One of the many ways of leveraging auto auctions is buying and salvaging cars and trucks. Now we aren’t just talking about cars that break down, have a bad engine, and the owners want to pay for the repairs.
No, of course not, we are talking about cars that are “totaled” and then are put up to sale by insurance companies. They might as well try and get their money’s worth — meanwhile there still are some people that will be interested in repairing them or using them for parts.
This includes how to find the auctions that sell these cars, all the way to the best ways to sell them after the fact. If you are looking to get off to a hot start in this market, then this is certainly the way for you!
Where to Find Totaled Cars at Auction
We recommend that you begin your search online as we all do nowadays. However there are two ways that you can go about this. The first way is by searching up car auctions within your area that you can attend in person.
Besides the hassle to drive to the auction in person, these can actually be pretty successful. This is in part due to the fact that you will be competing against less people in an in person auction.
On the other hand, there are downsides to the in person auctions since the variety of cars will be limited. The number of cars can also be limited depending on your location.
To combat this issue you will find it helpful to go attend car auctions near big cities. Not only will they have a large number of vehicles but they will likely have a good variety as well.
Although the pandemic has not been a pleasant thing in our world by any means, there has been one main positive for the car industry. This is none other than it going virtual which includes online auctions in this case.
Prior the pandemic there were already some car auctions that you could find online, but they were few and far between. However since everything went virtual during the pandemic, the car auctioning market did as well.
This allows you to find nearly any car of your choice and purchase it for a discounted price. In fact, I have a 2017 BMW M4 pulled up right now that has the front part of the car totaled. This car can still drive and only has a little over 20,000 miles, but it is being sold at half of the market price.
As you can see, there is a ton of money to be made in this process, which is exactly what we will be discussing next. So whether you know a lot about cars and can fix them up yourself, or you just want to pay someone else to take care of it for you, there is a ton of money to be made here.
How To Make Money Salvaging Cars and Trucks
If you know anything about repairing cars and doing bodywork, you will be at an advantage. In this case with totaled cars specifically, they are often deemed as a total loss vehicle by the insurance companies and put up for auction. Either that or the owners of the cars do not have enough money for the repairs so they are then purchased by the insurance companies.
Either way the classic saying: one man’s trash is another man’s treasure, certainly holds true in this case. From the earlier example you can see that by purchasing these cars that are often deemed beyond repair, you can almost double the value of the car.
Again there are two ways going about this, and we will first discuss the best way to maximize your profits. This is none other than doing the repairs yourself and doing things the hard way.
However, this method does depend a lot on how much free time you have on your hands. So for those that are already busy with another job or don’t like to work on cars in their free time, this might not be the best option for you.
Although it can be a cool way to learn and develop a new hobby! If you can take these cars that are absolutely totaled and make them run again, then you should never have to put your car in a shop again.
Trust me after this year alone I have learned the hard way how much shops will charge you to fix your car. If you can learn how to fix the common problems, let alone repair a totaled car, then you can make some decent profits.
Besides doing all the work yourself, you can certainly pair up with a local repair shop. You may even be able to strike a deal with them if you explain your situation and why you are bringing cars in so often.
Now you will spend a lot of extra money with this method, but you will also save yourself a lot of time. You won’t have to spend hours and days in your garage working on fixing cars. Or you could double up your profits and have the shop work on a car while you are working on another. There are so many ways to make money when buying and salvaging cars!
You can start by attending your local car auctions or by simply looking up online salvage auctions.
