Your Model 3 already has a number. Here is what it left out.
A number that came off a website was built from what a form can hold. A registration, an odometer reading, a dropdown.
Ours starts there, and then adds the things somebody has to actually ask you about.
- Battery electric
- Australia wide
- Finance settled directly
4.9/5 from 500+ sellers across The Car Buyers group
The second number
What an instant quote had no way of knowing
If you have already put the registration into a valuation site and did not quite believe what came back, it is worth understanding what that number was made of.
A price that arrives in a few seconds can only be built from what the form could hold, and the form has no box for what is in the boot, what has been bolted to the car, what the car has been used for on weeknights, or what the battery reads. A buyer working from that has to price for the version of your car that would cost them the most, because they are the one carrying the guess. It is not dishonest. It is just a number set where it is safe to set one.
The second number takes longer for exactly that reason. We ask the questions the form had no boxes for, give you a real price range on the phone, and then an inspector comes to your home or your work and reads the battery state of health, which on an electric car moves the value more than kilometres do. Some of what turns up lifts the number and some of it lowers it. You see all of it either way, and you see it before anything is signed.
The other half of what the first number missed is everything that comes with the car. What is under the boot floor, the box on the garage wall if it is coming across, whatever it is that unlocks the car. None of that fits in a valuation form, so none of it was in the price, and a seller who does not mention it usually ends up handing it over for nothing.
Before we quote
What we ask about a Model 3
The questions a valuation form has no box for. Answer them on the call and the range we give you is a range that still stands at the door.
- What is actually in the boot, under the floor?
- Whatever came with the car and whatever you have bought for it since. This is the part of the sale a screen cannot see and the easiest part to forget to mention, so it tends to get handed across for free. Tell us what is in there and it goes into the number instead.
- Is there a tow bar on it?
- If one has been fitted, tell us who did the work and whether there is any paperwork for it. It is a change somebody made to the car after it was delivered, and it is better in the conversation early than met for the first time in the driveway.
- Has it ever been driven on a rideshare platform?
- Say so on the call. It changes what the inspector looks at rather than whether we are buying, and it is precisely the kind of thing an online price never contains, so it surfaces later at the worst possible moment. Raised at the start, it is simply priced.
- Is the wall box coming with the car, or staying with the house?
- Both answers are fine and they are two different numbers. If the box is coming across it is part of what we are buying. If it stays because the house is staying, we need that too, since a photo of a car plugged in at home says nothing about who owns the thing it is plugged into.
- Do you still have everything that opens the car?
- All of it, and whether it is still in the house rather than in a drawer at an old address. If something has gone missing that is not a problem, it is a line in the number. It is a small thing to sort out in advance and an awkward one to find on handover day.
Whatever you tell us
Three things that do not change once you answer
- The range holds if the car matches the description. It is built out of what you tell us, so the fuller the answers the tighter it gets, and the inspector arrives to confirm that number rather than to reopen it.
- The other quote stays out of it. Show us what you were offered or keep it to yourself, it makes no difference here. We are not trying to inch past somebody else's offer, we are trying to explain how ours was reached.
- Saying no costs you nothing. Have the car looked at, hear the number and walk away. The inspection is free, there is no obligation at any point, and nobody rings you the following week to try again.
The second opinion
What sellers ask us after the first number
I have already been quoted online. Is it worth doing this as well?
That is the usual reason people call. The other number was built from a form and ours is built from the car, so they are not the same measurement and there is no reason to expect the same answer. If ours comes out lower, we will tell you why, and you are free to take theirs.
Does mentioning a tow bar or rideshare work count against me?
It changes the number and it does not change whether we buy the car. What actually costs a seller money is a price agreed on a description that turns out not to match, because that is the price that moves in your own driveway with somebody standing in front of you.
The car is on a novated lease. Does that change how you quote it?
It changes who gets paid rather than what the car is worth. We ask the financier for the payout figure and settle it directly, and where the payout comes to more than the car is worth you get the shortfall in writing before anything is signed.
Get the questions asked properly, then compare the two numbers.
Or call us on 03 9000 0075 and talk it through first.