Sunday, January 20, 2008

How One Car Seller is Using PriceHub on Craigslist

This weekend, a PriceHub user brought a particular car ad on Craigslist to my attention. While this ad for a Lexus RX300 was similar to the 100 or so other ads for the same car, it was different in one way. In the vehicle description, the seller mentioned that his asking price was fair, based on the actual prices he had seen on PriceHub. He then linked his ad to the PriceHub actual sale prices for the Lexus RX300. Because these actual sales prices were submitted by real people, the seller felt his asking price was more than fair since it was based on real data, not a best guess calculated from a pre-determined formula.

In my experience, this is the first time that I've seen a seller use actual car sale prices to justify their asking price. Sellers commonly use KBB or Edmunds.com to provide price justification, but I personally discount these estimates since they are so broad. Depending on which price the seller decides to use from KBB or Edmunds (trade-in, private party, or dealer retail), the range of prices for a given make/model of a car can really vary. For example, if a seller says that they are pricing their car "way below blue book", I automatically assume that they are using the 'dealer retail' price as their basis, which is always the highest price quoted.

It is our hope that PriceHub can bring a new level of transparency to the car buying and selling process. This RX300 ad from Craigslist is a good indication that this new level of transparency is starting to gain some momentum.

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Friday, January 11, 2008

Thanks to eHub and Emily Chang!

I just wanted to quickly thank Emily Chang's eHub for mentioning us yesterday. Her positive influence and authoritative voice in the web community are clearly evident by the large amount of people who have visited our site. As a result, we've gotten some great user feedback on how we can improve PriceHub to help make the car shopping process easier and more transparent.

Thanks Emily!

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Saturday, January 5, 2008

Top 15 Family Sedans from Consumer Reports - Feb 2008

In the latest issue of Consumer Reports magazine (2/2008), the top affordable family sedans were revealed. The biggest revelation was the fact that the almighty Honda Accord lost its top spot the Nissan Altima. The price range (new) for this category ranged from $20,415 (Mercury Milan) to $23,900 (Kia Optima). Here are the latest rankings:

1) Nissan Altima
2) Honda Accord
3) Kia Optima (4 cylinder)
4) Toyota Camry
5) Hyundai Sonata SE
6) Kia Optima (V6)
7) Hyundai Sonata GLS
8) Mazda6 i
9) Ford Fusion
10) Mercury Milan
11) Subaru Legacy
12) Saturn Aura XE
13) Mitsubishi Galant
14) Pontiac G6
15) Chrysler Sebring

Besides the Accords slip to the number 2 spot, I was also surprised to see 4 Korean cars in the top 7 spots. I guess I still remember when the Hyundai Excel (~$4000 new) was considered a disposable car, much like the Yugo.

With new car ratings, the pricing is pretty narrow. As you start looking at used versions of these cars, the number of factors to consider multiples (mileage, location (snow vs. sun), condition, Carfax history, etc...). Be sure to check PriceHub's actual sale prices for all 15 of these models and all other cars and trucks.

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