Value of 2013 Leaf SL?

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user 10599

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Aug 11, 2013
Messages
774
Later this month I should be receiving my new ID.4. Once that happens, I will be interested in selling my 2013 Leaf SL.

KBB suggests $5,500 trade-in and $7,300 private party sale.

Are KBB numbers fairly accurate? For quite a while, it seemed like trade in offers from dealers were much lower than KBB would indicate and it wasn't uncommon to see dealer listings below KBB. But I also heard in the news that there is a shortage of cars, including used cars, so prices are going up. Does that appear to apply to the Leaf? Is there a decent private market for used Leafs? Or am I better off just going for the trade in?
 
If you still have 11 capacity bars remaining, I would think you might get $7k for your 2013 LEAF SL in Thousand Oaks. It's unlikely to sell for much more than that though.
 
...which raises the whole 'selling things here' issue. I'll let the other mods deal with it as they see fit. I have no objections to selling Leafs here, but don't know the actual site policy.
 
In the distant past, pre-Leaf, I found that for used car values, KBB was usually too high and Edmunds was too low. The joke about KBB values is "sell it to KBB for that much then". :)
 
LeftieBiker said:
...which raises the whole 'selling things here' issue. I'll let the other mods deal with it as they see fit. I have no objections to selling Leafs here, but don't know the actual site policy.

The OP isn't trying to sell his car here though, he's just wondering what it's worth...
 
That's true. As I said, I'm not going to do anything about it.

The 2013 Leaf now falls right between the mostly-undesirable Gen I Leaf and the mostly-desirable 2014+ (especially 2015+) Leaf. It's the only non Gen I Leaf with an 80% charge timer, but those made in the first three months of 2013 have bad batteries, and they are all now old enough to have mostly substantial degradation, although only the Canary pack cars should have excessive loss, and they are now somewhat likely to have new packs. As far as the above Leaf goes, as I said it depends on the build date (very likely post March) and what option packages it has.
 
LeftieBiker said:
Build month? Options? You can get a '13 SL with a Canary pack and not even a backup camera, or a loaded one with Premium package and a Wolf pack.
All '13SL's came with a backup camera, just on the S and SV was it an option :)
But yes, build month is quite important, although only to someone who knows. I believe the Premium package which included the Bose stereo was the only option for the 2013 SL.
 
I seem to remember one '13 SL talked of here a few years ago that had no backup camera, but I wouldn't swear to it. Maybe, like the one SV that came with a leather lower back seat, or my '13 SV with automatic headlights (or at least the switch for them) but no Charge Package, it was a factory mistake.
 
This is not a for-sale post, so I moved it to the main owners forum, since that is a better location compared to off-topic.

LeftieBiker said:
I have no objections to selling Leafs here, but don't know the actual site policy
The site owner's policy is that you must be a forum supporter to post an item for sale (as noted in this sticky topic at Forum Discussions).
 
A couple clarifications:
1) I'm not decided yet as to best course of action - trade in or private sale. Just seeking advice at this point, not trying to sell it with this posting. I see the for sale section requires a $15 upgrade, and am willing to do that if I go the private sale route.
2) Good points on needing more details. It's a July build from their newly commissioned US production - so should have the better battery but don't know if being fresh out of the new plant means quality issues due to lack of experience on the line with this model. Premium package and it has the full set of cameras. 11 bars remaining on original battery (most of the life I used the 80% charge option to preserve battery and didn't do more than about 2 dozen DCFC sessions so I think the battery is still pretty solid. I've never done the LeafSpy thing thoug. It will be about 47-49k miles on it before I'm ready to sell it. White if that makes a difference in values. Also, CarWings doesn't work as it has the original 2g system - I figured it wasn't worth the funds to do their upgrade. That's just about everything I think would impact valuations.

Thanks for the info on KBB vs. Edmunds. I guess I should look up Edmunds' values and figure somewhere in between.

So there was one estimate of $7k for 11 bars on private sale.

Any insights as to how much dealers are offering on trade? I would think the private market would be limited to very small subset of population - those who really researched these vehicles and have already gotten the LeafSpy setup so can confirm battery condition. A Nissan dealer would be able to have their service department give them a pretty quick assessment which I think would support this as a more desirable one. Other dealers like the VW one I'm getting my ID.4 from probably would be clueless.

I doubt it is worth anything, but I also have a postcard from local Nissan dealer saying they really need my 2013 Leaf due to the shortages. :roll: But of course, their assumption is that I would trade it in to them on a new purchase so I doubt they will give much value on an outright buy - especially since I'm switching to VW.

I'm trying to gauge how much difference I'm looking at between trade in vs private sale to see if I should attempt the private route.
 
FWIW, in your shoes I would private sell the LEAF as, for me, the extra $1000 - $2000 in my pocket would be worth the effort of selling it. It's so much easier to inexpensively market a used car sale nowadays via Craigslist, Kijiji, FB Marketplace, social media, etc.
 
Some people like white cars, while others don't - it's one of the more polarizing "colors" like Black. Plenty of people do like them. A July build is good; you are right about there being some build quality issues (climate control issues, IIRC), but they correspond with the Canary pack months: Jan-March of 2013.

Want to find out the real trade in value? Spend 20 minutes negotiating a tentative deal on a new Leaf with NO trade. Then, when you have a firm offer, get them to calculate the trade in value, as an "afterthought". My guess is that it's now worth as much as it will ever be worth. Actual market value in your area is harder to determine, unless you have quite a few older Leafs for sale, and can follow what happens to them. Finally, if you won't run LeafSpy, assume that it's near 10 bars. I'd run LeafSpy on it.

I did know what the stated site policy is on selling Leafs here. It's just that it doesn't seem to correspond much with what actually happens.
 
cwerdna said:
In the distant past, pre-Leaf, I found that for used car values, KBB was usually too high and Edmunds was too low. The joke about KBB values is "sell it to KBB for that much then". :)

Lol, I just checked and the Edmunds values came in at $5,643 for trade and $7,929 for private sale, both higher than the KBB #s. KBB estimates $1,800 premium for private while Edmunds puts it at $2,300.
 
DarthPuppy said:
cwerdna said:
In the distant past, pre-Leaf, I found that for used car values, KBB was usually too high and Edmunds was too low. The joke about KBB values is "sell it to KBB for that much then". :)

Lol, I just checked and the Edmunds values came in at $5,643 for trade and $7,929 for private sale, both higher than the KBB #s. KBB estimates $1,800 premium for private while Edmunds puts it at $2,300.
LOL, indeed.

I would be curious about how much you end up getting for it either via trade or sale. I still need to sell my '13 SV w/premium only (no CHAdeMO).
 
FWIW, given the used car price surges recently, the other day, I decided to try getting quotes from Vroom, Shift and Carvana the other night for my blue '13 SV w/premium with 11 bars at under 68.5K miles. Shift and Vroom were way too low. One was $3201 and the other was $3700.

Carvana surprisingly offered me $5,140, good until June 1st (but I didn't sign in to create an account). Back in late 11/2020, I was offered $4262 by them, $4270 in 8/2020 and $4400 in ~late Feb 2019. I'm not sure if I answered their questions exactly the same. I hope this time,I answered the questions per their standard/what they'd expect.

My CA registration needs to be renewed by 6/24/2021 for $164. The car hits the 8 year mark that day. If I sell it after that, I would've kind wasted that $. If it's near expiration and I try to sell private party, someone might want to talk me down $164 since the tags are about to expire.

it is super tough for me to compare local and semi-local '13 Leafs for sale. I checked Craigslist, Autotrader, Cars.com and Facebook marketplace. The prices are all over the place. Many don't have capacity bars visible. Some are down a lot but some aren't. I can't command dealer prices and I see some nutty prices. As many of us know, the used Leaf market doesn't properly price battery condition and build month. And, (from what I've seen on Leaf FB groups) many buyers have no idea about capacity bars, build months, capacity loss, temp influencing degradation.

One FB marketplace listing points to a '13 SL (which it's not, it's an S) by Carvana at https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/item/4143606985698763/. Fortunately, the FB listing points to https://www.carvana.com/vehicle/1723309 which accurately lists it as an S. Carvana is crazy to be asking for almost $11K for an S trim w/10 bars!

https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/item/3611623345588260 is an S trim with 8 bars that's listed for 18 weeks for $5,495. On FB marketplace's Carvana listings, I think I spotted a Leaf I saw on Craigslist before but I'm guessing its owner gave up and sold it Carvana.

I see https://sacramento.craigslist.org/cto/d/carmichael-2013-nissan-leaf/7322185042.html trying to sell a salvage title '13 SV w/premium for $6K??? Salvage asking for that much, really?

And w/any of these listings, who knows what they end up selling for vs. asking? Carvana's no haggle AFAIK, but to me, if it something doesn't sell, they have no choice but to keep cutting the price or send it to auction.

The last time I tried sending it out to my work's for sale email list was in July 2019 where I'd dropped the price to $6300 when its SOH was between 81 and 83% (now it's like ~79ish%). During the whole time, I got virtually no interest at my work despite our free L2 charging at work. At my work (which pays very well), seems like most of the new/new to the driver EVs are Teslas. We literally have hundreds of Teslas in our EV/PHEV registry.

If I sell it to Carvana, I bet they will mark it up big time and either they will get lucky or they will be stuck w/the car for a long time and forced to keep cutting prices until it sells. At least it won't be my problem.

I'm busy w/my day job but I'm thinking of getting the car washed, cleaning up the interior and trying my luck on FB marketplace, a local Leaf FB group and Craigslist this weekend. At least I'm fully vaxxed now and have N95 masks, as well.

If I get almost no interest, I may just dump to Carvana on Monday.
DarthPuppy said:
Any insights as to how much dealers are offering on trade? I would think the private market would be limited to very small subset of population - those who really researched these vehicles and have already gotten the LeafSpy setup so can confirm battery condition. A Nissan dealer would be able to have their service department give them a pretty quick assessment which I think would support this as a more desirable one. Other dealers like the VW one I'm getting my ID.4 from probably would be clueless.

I doubt it is worth anything, but I also have a postcard from local Nissan dealer saying they really need my 2013 Leaf due to the shortages. :roll: But of course, their assumption is that I would trade it in to them on a new purchase so I doubt they will give much value on an outright buy - especially since I'm switching to VW.

I'm trying to gauge how much difference I'm looking at between trade in vs private sale to see if I should attempt the private route.
In my experience, how much a dealer will give you for it depends on whether they think they can sell it and for how much + how much risk. If they don't want it, they will give you auction value. I've personally witnessed that with a friend who was wanting to get rid of a very old Accord when she bought a new Prius. The amount was crazy low.

I suggested she try selling her Honda to the Honda dealer next door. They offered her double what the Toyota dealer was offering, so she went w/that. There was no way she was going to do the private party route, likely due to time and personal safety.

I sold my former 350Z to a Nissan dealer. I actually got a surprisingly good price. Another Nissan dealer gave me a crap offer. The place I sold to, Stadium Nissan in Seattle went out of business later. :) The guy told me part of the reason why they were giving me a good price is they believe they could sell it. And, (memory very foggy) because it was under a certain amount of $ so the buyer wouldn't need or could easily get financing... something like that.

https://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=551302#p551302 and https://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=552055#p552055 have pointers to my attempts in 2019 to sell my '13 Leaf SV w/premium to three Bay Area Nissan dealers. Essentially, all three didn't want it and told me to stick w/Carmax's offer of $5K back then. One of those dealers (Nissan Sunnyvale) is now out of business.

You can try taking it to Nissan dealers and selling to them. You don't have to buy anything. I'd sold my Z already when I made the suggestion to my Accord/Prius friend. Don't get your hopes up too high. You might try Carmax, but I just checked and they seem to have no Leafs for sale older than model year '15 now.
 
I tried to sell my 11 bar, '13 LEAF 'S' model about a month ago through Craigslist for $7k in Albuquerque. The car has has a new 12v battery, new good tyres, and is in excellent condition. There was interest but no sale. Carvana offered $5,600.

I've tried other, more expensive private car sale services before and decided they were useless. The one saving grace of our LEAFs not being worth much money is that they slot in very well into the craigslist demographic.
 
I found a 2013 SV with 11 bars for $5k on the Denver CL. I thought (and still do...) that it was a good deal although 1) one tire was completely shot and the others were mis-matched and 2) there was a superficial scrape in the paint on the back corner. I got it for my dad and he has put new tires on it and had the paint fixed. I don't know exactly what that cost but I'd guess < $1k for everything. So he got a very nice 11-bar 2013 SV for $5500-$6k. I'd call that the low end of the market as most Leafs around here are listed for much more.

And +1 on the used Leaf market being 'inefficient'. It takes a while to learn what you need to know about EV's and while it's easy for us who drive them to 'get it' I think it's much harder for someone who has never owned an EV to understand what makes a difference.
 
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