule of
thumb and I'm going to share them with
you so they can choose what makes to
sense to you you could discard the rest
of the information but if you do like
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so if you already have a rebuild title
car that you're trying to sell and you
can't it might be due to things that
happen prior to you obtaining this
vehicle so you cannot go back in time
and change these things but hopefully I
can give you some methods that will help
you tweak and increase your chance of
success in selling this vehicle and also
give any flippers out there some methods
in which you can use to more
successfully deal with salvage or
rebuild vehicles tip number one has to
do with price and price is the most
important thing
if you are selling a salvage vehicle at
a retail price or a private party value
you will be waiting for the rest of your
life to sell that car on the flip side
if you are selling a salvage or branded
vehicle branded title vehicle at 50% of
the retail value or less buyers are
going to be super suspicious about your
vehicle and nobody's going to want to
touch it with a 10-foot Pole they're
gonna think the car is junk buyers of
rebuilt cars expect a deal and
rightfully so so if you're in the
business of buying damaged cars and and
turning them for profit you need to take
this into consideration before you even
ever bid on the vehicle the success of
flipping salvage cars lies in the fact
that you buy cheap and you sell cheap it
just doesn't work any other way so if if
you're trying to sell a branded title
vehicle or just a clean title vehicle
with a really ugly Carfax it needs to be
a priced accordingly so if the car has a
branded title you need to be at around
20% under the retail value and work your
way down from there if it's a clean
title but with an ugly Carfax you might
be able to start at around 10% and
honestly the majority of the vehicles
that I've sold in the past ended up
selling between 20 and 30% under the
listed average retail value I say
average because there's a lot of
different methods for getting retail
values there's Kelley Blue Book there's
nad a there's other ones out there but I
think those two would probably be the
most accurate you can also use Carfax
cars calm and true car they will have
some useful information of actual sold
prices on ebay will give you some
interesting insights because you can
isolate by the title status whether it
was rebuilt or salvaged or clean now
Edmunds is on a completely different
planet I don't know where they get their
information if you I wouldn't rely on
Edmunds honestly as a buyer or a seller
but it makes for a good laugh every once
in a while also understand that the more
valuable the car is the smaller the
all the potential buyers will be because
most likely you'll be selling cars to
cash buyers due to the fact that most
banks would not loan on a branded title
vehicle so if you think about it think
about the amount of people that have
$5,000 in the bank versus the amount of
people who have $50,000 in the bank so
you'll typically be able to sell
vehicles that that are worth maybe less
money at a lower value that will be an
easier transaction of course there's
always exceptions to every rule but
generally this is true tip 2 has to do
with quality now I'm not going to
sugarcoat it at all selling a rebuilt or
branded title vehicle can be super
challenging sometimes but everyone
whistle while selling a branded title
vehicle can be pretty easy getting a
potential buyer to look at your car is
difficult even if it's sometimes a clean
title vehicle but it's a real shame to
lose a buyer because the quality of your
repair is poor so success at buying and
selling salvage cars depends greatly on
the quality of the work that was done
you need to be your biggest critic and
look at these cars as if you were buying
them for top dollar if it bothers you
it's gonna bother them
so before you even ever debut a car I
would show it to some family and friends
or some other people that are not
looking to buy your car so you can get
some feedback also if you get a
potential buyer to actually look to your
car and he walks away from the deal
without giving you any feedback you've
really lost some really valuable
information so I always try to ask
people what they think of the vehicle
sometimes they'll tell you something
that might hurt or be insulting but it's
really the best thing to not be insulted
but to really take that feedback as
constructive criticism and try to fix
whatever issues might they might have
brought out so that the next buyer won't
have those objections obviously you're
not going to be able to please every
single person some people are just
impossible to please and remember too
that you might get buyer one coming
through say your cards
junk it's worthless and then by our to
comes around and he thinks that the car
is amazing it's the best deal ever so
don't ever let one person's opinion of
the car bring you down but it's
important to listen to learn to adapt
and be patient and if you have
confidence in the quality of your work
it's going to show on how you talk to
people and it's going to make a
potential buyer more comfortable with
the deal tip three has to do with
patience there's been many times that I
in the past that I've dealt with a clean
title one owner vehicle that I was
trying to sell and I thought it would
sell in just a few days and it ended up
taking several months and then there's
times where I bought a vehicle that was
wrecked I didn't want to have to deal
with it so I just listed it for sale
completely damaged with a salvage title
not even drivable and it sold in just a
few days a lot of this has to do with
your price point but sometimes it also
has to do with selling at the right time
or the wrong time maybe your vehicle is
in demand
maybe there's a ton of cars just like
yours that are listed online and
everybody's competing for the best price
either way you have to prepare yourself
mentally and financially for the long
haul should it happen so if you're
trying to sell cars if you're buying and
selling salvage cars at the upper limit
of your budget let's say you had 10
grand to work with and you or you just
spent it all and you're working with
that but you now you're really strapped
to get that money back well you're gonna
be desperate to get that money back and
unfortunately when you talk to potential
buyers it's gonna shine through unless
you're a really special person so it's
very good to operate well within your
budget so you don't ever get into that
situation where you are desperate to
sell and so one way to help with that as
many rebuilders daily drive their
vehicles so they kind of serve as a dual
purpose so that if you're not selling it
well at least you're getting some good
use out of it so you've got to be
patient with salvaged cars and operate
well within your budget
tip number four has to do with
information too much information or too
little information will ruin a sale
every single time when you sell a
salvage car it's best to deal with those
issues or the issue of that nasty
salvage history or whatever accident
that car was in it's better to deal with
those issues as soon as possible don't
leave them as an elephant in the room so
obviously if your car has a branded or
ugly Carfax a brand new title or ugly
four Carfax don't ever hide that
tricking people is a super short-sighted
business plan remember you're trying to
find the right buyer do you really want
to waste your time with people who
aren't the right buyer so that being
said do you scream from the mountaintops
that your car was previously damaged and
is salvaged or do you kind of whisper it
in their ears so to speak well it
depends so my recommendation is your
advertising if you are advertising
locally make sure that you put somewhere
in the ad the vehicles past whether it
has a salvage or branded title you are
definitely obligated to do that legally
and it's the right thing to do but also
realize that many people just graze over
information they skim over it quickly
and that's a good thing because you do
want to get people to actually come and
look in this look at your vehicle
because if you if the first thing in
your description is that this car is
rebuild and salvage it was totaled
you're gonna lose a lot of buyers so yes
I'm not saying hide the information but
he put it in there but put it somewhere
where it's like they would have to read
the entire description so you actually
get people to look at that car and when
you get people to look at your car if
the quality of your repair is good and
they see it they might possibly fall in
love with your vehicle and then at the
end you could remind them that your
vehicle has this history sometimes
you'll get people to walk away because
that statement sometimes they may
actually consider buying your car some
of these people may not even know what a
salvage or rebuilt or they don't know
anything about this kind of stuff so you
may have to explain it to them
it's important that when you explain it
to them you explains to them properly
don't just say oh yeah the car was total
it was just found in a swamp no you want
to what you want to do is is you want
explain to them what really happens when
a car ends up with a salvage title and
what happens is that when a person gets
in an accident the insurance company
will either fix that car or they will
take possession of it and liquidated so
in that case the car was not fixed the
insurance company took ownership of that
vehicle they liquidated it you obtained
it you repaired it for a lower amount
which they were not able to do because
they only deal with probably high-end
body shops or maybe just body shops that
have a high labor rate so it's not worth
it for them but for you you can get the
work done for a reasonable amount and
now that you you have actually fixed
that car properly you are offering it
for sale it's been inspected and now
it's safe to drive however you have to
let them know that the title was branded
which means they've made notation on
that title that that happened you can
never remove that from the title and it
does affect the value of the vehicle but
it doesn't mean the car is a bad car so
it's important to explain it properly
people make them comfortable with the
deal and sometimes you will be able to
convert these type of people who don't
know what a salvage or repo car is
obviously explaining them all the facts
and letting them make their own decision
but sometimes people will actually go
with you now if you are selling the car
though and you have a listing and
somebody tells you they're coming from a
very far distance to see your car or
maybe you've advertised it nationally
and somebody has to travel from out of
state to see your car make sure that
nobody misses the fact that your car was
previously salvaged rebuilt because they
will be upset with you if even if it was
their fault but they miss this
information it's just better for you to
avoid that situation and just make sure
that they know up front what kind of
deal this is also when you ask people
will ask you about the accident history
be prepared to have photos of that
vehicle in its damaged State
and also be prepared to be able to
describe some of the work with that was
done nobody wants to buy a complete
question mark so if you don't have this
information you are at a huge
disadvantage and you're gonna have a
really tough time selling that card so
if you don't have this information get
on the net try to find some photos of
that vehicle as it was being sold at the
salvage auction if that was where it was
originally obtained you can go to a
website such as auto auctions dot IO or
similar website and you can just google
the VIN as well to try to find photos
and try to be able to explain what kind
of repair was done and people are gonna
want to know what part of the car was
fixed because when they go to sell a car
in the future that is a story that needs
to be passed to future buyers as well
also if there ever arises some issue
some mechanical issue or some type of
issue of the vehicle it helps to know
what was done to the car so people need
this kind of information without it they
may be uncomfortable buying your vehicle
and so while this information will
definitely help you with the deal too
much information too soon will destroy
the deal every single time so when
somebody asks you for pictures of the
car give them the pictures of the car I
don't think it's necessarily a good idea
to put in your listing pictures of the
damaged state of the vehicle I don't
think there's a lot of people that just
don't understand what can be fixed and
what can't be fixed but if they ask for
it given the information if they ask you
a question about what was done give them
the information don't try to hide
anything
however it's never a good idea to just
start ranting about every single bolt
you turn and every little thing that you
did to the car in this situation you may
sound too eager so what you want to do
is listen to their questions answer
their questions be honest about what
you've done to the vehicle but you want
to answer the question with enough
information no more no less be open and
honest
listen more talk less and you have to be
confident in your work and then the
potential buyer will be confident with
with you and always remember that as you
get into higher ticket vehicles if you
plan on doing that
you're gonna find out that their
standards are gonna be much much higher
so and they're going to size you up very
quickly as to whether or not you know
what you're talking about so it's
probably not a good idea to jump in to
the deep end of the pool too quickly
when it comes to dealing with higher
ticket cars too soon
tip number five is where to list the
vehicles you should be able you should
advertise that vehicle anywhere in
everywhere you can it's a good idea to
get a sign on that vehicle I mean this
is real basic stuff here but on a
salvage vehicle if they can see that
that car is in nice condition and they
see that the price is low that's a great
way to get a potential buyer and if
you're not on the Internet
you are definitely invisible so make
sure you get it on Craigslist cars comm
let go offer up Facebook marketplace in
any social and media accounts you want
to get it on any type of listing and
anywhere at the same time there's so
many cheap and free ways to get cars
listed on the net now if your car is a
little bit more of an uncommon car maybe
it's the thing that's kind of unique or
rare you might consider getting some
type of national exposure on auto trader
or eBay or something like that always
remove and realist ads regularly you
don't want people to see that you have
had this vehicle up for sale for six
months or more that's not going to help
you so delete the ad and renew it don't
hide your VIN that will also make people
very suspicious and have as many quality
photos as that site will let you have
and also consider getting some type of
picture hosting service so you can post
additional photos for national ads this
is definitely something you want to do
and for national ads you're going to
want to have some type of video because
not a lot of people do that and that
really really helps people to get a
idea of what kind of condition your car
is in and it makes people much more
comfortable and you are going to put
yourself way above the competition
because not a lot of people do that for
national ads tip number six is to save
your time weed out the wrong buyers as
quickly as possible most likely if
you're selling a salvage title car and
the potential buyer asks for CARFAX
right off the bat the buyer is probably
the wrong buyer because either they
don't understand the purpose of the
CARFAX or they didn't read the ad so it
is true that a Carfax will sometimes
have some service history records on it
so it is a reasonable question ask but
just recognize that that they're
probably the wrong buyer also people
asking for service records these type of
buyers are usually pretty picky you can
understand why they would ask for
service records but it's not something
you're going to have and most likely if
they need service records they're not
going to be able to handle the fact that
the car was a salvage car also of my
experience if the first thing the buyer
talks about is price if he tries to make
you an offer and I don't care if it's a
high offer or a lowball offer most
likely they are not a serious buyer you
have to think about the kind of
questions the serious buyer will
actually ask and a serious buyer who's
ready to buy a car wants to know a
little bit about the history of your car
and maybe why you're selling it now I'm
not saying this is always the case and
I'm not saying you should shoo away
these people and be rude to them
sometimes you can convert these people
to actual buyers but you need to
recognize what type of request or where
this is coming from and realize that
this isn't just a this shouldn't
discourage you because it didn't work
out with this type of person this type
of person may not be the right buyer
also sometimes you're going to get
requests for people to do a PPI or a
pre-purchase inspection which means they
want to take your car to a mechanic that
they pay in order for that mechanic to
do an inspection and then that mechanic
will privately relay that information to
the buyer whether or not you want to do
a pre-purchase inspection is completely
up to you
just know that in my experience rarely
do these deals ever work out and the
reason why I suspect is that show me a
mechanic who's willing to recommend a
previously salvaged car when he's being
paid the exact same amount whether or
not he gives it a thumbs up or a thumbs
down he's still being paid and honestly
most mechanics probably would rather be
cautious about this just tell the
potential buyer keep looking
get paid their $50 fee or whatever and
they don't have to deal with that guy
later on down the road when he finds out
the car's a piece of junk it's just
safer for them to tell them that the car
is not a good car so I might do a PPI
from time to time if it's at a place and
time that's convenient for me but a lot
of times I know through experience that
these things don't work out so it's
important to take that into
consideration and just understand that
there is a lot of buyers out there that
don't have all these high requirements
they always come along sooner or later
and when you do if you do decide to do a
PPI just make sure that you watch that
mechanic like a hawk there's some bad
eggs out there that want to maybe
harvest parts off your car or they might
unintentionally damage your car and just
make extra work for you so don't trust
your vehicle in the hands of other
people common-sense stuff but it's
important to know tip number seven is
along these lines and that is protect
yourself these are just general
guidelines for sending selling anything
or any vehicle but it's good to know
with vehicles but that it's definitely
not a good idea to initially bring these
buyers to your house try to meet people
at a public place and size them up first
if you ever bring them to your house if
you choose to do that most buyers are
going to be cash buyers but some will
want to do a cashier's check and
understandably so some people are not
comfortable with carrying around a lot
of cash so if they do that make sure
that you look at that cashier's check
and if there's a phone number on that
cashier's check don't call that phone
number get on the net
find out the phone number of that
financial institution call verify funds
try to do the deal during banking hours
so you can do that sometimes you're
gonna get people that want to use a
personal check I am not comfortable with
personal checks but if you do accept
them
make sure the buyer knows that you're
going to need their driver's license a
copy of it and you're gonna have to wait
several days for that money to clear or
you'll just have to go down the bank and
cash it immediately but just protect
yourself in that way know how to
identify counterfeit money because
there's a lot of that going on as well
in the rebuild and salvage title world
if they want to make they want to wire
you money obviously make sure it clears
and try to bring another person to the
deal if if you can just use common sense
if it doesn't feel right walk away and
this is super important if you sell a
title branded vehicle make sure that the
buyer signs some sort of document that
he was made aware that fact because they
could come back and have a legal basis
to make you buy that vehicle back so you
want to make sure they sign some type of
document so if you make sure that your
price and your quality is in check if
you have patience if you get and give
the right amount of information if you
advertise properly and you make sure not
to waste your time and you protect
yourself you can successfully flip
salvaged cars so please make any
comments below up stay tuned for future
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truly appreciate you guys watching and
I'll see you next time
Oh
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