A trade-in is one offer from someone who does this for a living. Here you start with the number, then choose how to sell: to dealers competing for your car, at auction with a floor you set, or straight to a private buyer.
The Smart Estimate gives you three figures for your car: what a dealer would offer on trade, what competitive bidding should get, and the private-sale ceiling, with every factor behind them. It's free and takes a few seconds.
Knowing the gap between the first two numbers is what changes the conversation. It's what one offer leaves on the table.
What's my car worth?Tell us where the car is, and we list the dealers near you most likely to want it, ranked by our buyer's take. You tick the ones to ask, add a few details, and we write the message.
You send it yourself, from your own email, and dealers reply straight to you. Where a dealer's email isn't on file, you get their contact page and phone number with the message ready to paste. Tick each one off as you go.
We don't contact dealers on your behalf, and nothing is marked as sent unless you say it was.
Get dealers biddingSet a reserve, the minimum you'll accept, and a closing time. Bids from dealers and private buyers are all visible, with a timestamp and the bidder's type. If bidding ends below your reserve, the car doesn't sell and you owe nothing.
Set the opening bid low. A low opener pulls bidders in early, and bidders who have already committed tend to keep bidding.
List it for auctionPrice the car for a private sale, write your listing, and get a single link to share: on Kijiji, Marketplace, AutoTrader, or with people you know. Buyers who open it see a price check against our estimate and can email, call or text you (whichever you allow), or send an offer in one step.
The listing lives entirely in its link. It never includes your address or full postal code.
Skip the dealerWhat each dealer says on its own website — whether it buys cars from the public, has a sell or trade-in page, offers appraisals, lists used stock — plus what we know from our network: the makes it sells, its group, its specialty. When you tell us your car, a dealer that sells your make new counts for a lot; it's usually the strongest buyer for one.
Service, reputation and price. Those aren't in the data, and the take doesn't pretend otherwise. It tells you who is most likely to want your car; ask a few and compare the offers.
We read each dealer's homepage and keep the dealer's own words as evidence, with the date we checked. A dealer whose site we couldn't read isn't marked down; it's just unknown. Businesses that aren't car buyers — repair shops, lenders, rental fleets — are left out.
Some dealer websites have lapsed and now belong to someone else. We don't link to those, so we never send you to a spam page. The dealer may still trade, so call before relying on it.
Nothing. The estimate, the dealer finder and private listings are free, and there's no charge to list at auction.
No. An offer from a dealer is just an offer, and at auction nothing sells below the reserve you set.
Only the people you send them to. Dealer messages go from your own email. A private listing shows the contact details you choose, to whoever has the link.
Older, modified and collector cars vary more than any curve can capture, so the estimate says when its confidence is lower. That's exactly where several offers beat a single appraisal.