Carfax vs Autotrader

[HK Rides]

We are still a relatively new independent used dealership in Los Angeles. Currently mainly use Autotrader, Offerup, and Facebook Marketplace. We were looking to drop Offerup and add Carfax where the sales rep initially told me it would be $7-800 a month with unlimited reports (currently pay $400 for 50 but no listings). However, after he confirmed the actual price is $1,089 a month. They have a special 4 month contract where it will basically be $850 a month and then I can cancel. That would bring my monthly expenses to over $3.5k.

So I basically wanted to ask since I know Carfax is/has been on the rise. Is it worth it to add them to our listings? We recently have been more full time and are looking to have about 5-10 cars a month. Is it worth it being a small dealer to add them? Should I wait until we see more consistent sales? Any dealers in Los Angeles can vouch that Carfax is worth it? Should we drop Autotrader for Carfax?

Apologies for the loaded post but want to hear/gain as much knowledge before making a decision.

 

[BillKVMotorCo]

We are still a relatively new independent used dealership in Los Angeles. Currently mainly use Autotrader, Offerup, and Facebook Marketplace. We were looking to drop Offerup and add Carfax where the sales rep initially told me it would be $7-800 a month with unlimited reports (currently pay $400 for 50 but no listings). However, after he confirmed the actual price is $1,089 a month. They have a special 4 month contract where it will basically be $850 a month and then I can cancel. That would bring my monthly expenses to over $3.5k.

So I basically wanted to ask since I know Carfax is/has been on the rise. Is it worth it to add them to our listings? We recently have been more full time and are looking to have about 5-10 cars a month. Is it worth it being a small dealer to add them? Should I wait until we see more consistent sales? Any dealers in Los Angeles can vouch that Carfax is worth it? Should we drop Autotrader for Carfax?

Apologies for the loaded post but want to hear/gain as much knowledge before making a decision.

The answer would depend on if one of the main reasons you are considering it is for the history reports. I did not find the value of the listing service worth it in my area. We did not see enough from it. Plus, AutoCheck is much cheaper. They also have a listing service, but it's more of a subprime market service. I know people will say that CF has the name recognition and it has more thorough reports, but since we've switched we've had no customer complaints.

 

[Jon Singo]

Carmax uses Autocheck. Enough said. Get good at overcoming the customer objection when they ask for a Carfax.

"Carfax is expensive due to marketing, Autocheck is what dealers use at auction"
"Autocheck is an Experian company, they can be trusted"
"Autocheck offers similar consumer protections as Carfax"

 

[Carsten]

"Experian company, they can be trusted" to source jobs to offshore accounts.
"Experian company, they can be trusted" to take a good product and run it into the ground.

I'm sure Autocheck will have at least 6 good years before you need to find a different solution.

I wonder how much this data differentiates from what the "government" reports offers?

 

[HK Rides]

I have also ran into issues in the past with Autocheck. I used to buy vehicles from iaa/copart using a broker and noticed a few vehicles' autochecks were relatively clean, but then on Carfax it would say there was a total loss reported. That was last year before opening up our dealership, not sure if it was just a few select cars but ever since then I haven't been too keen on Autocheck.

 

[BillKVMotorCo]

I have also ran into issues in the past with Autocheck. I used to buy vehicles from iaa/copart using a broker and noticed a few vehicles' autochecks were relatively clean, but then on Carfax it would say there was a total loss reported. That was last year before opening up our dealership, not sure if it was just a few select cars but ever since then I haven't been too keen on Autocheck.

I regularly hear the exact same issues the other way around as well.

 

[Jon Singo]

I regularly hear the exact same issues the other way around as well.

I can second this.

I assume they both get their reporting from different institutions/agencies that obviously don't talk to each other. But I see accidents/flags that appear on one and not the other ALL the time. It's way more common than you think. In my 10 years at Carmax (using Autocheck) I only saw us buy back a couple cars for the Carfax saying something drastically different than the Autocheck did. Most people will never know.

Go with the cheaper one and overcome the objection.

 

[HK Rides]

Thank you all, I appreciate the insight.

 

[MiriamGate]

Any dealers in Los Angeles can vouch that Carfax is worth it?





cheap carfax

 

[Dan Sayer]

We are still a relatively new independent used dealership in Los Angeles. Currently mainly use Autotrader, Offerup, and Facebook Marketplace. We were looking to drop Offerup and add Carfax where the sales rep initially told me it would be $7-800 a month with unlimited reports (currently pay $400 for 50 but no listings). However, after he confirmed the actual price is $1,089 a month. They have a special 4 month contract where it will basically be $850 a month and then I can cancel. That would bring my monthly expenses to over $3.5k.

So I basically wanted to ask since I know Carfax is/has been on the rise. Is it worth it to add them to our listings? We recently have been more full time and are looking to have about 5-10 cars a month. Is it worth it being a small dealer to add them? Should I wait until we see more consistent sales? Any dealers in Los Angeles can vouch that Carfax is worth it? Should we drop Autotrader for Carfax?

Apologies for the loaded post but want to hear/gain as much knowledge before making a decision.

Sorry for the late entry here but we've gone CarFax to AutoCheck and back to CarFax. CarFax is the premium product with a more consistent report history, and service history, than AutoCheck, not perfect, but we had fewer issues with CarFax. @BillKVMotorCo just because CarMax uses AutoCheck is about big money and if CarFax was cheaper, they'd be on CarFax. CarMax has established a brand of trust with their shoppers so they could show them a hand-written note with a history and the shopper would probably still be fine. As far as listings go, and we're Midwest yokels, CarFax listings convert high at a third the listing fee of AutoTrader. In fact in the last 90 days, we've sold the same number of CarFax deals as AutoTrader but CarFax was $30k cheaper in the 90 days to run....