How to Buy and Sell Used Cars for Fun and Profit

For the beginner I recommend you specialize. Learning one car type first. Pick one model, brand or car type and become an expert with that car. This will help to reduce your risk and will make you more confident in the beginning.

Here is a tip on becoming an expert on almost any car. Find an Internet forum related as closely as possible to your model or car type, then you can just read the questions and answers posted to that forum, on that car type and you will learn all kinds of stuff.

You can join the forums if you want to ask questions. And it’s all free. The following is a list of four search tools for finding forums, and newsgroups.

You can also go to a search engine like google.com and search on your car type and the word forum and get some results. (example: camaro + forum)

• http://www.boardreader.com
• http://www.forumone.com
• http://www.liszt.com
• http://www.dejanews.com

I prefer American made family cars. They are the cars I own and am most familiar with. There is a good demand for them and they can be bought for cash. They see less abuse than high performance cars or any other cars that teenagers might tend to own.

Later when you get more experience you can find your own niche. These cars are usually cheaper to maintain and are nearly as dependable as Japanese cars.

There is quite a large following for Hondas, Toyotas, and other imports, which makes it a little more difficult to get really good deals.

I would very seriously consider Volkswagens. They have great customer loyalty and it’s usually much easier to negotiate a good deal on a Volkswagen then on a Honda.

Look for cars that are below $3000 and about 10 to 12 years old. I prefer cars with less than 100,000 miles on them. Cars in this price range usually trade for cash.

Your return on investment can be phenomenal! For example, if you were to buy a car for $1200 and sell it for $2,000 your return would be 67%! Your financial risk is low. There is always a demand for cheap cars, even when times are not so good.

For obvious reasons I have a hard time buying a car that had already been detailed. Those people usually want top dollar. That’s why they detailed it. If I were to pay top dollar I would have no room to make my profit.

For those of you that don't know what detailing is. It is when the car has been cleaned and buffed and polished and gone over with a fine toothcomb. The tires are extra black and there are no fingerprints or dust anywhere. You get the idea.

These guys are trying get top dollar for their cars. So just move on. Remember, you may have to make 20 offers before you get the deal you’re looking for.