Save Thousands Of Dollars At Trade-in Time By Considering The Trade-in Value When Buying A New Car

For identical monthly finance payments, some cars will depreciate less than others and at trade-in time save thousands of dollars for the far-sighted owner

Getting residual values
This will take a little homework and shoe leather.
1.Identify several cars having similar features that can be leased for similar monthly payments.
2.Note and write down the residual value of the cars.
3.If you're not married to a brand name (most cars today have similar high quality) then if features are similar, go with the car having the highest residual value

The Internet may not be the best place to try to get this information. Surveys show that 60% of people looking to buy or lease a car do some searching on the Internet. This has made the manufacturers less willing to disclose residual values. In fact, some of the Big Three (GM, Ford, Chrysler) will not print them in a quotation from the dealer.

Residual values risks

• These values are at best educated guesses
  Residual value amounts are made by companies (or the car's manufacturer) as to what the car will be worth after a certain number of years. It is not a value you can take to the bank. The manufacturer might even inflate the value in order to increase the sale of leased cars, where by increasing the residual value the monthly lease payment is decreased a little bit and may be more completive vis--vis another make of car.


• Check popular publications
  If you sense from popular publications (newspapers, car magazines, etc) that the car is not selling very well and that there is a big push to get rid of inventory, then assume that the residual value might in fact be as much as 10% less than the actual value ought to be.


• Other risks in residual value accuracy
  This risk is present matter what two cars you select for comparison. Between now and, for example, three years from now, a competitive model might pop up that makes your current prospect a real dog by comparison, thereby decreasing its residual value. But that is true about any current model. So don't worry about that, as you are only trying to compare two residual values knowing that both are in danger of being similarly different in the next three (or 4, or 5 or 6) years.


• Residual values from the Internet
  Although the Internet is jammed with card sites offering residual values, they are mostly approximations. The largest automotive database I know of ($50,000 annual license fee to use) offers residual values for each of four different geographical areas of the United States. In the Northeast U.S. it offers one set of values for the western half of a State and a different set for the eastern half.
  

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