Auto Price in Green Book?

Question

I have heard that all the car dealers have something called "Green Book", which contain the price they paid for the cars they bought and they should show it to a car buyer if asked for it. My question is

Is there something like Green Book exist?

Thank you

J

Answer 1

There is no book - green, red or other color - that tells you what price dealers actually paid for a specific car.

There are lots of sites that use data to provide reasonable values for cars.  One of the keys to pricing a car is to effectively rate the car as the price will vary widely based on condition and mileage.  Mileage is pretty obvious.  You should base condition on a Carfax report (which would also help catch any odometer fraud) and your own review. Before you buy your final step should be an inspection by a qualified mechanic - but that's too expensive to do on every car you look at.

There are a bunch of places to check car prices on the Internet. NADA guides is one - but since they are owned by the car dealers association I never recommend them. KBB is another. Driverside.com is a new site and they have a couple of extras - great data showing price based on mileage; DriverSide Estimate where they search actual listings to find what cars are actually selling for in local markets; and estimates for trade in pricing.  

Answer 2

Haha, Green Book, it is a Blue Book.  Best known as Kelly Blue Book or www.KBB.com.  If you are looking to do a trade in then take another couple thousand off the Book value and that might be what they offer you.