selling a Z (that you're still making monthly payments on)...
 

this section should be expanded to Buying/Leasing/Selling (a Z)... haha dont hate :)..

anyways, quick question... i want to sell the Z, but im still making payments on it through a credit union... What is the proper way to sell it? I heard that there is a form that you can get at the DMV that turns over ownership to the new owner without the pink slip.. then after the person hands you the money, you just pay off the CU and everything is done... is this the best way to do it?

is doing a trade-in for something else a bad idea? or are there benefits to doing this?

sorry if these questions are dumb.. i just never sold a car before, let alone a car i didnt actually own...

thanks in advance :)

the CU will not release ownership to the next person unless your loan is paid in full - so to get the pink slip, you'll need the car paid off in full. if they are going to take over the payments in some form you will need to talk to your CU to see how or if they can do that.

downside to trading it in is you will get a couple grand less then what you could privately sell for. the upside to it is hardly anyones buying a car right now and you don't have to deal with any of the hassle.

Never heard of the DMV process you are talking about. your CU owns your car until they are paid no matter what.

You might want to consider when you meet the buyer to finalize the transaction, etc. You have the buyer meet you at your credit union. That way the CU can verify his payment (i.e. not a fake/stolen bank draft, etc.), can settle up with you, and sign the title over to the buyer on the spot.

Check with your CU; they can guide you through the process.

No buyer in his right mind is going to pay you without getting the clear pink slip.

a. Yes you can sell a vehicle with a lien.

b. You cannot transfer a title with a lean.

Personally I would not buy a vehicle with a lien. Too much hassle.

Are you upside-down, or no?

Funny you should say that...my wife sold her Cadillac over the weekend to a cash buyer ( I think he was a drug dealer ala Scarface) and we gave him a bill of sale and told him we would mail him the title. My wife and I were both in the legal field so we have no intentions of screwing the guy...and no smart comments about lawyers being honest :)

I did this when I bought my Z about a month ago. After the buyer and I had agreed on a price, we went to his CU. The CU was very helpful and almost acted as an escrow agent. I gave the CU the cashier's check made out to the buyer, they confirmed the cashier's check, paid off the seller's loan, gave him the title to sign over to me and paid him the excess. It was almost like an escrow because he did have the funds himself for a few minutes.

The other thing you can do is to meet at your CU, get the payoff amount, have the buyer pay off the CU with one check and pay you the balance with another, assuming your not upside down on the car. Then you have the title signed over to you by the CU.

I've also bought a car where it used a non-local lender. I spoke with the sellers lien holder and got the payoff amount. I then sent a check to the lender along with a copy of the bill of sale. They then sent the title directly to me once the check cleared.

Good idea, the CU will be helpful. A buyer might pay you without getting the title as long as they can be assured of getting it directly from the lien holder.

It can be a hassle, but then again you can often get the best deals when someone owes money on the car. I paid 20k for an '06 GT Coupe with under 21k miles.

thanks for all the replies guys...

so if i do decide to do a trade-in for something else, how does that work? does the CU transfer over the loan to the new car?

depending on what you get for your trade in amount.. random examples:

say you owe 15k, they give you 13k for your trade in .. thats being upside down, and you want to avoid it. the bank could potentially still give you a loan for the new car, usually they will approve up to a certain percentage of the wholesale value of the car, say 120% of the wholesale value of the car you want, anymore you'd have to pay as a down payment. they roll that 2k debt on top of it, as long as its still under that % value. the dealer will know how to play with the numbers to get it approved

say you owe 13k and they give you 15k for your trade in .. they pay off your loan and take 2k off of the asking price of the car - beware, dealers can be shady, make sure you are getting that 2k off somewhere..

I advise you to take someone with more expierience with you so you don't get f'ed with.

oh for sure man.. thanks that really helps... i had no idea what "upside-down" meant either :o

i dont think im upside down... it owe like 14K and i believe the car is worth atleast 18K (05 enth auto with 45K miles)

Ay bro my offer still stands to buy up some of your audio stuff, just let me know whats up, so that I save up, and don't spend the cash lol.

in all honesty they could probably only sell your car for around 17-18k right now. they will offer you less in trade, I would expect a 13-15k off of trade in. youll break even..

another word of advice, do not tell them how much you owe on your car, they dont need to know until much later. if you say you owe 13k they are likely going to offer you 13k and lowball you on it.

I always tell them I am not trading in my car at all and I just work on getting the price on my desired car down first.. once thats hammered out, I throw it out there that I want to trade in my car, then I work on negotiating that to a fair price. its easier when they arent playing with numbers that are generated to be *greatly* in their favor from the start.

Here's what I did... not perfect, but seemed like the best option...

I was buying from a private owner out of state, about 1:40 from me. I went up, looked at the car, agreed to buy it and left him a deposit. We wrote up a bill of sale with photocopies of both of our licenses.

He owed money on the car through a CU. He didn't have the cash to do a payoff. The car was the right price, and he seemed very honest (went to his house, he let me take a test drive with my wife without him, etc). The CU hours sucked, and I couldn't really get there to meet him during business hours. Also, the CU would not have released the title immediately since it was held at their corporate office, so the meet there thing wouldn't work easily.

I verified there was only the one lien he said there was using the Mass DMV web site.

He brought the car down to me, and turned the car over to me. I called his CU with him at my house and paid his loan over the phone. We wrote up a contract saying I would pay the rest when I got the title. I had the car at least.

Title was mailed to him, we met half way and swapped the balance of the loan (a few K) for the title.

This scheme is not perfect, but at least there is a paper trail every step of the way and you get the car when you pay off the loan for the seller.