You wouldn’t see the money you’d spend on maintenance or cosmetic improvements, but if you fix these problems, you’ll increase your chances of selling the car faster. Also fix the brakes atleast 🤷🏻‍♂️ brake pads are relatively cheap to buy and replace

There are cheap DIY fixes for fogged headlights. The headliner is a job for a pro. Maybe get a quote for that so you know what it would cost, this will be useful.when talking to buyers. If it is safe to drive, I would leave the brakes unless you can do them yourself for the price of the parts only. Chances are, the next owner will do these themselves.

Cheap fixes. Those things will definitely turn people off and lower the offer price . Skip brake job .

Headliner tacks are around $5. Buy a pack of them. Maybe even two packs. They will make it look better for a cost and an ease that cannot be beaten.

For a 2012 Jetta with 100k miles, minor fixes like defogging headlights and reattaching the headliner cheaply could help with resale appeal. Tint removal depends on cost, but it’s not a deal-breaker. Brake pads? If they’re critical, replace them; otherwise, just disclose it. Since the car isn’t worth much, avoid costly repairs that won’t significantly boost value. Check CarfaxDeals . com for pricing insights.

It's not even a consideration.

Treat cars like a sunk cost, not investments. If you can only afford the car because you can sell it for a decent amount after a few years which makes your monthly cost of ownership go down, you can't afford it.

In reality it’s not even on my radar since I keep cars till their almost dead but it’s a good indicator of long term quality.

Bottom of my list. I buy Toyotas and keep them a long time.

#7, not that important

Resale value is usually not random. It’s an indication of either how much the car was discounted new or that the car has terrible reliability as it ages or known problems that happen outside of the warranty window (Hyundai/Kai engines, electrical issues in luxury cars, Nisssan CVTs, etc). If it’s the first reason I don’t care, I do care about the second one.

Thanks for posting, /u/LoweeLL! This comment is a copy of your post so readers can see the original text if your post is edited or removed. This comment is NOT accusing you of anything.

Title. Is it worth it driving dealership to dealership or should I just go to a third-party used car salesman and hope they overpay? I just don't want to waste anyone's time during appraisals.

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Are you trying to trade it in or sell it?

Get a few appraisals done and whoever has the car you want had to try and hit that number

Keep in mind if you’re in a tax credit state, if you sell the car to a different dealer or institution, you lose that

No.

Also don’t get it painted in the cheap (definitely don’t do it Tijuana cheap cheap as you might as well just spray paint it at that point), it doesn’t end well.

I would much rather buy a car with body damage and beat up paint than an obviously cheap paint job that leaves me wondering what kind of damage it’s hiding.

Just let it be what it is and what it is worth otherwise you are going to get maaaybe half your money back if you’re lucky.

Are we talking hundreds for a decent paint job vs thousands for one? Or hundreds for a shitty paint job?

Leave it how it is

Negative.

No.

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This is hit and miss, the trade in can be worked into the deal and if you tell him how great your trade in is their trick is to offer you a good trade in price but not come down on prices.
Low hanging fruit? Clean, valet, wax

Give it a clean and vacuum. A bit of a polish will never go amiss. If something is actually broken and could affect the safety of the vehicle then fix it.

Depends on how much it will cost vs what you’ll gain. If it looks knackered try and tidy it up a bit.

If you are doing it yourself and all that is involved is time why would you not do things to get the best price possible. A t-cut and polish will only take a couple of hours. First impressions count.

There's a pretty famous TikTokker called Dave Fishwick. Who's always "buying" helicopters, Ferraris and so on. He is genuinely loaded. He started by borrowing old bangers from car dealers, cleaning them up and splitting the difference in the price "uplift". Before being able to afford the cars himself, cleaning them up and selling them on. Before long he started to specialise in minibuses and became the UK's largest minibus dealer. Then he bought his first helicopter and started leasing it out...........

A clean car without niggles, is worth more, quicker to sell and less embarrassing to have on the forecourt. A dealer is probably thinking that he'll have to get an employee to spend X hours at say £20+ including NI etc to sort it out. Unless he can off load it to an apprentice.

You are absolutely not the only one. I laugh inside when people put so much weight on what someone else will pay for their car in so many years time.

I also own my cars for 10+ years so the depreciation is so high it doesn't really matter in the end. Trade the fucker in and be done with it.

Dude, I've bought multiple French and Italian cars. I see your depreciation and I raise you. But you can't help what you love.

Covid gave people the false idea of resale. You buy a Rav4 Hybrid in 2020 after a 14month waitlist and now its worth $10k more.

Those days are gone and we're back to normal.

100%. I buy it for me. Never regretted the decision to actually be driving a car and spec I like.

I don’t sell my cars.

Resale value is at the very bottom of my list. What matters is if said cars give me joy. Which they all do.

You lost, pal?

Thanks American ChatGPT bot!

I refuse to believe that a Brit has owned an Accord, Camry and Mustang. That's the most American shit I've read.