Quote:
Originally Posted by Advanced Design
Very nice truck for $19,394 invested!
Root, can you explain a little about the auction where you picked this one up from?
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Sure can... I went with a company called Copart. Its free to sign up but different states have different laws. Here in MN I can bid and buy with no dealers licence but I can't bid on cars over in Wisconsin unless I hire a broker with a licence. Once I decide what cars I can bid on I search their website just like any other car sales site to identify ones I may be interested in. The list them months in advance of the actual auction so there is plenty of time to go view the cars in person. I took a day off and went to 4 lots to view a dozen trucks. Its free to be a member and members get onto the lots for free. Copart has 100's of lots across the nation.
Before I decided what I wanted to bid on there were certain things I did. 1) was look at the title status and make sure its something that can be repaired. 2)price out all repairs and determine a max price I would be willing to pay. 3) put in my deposit (fully refundable). At copart you can bid up to $1000 with no deposit but since I was going much larger I deposited $2000 to give me $20,000 in buying power.
There are 3 ways to bid. 1) set your max bid early like ebay and let the system do the bidding. I like this one because I can't get caught up in wanting to win and over pay. 2) Live bid online during the actual auction. or 3) Go to the lot in person to bid live.
On the first truck I bid on I lost. I bid $14,000 and it went for $15,000. the second one I bid on went out of my price range at over $20K. Then there was this one. I bid $15K and won it at $14K. This truck was drivable except for the windshild. The frame and air bags are all good. What kept the price down was the amount of body damage. A dealer or flipper would have a hard time making out on this one but as a DIYer I can save big. That emphasizes the most important thing. Buy the car thats right for you. If you paint you might want a truck like mine but if you do engines you might want one with mechanical issues. Trucks with front end or rear damage are pretty easy because you can unbolt and swap a box or a whole front clip where its harder to do that with a car. Those trucks all went higher than mine with all over damage. I always stay away from flood cars because of the electronics.
So anyway I won. I had to pay 15% auction fees plus a few other small fees and then tax, title, and licence. I had 5 days to go get my truck. Copart took care of the paperwork and my title and plates came to me in the mail.
From there on out its all state specific. In MN you can drive with a salvage title and you have a year to get it inspected. I know some states like Florida and I think Illinois (saw you are there) you can't drive until after you are repaired and inspected.
Check out Copart if you are interested. You can watch live auctions without even being signed up so you can get an idea of the process.