Florida county car auctions offer cheap deals on used vehicles of all kinds. County auctions tend to include primarily government fleet vehicles and stolen vehicles, however they can also be opened up so that insurance companies and banks can list their cars as well. While these kinds of auctions offer a number of cheap deals, it is important to know how to identify what vehicles are really deals and which ones could end up being less than ideal. Here are a few key indicators to keep in mind the next time that you attend a Florida county car auction.
The first thing that you need to do is make sure that you have already inspected every vehicle that you bid on. The process of doing this may vary from county to county so it is important to make sure that you check this out ahead of time. For most county auction, the auction floor will be open several hours before bidding begins so that you take a look at every vehicle that will go on the auction block. In some cases, there may also be a viewing time for several days before the auction begins. For most people, it is a good idea to take advantage of the viewing times before the day of the auction. By doing this, you will be able to inspect every vehicle that you are interested in, take any notes that you need, and then go home for a day or two. This will give you enough time to accurately assign a value to each vehicle that interests you. It also gives you a good benchmark for what your maximum bid should be. Remember, it is only a cheap deal if you pay less than the value of the vehicle.
Another thing that you should look into is where the auction is being held. In many of the larger counties, they will be holding multiple county auctions simultaneously or over the course of several weekends at different locations. This is most likely to happen in the largest counties such as Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach, Orange and Hillsboro. Fortunately, a majority of these listings can be found online. In fact, because they hold multiple auctions in different locations, they will often hold a concurrent online auction as well. This means that you may not even need to attend the live auction to place your bids.
The final key to taking advantage of Florida county car auctions offering cheap deals is to make sure that you always keep in mind the value of each purchase. There are a lot of great deals that most people overlook because they focus solely on the condition of the vehicle or the price, rather than the overall value. It doesn't matter if you are making a purchase for yourself or if you plan on reselling the car for a profit later on, getting value is the key. If you find a car that is worth $20,000 that is selling for $15,000 then you would get a great value by making the purchase because you are only paying 75% of the value of car. On the other hand, paying $3,000 for a car that is valued at $5,000 but will need $2,000 in repairs is not a great deal because you are paying exactly what the value of the car is.
