One thing that you might consider doing is making the interior look brand new along with making your car’s headlights not look foggy. There’s one product on the market that claims to do a good job with these things and it’s called Wipe New. I’ve used it and here’s my review.

Using Wipe New

This stuff is pretty powerful. They suggest wearing latex or rubber gloves and I suggest you do, too. You don’t want it on your hands because it’s difficult to get off. You’re going to throw away the gloves when you’re done, too. I’m no chemist, but I imagine Wipe New works a bit like acetone (nail polish remover) and might sort of slightly melt or dissolve plastic. Again, I’m no chemist and I do not suggest using acetone instead.

They give you some small sponges to use. On the second use, I just cut a cheap household sponge in two and that worked well.

Use just a bit at a time. You need to get the sponge wet but don’t soak it. As you work it on plastic, you’ll know if you are using enough or not. You’ll want to do it on a nice day (not too hot, not too cool out) and in a well ventilated area (there’s a smell but it’s not horrible). You can use it on your dashboard and really anything that’s plastic. Don’t get it on your car’s paint – so go slow around those areas.

On the exterior of your car, you can use it really on anything that’s plastic. Places like door trip are good and the black plastic area where the windshield wipers are is another good place. Also think about areas around the door mirrors, too.

Clear Up Foggy Headlights

Years ago now, car manufacturers came up with these plastic headlights. They’re nice because you just replace the bulb instead of the whole headlight assembly (I remember changing the whole headlamp on my mom’s Cavalier back in the 80s). Those old headlights, though, were made of glass so they didn’t fog up. The newer, plastic ones that you see out there appear to fog up but that’s just really wind and dust and sand and rocks hitting them and marking them up. They appear to look fogged out but in reality, they’re just worn.

A few years back, before Wipe New came out, I tried these headlight restoration kits and got limited results. I also had my headlights de-fogged at the local, full service car wash a few times and that lasted maybe 6 months and I’d have to get it done again. With that system, they using a solution and some sand paper and then finishing it off with some wax and a buffer. With Wipe New, you avoid all that and the results are better.

How to Use It

Just take some Wipe New and carefully apply it to your plastic headlights. Again, be careful around the corners so that you don’t get any on your car’s paint. Use a good amount of it. Once you’re done, you’ll just let it dry for several hours. Don’t try to wipe it dry or wax it or anything – just let it sit… then you’re done and the results are pretty amazing.

The Before and After

I got my BMW recently and it’s a 2009, so the headlights look pretty good still but my friend, Heather, was asking me if I’d help her with cleaning her car’s headlights. She wanted to borrow a drill with a cord since that’s what the directions on her headlight restoration kit called for. I looked and I still had enough Wipe New left over, so I headed over to her place with the drill and the Wipe New and some sponges.

She had some gloves, so we each did a headlight and the results were great. She wanted this done because her lights were getting so foggy that her lights seemed dim at night. Doing this definitely brightened things up.

I did take some before and after pictures of the headlights on her Camry and you can clearly (no pun intended) see the difference. Using Wipe New really cleared them up and the car looks better. Not only that, she’s going to get more light showing through her headlights, making night time driving safer for her and her daughter. Here are those pictures:

Left Headlight – Before and After Wipe New

Right Headlight – Before and After Wipe New

Final Review

I’d give Wipe New a 4.5 out of 5 stars for sure. It’s easy to use, does the job and works really well without a lot of effort. The only downside is the smell and that you have to let it dry a while but that’s a small price to pay for the results you get.

If you’re looking to clear up your foggy headlights, then the $20 (or so) investment into Wipe New is a no brainer. Local car washes and car detailers will charge $40 or more for clearing up your car’s headlights and it doesn’t last as long or look as good as Wipe New.

This is the type of product to use on your car once a year for sure – if you plan to sell it or not. If you are planning on selling your car, then again, it’s a no brainer. The $20 investment will pay off big time. Just make sure you do it a few days before you plan to sell the car and give the car time to air out so that the chemical smell isn’t there as you’re trying to show your car to a potential buyer. They might wonder what that is.

Conclusion

I hope you found this review article beneficial. I used Wipe New on my Acura and then now on Heather’s Camry with great results. I used the product myself and I believe I objectively wrote up this review because there have been plenty of products I’ve tried that haven’t worked out well.

If you liked this article, then please bookmark it and share it with others. If you have comments on using Wipe New or your own review of this product, then please leave your comments below.

How to Clean Your Car’s Engine

Engine Compartment Cleaning

If you’re considering selling your vehicle, it’s nice to get it detail cleaned. You can do it yourself or pay to have it done (up to you). Either way, make sure you get the engine compartment cleaned and you’ll get more money for your car. Anyone coming to look at your car and buy it will want to take a look under the hood to see what shape it’s in. If it’s clean and all the fluids are up to correct levels, then that’ll be an indication that the car was taken care of.

In this article, I’ll go over some tips and things to know about cleaning your car’s engine compartment.

Briefly… My Car

I’ve had my current car since October but haven’t had a chance to clean under the hood yet. I live in Wisconsin, so it gets cool at the end of October and that lasts through April usually. This year, we’ve had a lot of rain so there hasn’t been much of a chance to do it myself. I’ve been taking my car to the good local car wash often enough (not as often as my black Acura I had – this car is silver, which is nice because it shows less dirt… I love that) and I had it detailed once but I haven’t had a chance to do it myself yet – and I like to do it, actually.

Finally, today, I got the chance to clean under the hood. A guy there saw me taking pictures under the hood and asked if I was selling the car. I told him I was doing this for my blog. I think he was disappointed. When people see others taking care of their car, that makes them more attracted to the car. Doing this work at a local self-serve car wash may actually attract some buyers – it did for me and I wasn’t even selling it!

For me, the car really doesn’t feel like mine until I’ve had a chance to clean it really good – so I’m glad I finally got that chance today.

The Before Picture

Ok, here’s the before picture:

It’s a little dirty but not too bad at all. It’s a 2009 and I got it from the dealer back in October, so it was clean back then. It has been one winter, though and it’s due for a cleaning. Everyone should clean under the hood of their car at least once a year. I like to do it in the spring and then in the fall so that it’s clean going into winter.

Some Tips for Cleaning Your Car’s Engine

1. The Car Should be Cooled Down

First, do it when the car has had a chance to cool down. You don’t want to be digging around there when it’s been running and everything’s hot or you’ll burn your hands. Give it at least a half hour to cool down. Lift the hood to help it cool faster.

2. Consider Wearing Gloves

When a mechanic works under the hood of a car, they wear gloves. They do this to protect their hands. You’ll be doing the same thing. Working under the hood is not the same as cleaning the outside of the car where everything is smooth. In the engine compartment, there are a lot of rough edges. In fact, I remembered this tip or thought of it after getting a small cut on my hand within the first few minutes. I didn’t have gloves with me, so I made sure to wrap the towel I was using around my hand more to protect it.

3. Start with a Damp Cloth

I like to start with a damp towel or cloth – it’s usually the one I used to dry off the car after I just washed the outside. Start with the area around the hood and the underside of the hood itself. Dirt leads to rust, so get all the dirt off that you can. I then tackle the other parts that seem dirty.

4. Armor All is Your Friend

Next, use some Armor All (protectant) on a cloth. I like to either spray it on a cloth and then apply it or use the Armor All Wipes. Spraying Armor All liberally everywhere under the hood isn’t such a great idea because it’ll spray in more places than you can clean and you’ll be left with white spots in places you can’t get to. It’s not like spraying it on the inside of a door where you’ll be sure to wipe it all off. You have to be a bit more careful.

5. More to Do

I’ve never seen this before but in my car, there was a filter that was full of debris. It’s a filter, apparently, for all the rain and junk that falls from your windshield and drains down. Since it’s pretty safe to say that BMWs are over-engineered, they felt it was necessary to include a filter to catch some of this debris so that it didn’t go further into the vehicle. It was easy enough to lift out the filter and dump it out, so I did that.

Your car may have something different to catch debris. If not, check in the area where the windshield meets the engine bay and clean out all that you can. Maybe use a wet vac if you have one to really get in there.

After

Here’s the after picture after I did my work:

I’m pretty happy with the results. It needed it – especially getting the leaves and junk out of the area by the windshield.

How to Properly Degrease the Engine Compartment

OK, I’ve had a number of cars that weren’t quite as clean as my 2009 BMW. The cars were older and more dirt and grease had accumulated under the hood and it was enough where just using a cloth and some elbow grease wasn’t going to cut it. In that case, you either need to do some degreasing or steam cleaning.

Know What to Cover

Not everything under your hood is meant to get wet. You can’t just get a hose or sprayer and start spraying. You’ll most likely get water into the distributor or something and then your car won’t start.

Here are the things to cover up:

• All sensors
• Distributor
• Alternator
• Spark plugs
• Battery
• Electrical connections
• Air intake

Use plastic bags with rubber bands or tape to completely seal them up.

Warm the Engine

For this part, it actually helps to have a warm engine. This will help loosen things up. Run the car for a bit or take a short ride somewhere.

Quick Spraydown

Before applying degreaser, give the engine compartment a little spray down to get things wet. Don’t use high force or a lot of pressure. Just get things a little wet so that the degreaser can use that water.

Apply Citrus Degreaser

You can find citrus engine degreaser about anywhere – try Wal-Mart or a local auto parts store. You can get a spray bottle or even a gallon or so of it, depending on how dirty things are. You just don’t want to be in the middle of this project and then have to go get more, so make sure you get enough.

Spray the underside of the hood. Get all the areas that you can. Spray it on liberally.

Next, spray the engine area. Again, use quite a bit of it.

After spraying it, you’ll want to give it some time to work – enough where it soaks in but not so much that it dries up. During this time, you can help it work by using a brush (tire/wheel brush or something – even a scrubbie sponge) and working on whatever areas you can. If it starts to dry up, then spray more degreaser on. Do the underside of the hood and parts in the engine – everywhere you can reach.

Next, hose down all areas to remove the degreaser. Give it a very good rinse. Don’t use high pressure as you may force water into places it should not be. Let the degreaser do the work.

Let it Dry

You can let the car air cool for a while now. Take the plastic bags off. Leave the hood up. Let it dry for hours. Use a towel to clean areas that you had covered up. In the video I have below, the guy used a leaf blower to help dry out the engine compartment – that’ll probably look a little strange but it’s actually a pretty good idea.

Now you can go about using Armor All to make all the hoses and plastic parts look great. Armor All also helps keep the hoses in good shape so that they don’t dry out and crack – so yet another reason why doing this once a year is a good idea.

Using WD40

Another way to clean your engine compartment is to use WD-40. What WD-40 does is displace water and helps to prevent corrosion. It does help to get things cleaner. Spray it on, then use a brush to clean it and then wipe off the area with a microfiber towel. WD-40 works very well and professionals use it to clean under the hood.

Steam Cleaning the Engine Compartment

When I had my Acura, I found a guy that did some cheap body work and paint touch-ups. He had a buddy that did engine steam cleaning. It was $100 but I thought what the heck. WOW, did it look good when he was done. The car looked brand new. I was impressed! Here’s a picture:

The nice thing about steam cleaning an engine is that it goes deep and clean everything really well. You get a good clean that just can’t be done with a rag in your hand.

If you have the equipment and know how to do this well, I bet you could start a side business steam cleaning engines. Like I said, I thought it was worth $100. Maybe it takes an hour – that’s good money.

Here’s a guy steam cleaning an engine – he didn’t cover any parts up, so do not do it exactly like he did:

Conclusion

Yes, cleaning under the hood of the car can make a huge difference. This can help a lot if you’re planning on selling the car. Heck, someone could flip vehicles really easily by buying cars that people haven’t detailed, clean them up good and then sell them for a thousand or two more. It makes that much of a difference. So why give someone else that chance? Clean your engine compartment yourself or hire a professional to and pocket the extra money you’ll get selling your car.

If I missed anything, please leave it in the comments below. Don’t forget to tell others about what is on this page and share this article.

It Just Takes 5 Minutes – Do It Yourself!

When you get a car from a local car dealer (usually when you get a used car), the dealer puts their sticker on the trunk or somewhere to help promote their dealership and tell others where you got your great car. The good thing is that you don’t need to have this dealership sticker on your car or truck and it’s actually really easy to remove – it’ll take maybe 5 minutes or so!

Above, I’m showing the before and after pictures when I did it on my car. It really only took about 5 minutes and I was completely done. I wish I would have done this earlier. I guess I thought the decal would still show through somehow or that the paint maybe faded and I still would have seen the logo on the car since the paint under it had been protected more but no – there’s absolutely no indication that the dealership sticker was ever there!

What You Need

To remove the dealer sticker, here’s what you’ll need:

• A hair dryer
• A credit card or squeegee
• Goo Gone
• A rag or cloth

How to Do It

First make sure the area is clean.

Next, plug in the hair dryer and you’re going to warm the sticker up. Turn it on high and go over the sticker area for 30 seconds to a minute.

Next, get your credit card out (or even use your finger nails) and peel away the dealer decal. It should be nice and warm now and come off pretty easily. Keep working at it until you get the major parts of it removed (as much of it as you can).

Once it’s gone, there will be some sticky residue. What I like to use is Goo Gone. This stuff works really well and it something good to have around the house to remove sticker residue from price tags or whatever – so it’s worth just having a bottle of this stuff around the house. Spray the area, let it sit a few seconds and then wipe it.

If there is still some residue, then spray it again and wipe. It should all come off.

You’re done!

Unless the sticker has been on there a really long time, it should have come cleanly off and you shouldn’t be able to tell it was even there.

Removing these stickers is easy. Really anyone can do it, so there’s no reason to pay an auto detailer money to do it. You’re also increasing the value of your car because it looks cleaner to a buyer who comes to look at it. That’s your goal – to have as clean of a car as you can and one that looks as close to new as possible. This will help the buyer visualize them self in it, driving it and owning it.

How-to Video

Sometimes seeing something done helps you understand how to do it better. It makes more sense than reading some instructions – most of us are more visual learners anyway.

Below, you will find a video showing you how to remove dealer stickers from your car – just follow what he does and, along with the instructions here, you’ll have that decal removed in no time!

Remove Stickers from Glass

You may also have some stickers on the glass of your car (like the windshield) that you might want removed. Doing it is easy, too. You might as well do this task at the same time and get the car totally clean. This can include parking stickers, state park stickers or even residue from your state’s toll road unit that you stick onto your windshield.

What You Need

• A razor scraper
• Window cleaner
• Paper towels

How to Do It

You’ll first spray down the sticker and area with a good amount of window cleaner. I like to soak the area pretty well.

Next, use your razor scraper to remove the sticker. Start at an edge and slowly scrape. You may need to apply more window cleaner a few times but it should all come off. When you scrape the glass, you’re not damaging it – the glass can take it.

Use paper towels to clean up and you’re done! If there’s still a little residue, then either keep scraping or else try some of the Goo Gone and that should clean it all up for sure.

Conclusion – Removing Stickers

There’s really no need to have these stickers on your car. They just clutter it up. By removing them, you clean up the appearance of your car and make it look nicer. This, of course, applies to a car you’re trying to sell and the next one you pick up from a dealer or a used car lot.

I hope this article helped you. If it did, let us know and leave a comment. If we forgot something or if you have a tip that will help others, please leave that below. Don’t forget to share this article with others!

Spending just 2 hours cleaning your car could easily ad hundreds of dollars of value when selling it. If you got an extra $400 because your car looked great and you only spent 2 hours cleaning it, that’s like working for $200 an hour. So why not?

What Does Detailing a Car Mean?

First, let’s just quickly discuss what we’re doing. When you detail a car, you’re cleaning beyond what’s normally done at a car wash. Think about it… you’re out there driving on the road, which is dirty and small specs of dirt come off the road and onto your car all the time. There’s also dust and rain that play a part. Instead of just getting the main parts clean, you’re going after the parts that usually get a light cleaning or get skipped over with a normal car wash. You’re going into more detail.

When you detail clean a car, you’re goal is to get it looking its best – the best that you can – and as close to new as you can. You may choose to go beyond what you can do and have a local body shop do some touch up work to the body of the vehicle. That’s up to you and we’re not going into that here – I’ll mainly talk about what to detail and how to do it so that you get every area that’s important, which should be time well invested.

How to Get Ready

First, you have to dedicate the time. Make sure you are able to spend maybe 2-3 hours on a good cleaning. Before you get started on the detail work, here are some things to have ready or things to do before you start detailing your car:

1. Get it clean. This means take it to a car wash first – one that will do a good job and most of them use environmentally friendly ways of reusing their water. You have the option to clean it yourself, of course.
2. Get some rags and dry cloths – ones you can throw away or dedicate to washing the car. Old t-shirts are good.
3. Get a vacuum cleaner that has thin attachments that let you get into tough places.
4. Get some cleaning supplies – you’ll need:
   1. Soap – get car shampoo, not dish soap.
   2. A bucket.
   3. A sponge.
   4. A brush – the kind with a wood handle.
   5. Armor All Protectant (spray)
   6. Tire wax – the kind that foams up.
   7. Chrome cleaner for the wheels if they need it.
   8. A scrubbie sponge – the green ones that are a bit abrasive.
   9. A brush or upholstery brush
   10. Window cleaner and paper towels.
5. Carpet and upholstery cleaner – there’s one called “Tuff Stuff Multi-Purpose Foam Cleaner” that works excellent. Make sure you get some of this.

Wash the Car

You got a normal car wash first because what you’re doing is detailing your car – not just a normal washing. You’re going beyond what a local car wash place will normally do.

Find a Place to Start Detailing

Get all your stuff together and set yourself up in a good place to work. For most people, this is their garage or driveway. If you live in an apartment or condo or some place where you can’t clean your car there, then go to one of the self-serve car washes in the area. You can clean your car there and then pull to the side somewhere and start your detailing.

Made in the Shade

If possible, work out of the sunlight, in the shade. This is especially important when you’re waxing the car or truck. Also, it’ll keep you cooler while you’re working. Of course, it can’t be too cold while you’re doing this either. If you’re washing your vehicle yourself, then you always want to do that in the shade so that you don’t get water spots.

Get Help

One good tip is get someone to help you. They can do one thing while you do another. Have the radio on and be sure to get them something to drink and maybe share a pizza when you’re all done!

Get Started Doing Your Detailing

Since working on the carpets (getting stains out) is going to take the longest to dry, you’re going to do everything else first and save that for last.

Detail Vacuum

Before everything gets wet from cleaning with a sponge, do your detail vacuuming. Get under the seats and everywhere you can. Watch for loose change and don’t forget to keep it. Pull back seats if you can and get all those crumbs out. Doing this will help the car smell better, too. Vacuum out the trunk.

Try different attachments with your vacuum cleaner so that you do the best with your time that you can getting under the seats and working on cloth areas.

Door Areas

Get your bucket full of warm water with soap in it and get a sponge and a dry towel. You’re going to go around to each door and clean out all the corner areas really good. Go into where the hinges are and carefully clean in there. Clean the rubber and everything that you can. Leave the door hinges greased up so that they open and close easily.

Hood and Trunk

Next, go into the hood and trunk and do the same. Clean everything.

Under the hood, you can clean most parts. Don’t get anything electrical wet. I like to use some Armor All on the hoses and anything plastic. Cleaning under the hood will make it look like the car was well cared for when you sell it. Do a good job on it and you’ll see some amazing results.

Tackle the Tires and Wheels

When a vehicle has nice looking tires and wheels, it makes a huge, huge difference! Here are two pictures showing the before and after when I did some detailing of my brother’s 1999 Nissan Pathfinder (which I got looking super sharp!)

Start with some clean water and soap in the bucket and get the green scrubbie sponge out. Get into all the corners of the wheels and clean those babies! It might take some elbow grease (muscle).

Next, get the chrome cleaner out if you have chrome wheels and spray it on. Let it sit 2 minutes and then spray a bit more on and then towel them dry with maybe a light scrub first.

If your car has wheel covers instead of alloy wheels, you have some options. First, you could just go buy some new wheel covers – that will pay for itself for sure. Second, you can clean and then carefully spray paint (black) the steel wheels to make them look better even though they are behind the wheel covers. Use some tape and tape off the tires so that you don’t get spray paint on the tires – you don’t want that.

Next, use the tire foam wax on all 4 tires. Spray it on and then I wipe if off. Make sure you spray it evenly and go to the edge of the tire.

Now your wheels and tires should look awesome!

Armor All the Inside

Get the Armor All protectant out and clean all the plastic. Use a clean rag. I like to spray it on the rag, outside the car and then use the rag to put it on the part I’m shining up. This makes sure you’re not getting it on places you don’t want it. They also make some Armor All wipes, which are good, too.

Where you don’t want to use Armor All is on the pedals, steering wheel (the wheel itself – the steering column is ok… you just don’t want a steering wheel that’s slippery) or windows.

Armour All the Outside

Your car may have some areas that you can shine up with Armor All. Don’t get it on the painted areas of the car, of course, but maybe things like mud flaps or trim or mirrors.

There’s this stuff called “Wipe New” which you can order that works really well. You have to be careful when using it but it does wonders. It works great and is more permanent than Armor All.

Clean the Windows

Use some window cleaner and clean both sides of the windows. Don’t leave streaks.

I think cleaning the windows good is huge! This is what people are looking through when they are test driving the car. A dirty windshield can make the whole car seem dirty.

If you’re in a warm climate or it’s summer out and you’re one of those people that don’t crack their windows when the car sits outside, the chemicals from the seats or dirt or whatever you have sitting in your car is going to get into the air and then create a film on the windows. It might take washing the windows 2-3 times to get all of that off.

Carpet Cleaning

Now that most of the inside work is done, you can tackle the carpets. Cleaning the carpets gets out stains and will help the car smell cleaner and fresher. You can have a car wash place do a steam cleaning if you like or you can do that yourself, too. At least get some baking soda based carpet cleaner and use it on the inside.

If you have stains on light colored carpet, don’t worry – you can get them out. This Tuff Stuff that I mentioned basically performs miracles. What you do is spray it on an area until it foams up. Let it sit for at least 2 minutes – maybe wait up until 4-5. Then, get your wood handled brush or upholstery brush and scrub the area. You might scrub for 30 seconds or so but the stain will usually come out or get much better. If there’s still some stain there, then do this whole process 1-2 more times and that should take care of it.

Once you’ve taken care of all the spots on the carpet and if you’ve followed all the steps here so far, you might start thinking that your car looks awesome and you might not even want to sell it now. Thinking that is normal.

You’ll want the car to air out, so have it somewhere that has a breeze and leave the windows and sunroof open so that it can dry. It might take 1-2 hours.

Detail Waxing

The last step (and probably only thing left to do) is wax your car. Doing this will really make it shine and give your car the “wow” factor when someone sees it.

You’ll first use rubbing compound on tough areas. This is explained in the video below. If you have a car that’s red, then you might need to first use rubbing compound on the whole car to get rid of the dead layer of paint. This is mainly a problem with red cars.

Get some Turtle Wax or similar kind and get to it. You’ll do a small area at a time. Put some on, let it dry and then wipe it off with a clean towel. Borrow or buy a car buffer if you want.

Here’s a good video on how to wax a car. Watch this before you even start this process:

Some Cheats / Extra Stuff

What I explained here is if you want to do all this work yourself. You could, of course, hire someone to do this for you and still come out ahead. You will need to leave your car with them for several hours. Find a local car wash or search for an auto detailer in your areas. Sometimes Groupon will have some deals.

Use Febreeze in your car. You don’t want some air freshener that’s too strong or it’ll seem like you’re covering something up. Get a neutral type of air fresher or upholstery spray and put it on.

Getting new car mats makes a pretty big difference. Spending $30 on some is worth it if your car needs new ones.

Visit a local junkyard and try to find some replacement interior parts. You might spend $5-10 on a bunch of things and you can easily fix some stuff. This will pay for itself, too. There are also websites that sell OEM replacement parts, so check those out, too.

Conclusion

Hopefully, as I kind of mentioned already, you’re now looking at your car in a new way. It should look so good that you want to keep it maybe. Your main goal with a good cleaning and detailing is to go for that “wow” factor. You also want to make feel good emotionally about the car. If it looks clean and cared for, you’ll fetch a better price for sure. People are trying to imagine themselves in the car when they are looking it over. Try to give them a good of a feeling about that as you can.

My Work

Here are some pictures of the work I did on my brother’s Nissan Pathfinder – a before and after picture. The interior actually took a lot of work and was an ever bigger transformation but I don’t have pictures of that.

If there’s something else you think I missed, leave some comments for us below. And don’t forget to share this article with your friends!

Prepare the Car for Sale

Wash the Car

You obviously want to get it washed and cleaned. Take it to a car wash where they have people wiping it off and cleaning the inside. This will cost you $20 for their top of the line wash. Consider getting some extra detailing done, too. They can usually do it quickly or else you can leave the car there and go do some shopping near by.

I even found a guy that detailed my car for $100 and he power washed the engine compartment, too. Wow, did that make the car look new! To do that, they disconnected the battery and then ran a power washer over everything. They let it completely dry and then reconnected the battery. Finish it off with some Armour All on the main parts and hoses and wow does that make a difference. Anyone looking over a car is going to pop the hood. If they do that and see things looking really good, that will make them feel better about buying the car. They’ll know the car was well taken care of. Car dealers do it – so should you.

Make sure the wheels look amazing. Get some wheel cleaner and apply tire wax. This is a must!

The interior should also have some Armour All applied to it so that it looks sharp. Clean all the windows, both sides, with window cleaner. Do it twice if you have to so that there are no streaks.

Clean the Carpets

If you have light colored carpets, get all the stains out. There’s some really good foaming carpet cleaning spray that I use (and love – it works great) and it’s called Tuff Stuff (about $5 a bottle at Amazon). You spray it on, then wait a minute and then I use a scrub brush on the area and carpet stains come right out. I use it on my home carpets and it works great in the car. Stains you think would never come out just come right out.

Also consider getting the carpets and upholstery steam cleaned. This will deep clean everything which will also help with our next point…

Is There a Smell?

Sometimes, if you’re used to your own car, you might not notice a smell. Ask someone else to smell your car. If there is an odor, then you can do a few things. First, think about getting it steam cleaned, like we mentioned. Second, try carpet cleaner that you vacuum up (baking soda based). Third, use some air freshener like Febreeze in the car. Don’t use too much or it’ll be too obvious that you’re trying to cover something up.

Worst case, you have some mold or mildew. If your car is a convertible and if the top leaks or if it has been wet, then you might need to pull up the carpet and have it totally cleaned out.

Remember, all the little tricks and tips that we mention here are small investments that will help you get more for your used car. Sometimes taking a hour to do something will net your a few hundred dollars, which is like getting paid a few hundred bucks an hour!

Body Work

How does the car’s exterior look? Are there any rust spots? I had one on a car that I was trying to sell and I found a guy with a body shop near by that fixed it really cheap. It was like $300 and now I can post that the car has no rust showing. That’s just one less thing someone can use to bring down the price when they’re looking at the car. You can also keep emphasizing that there is no rust on the painted part of the car and that it’s clean – doing this will prevent people from going too far down in price when it does come time to talk money.

Get an Oil Change / Do Fixes

The picky buyer is going to poke around under the hood or even ask if they can take the car to a local shop and have it checked out (at their expense). You don’t want old, dirty oil in it. All fluids should be topped off and looking good. Take care of any leaks.

Maybe there’s something that needs to be fixed – like the brakes for example. Spending $75 or $100 might net you much more than that plus it’s something you can say just got done, which the buyer will like.

Get New Tires Put On

Speaking of fixes, one popular thing to do is get new tires. Putting on a set of budget tires can really add value to the car. If someone is buying the car for their teenage driver, then new tires on the car will be a huge selling point. Again, it’s just one more thing that the buyer can’t use against you.

Price Your Used Car

Now that your automobile is clean and looking its best, it’s time to figure out what price to sell it for.

Free and Clear Title

What works best is if the car is clear – which means you don’t owe anything on it. You want a title that’s free and clear so that you don’t have to first take the buyer’s money to the bank and pay it off. That’s too much of a hassle for people and you’ll get very few people interested in the car and, because of that, you’ll get less for the car.

Search Online

Go to places like Kelly Blue Book (kbb.com) and see what the car is worth. Also, check out used car websites and try to find cars like yours (in the same condition, etc.) and see what they are selling for.

You should know all the features of your car. It doesn’t hurt to take a pen and pad of paper and go out to your car and write them all down.

Add Some Wiggle Room

When it comes time to haggle, you’ll lose a little right away. Add a few hundred in so that you are able to slide down on the price a little and let the buyer feel like they’re winning a little.

Also, here’s a good tip… take whatever price you want to sell your car for and subtract $5 from it. For example, if you are selling it for $5800, then set the price at $5795. It looks more attractive that way.

Take Pictures of Your Car

You’re going to want to sell your car online and maybe in a newspaper or print ads, so you will need some good pictures of it.

Find a Good Location

What’s around your car in the picture will help make the car look better, too. Find either a park where you can park your car on the grass for a brief period of time or else what I like to do is head over to a nice business park and find a nice building and parking lot there – like on a Sunday when nobody is around.

Weather and Lighting

A sunny day is good. Your pictures will look nice. With a somewhat cloudy day, you’ll get even lighting, which can also be a good thing. Do not take pictures going into the sun. Have the sun behind you always. You shouldn’t need a flash on your camera if you’re outside and there’s good lighting. The flash can reflect off of windows and ruin your shot sometimes – which is why you have to be careful about taking pictures inside the car. When doing that (and if you need a flash), do not aim the camera at windows but aim it downward or away from windows.

What to Take Pictures of

Here are some important things to make sure you take pictures of:

• The front, back and sides of the car.
• The interior – including the seats, dashboard, instrument console and radio.
• All four wheels. Try to show how much tread is left on each tire, too.
• The trunk.
• Under the hood.

I usually try to include a shot of the car from the front but from a low angle. You might have to be on the ground for it (which is why a park with a grassy area works well). Doing this makes the car look more “grand” and more special. Don’t just stand there and take a picture, move your body.

To get a good shot, move the car. Get in, move a little, take more pictures. When you get back home, you’ll pick out the best ones, so take a lot of pictures.

I also like to take one kind of funny picture and then decide later if I want to use it. For example, one with everything open – all the doors, the sunroof, the hood, trunk… everything.

Write Up The Specifications and a Good Description

Get out your list of features and write them down. Open a Word document and list them with bullet points. Don’t forget these items:

• Mileage
• VIN Number (it’s ok to post this online)
• State if the title is clear.
• Kind of transmission (automatic or manual)
• Any recent work you’ve had done – this will tell the new buyer that they won’t have to take care of these things for a while.

Then, what I like to do is be creative and write a good description. Include why you are getting rid of it. Maybe you just got another car or want to get a new car. Maybe you just need the money. Maybe you can’t store the car anywhere. List a good reason so that this doubt is removed from people’s minds.

Tell people what they will enjoy the most about the car. Maybe it’s the sunroof or the all wheel drive in the winter. Come up with at least 3 things and list the benefits of each one. Be emotional about it – meaning, say that the sunroof is great on sunny afternoons when you’re leaving work for the weekend and you feel nice and free with it open. Attach an emotion to each feature. This helps to create desire for the vehicle, which will help you get more for it because emotion very often over powers reason and logic.

Go Sell It!

Now that you have the car clean, the description and everything together, go sell the car. There are a number of places where you can get free car ads online. Here is that list:

• Craig’s List
• AOL Autos
• Cars for Sale.com

Craig’s List Scam

Craig’s List is great but watch out for scammers. I’ve seen these emails come in. Someone claims that they will pay your price plus $100 but they can’t see the car because they’re on a ship or something. Don’t fall for that. They won’t ever come see the car or send someone to pick it up. They want you to pay via PayPal and they’ll generate a fake email to send you and maybe pay you too much and have you refund them – something like that. Again, be smart and be careful!

Sell the Car Locally!

Put an ad in your local paper. Go to the supermarket and see what free car magazines are near the door. See about putting ads in those publications (I find some of those to be too expensive).

Put up Flyers!

You already have information about the car in a Word document. Add one of your pictures and print up flyers. Do them in color because they’re only about $0.50 a copy. Check it over for grammar and spelling errors (have someone else do it if you can’t). Put them up at grocery stores if they have a place for ads.

Also, some auto parts stores will have a place in their store for cars ads. I think this is so smart of them. They know that people selling their cars are going to need car parts and car cleaning items, which brings people into the store. Also, people will return there to buy parts and things once they have a car. Auto parts stores aren’t selling cars either, so you’re not competing with them. I don’t know why every one of these stores doesn’t have a board like this. If they don’t, then suggest it to the manager.

Park it Somewhere There’s a Lot of Traffic

No, don’t park it on the side of the highway. Find a busy street and park it on a corner (street parking) with a for sale sign on it. Don’t leave it there overnight or else you’ll invite thieves to break into it. Also, if you do want to park it at a store or business, get the permission of the store first. They probably don’t want their lot turned into a used car lot… or maybe they do!

You should have a for sale sign on the car at all times, too. If you’re driving it around, people will see it. Have the amount you’re selling it for along with your phone number in large letters so that it can easily be read.

Include Your Contact Info

Make sure you’ve included a way for people to contact you. List your email or phone number. I don’t like my cell number being out there, so what I did was get a free phone number at Google Voice that forwards any calls to my cell. That way, when the car is sold, you can shut down that number or not have it forward to you any more.

Build a Small Website for Your Car

This works well if you have a car that’s a little different like a sports car, an exotic, a classic or just something different. You might actually have a national audience for your car if it’s rare enough.

When I was selling my Toyota MR2, I realized it fell into this category and I bought a domain name and set up a simple website called MR2ForSale.com. It was a name that people could easily remember and it’s something that could get searched on if someone out of my area was looking for that kind of car.

You might also consider selling your car on eBay if you want to get rid of it quickly.

When Buyers Call or Arrive

When you start getting calls, here are a few tips.

First, it’s good to keep a list of people. When someone calls, make sure to get their name at least. Write down when they called, too. Just keep a small log for your reference. If you can get their phone number, then write that down, too.

Second, make sure they’re serious and just don’t want to waste your time looking or test driving a car – especially if it’s a nice or rare car. Be polite about it.

Third, pick a time and place that’s convenient. Maybe you don’t want people coming to your house – or maybe you do. I don’t really mind but I can understand how, in today’s world, someone might not want that.

As they’re looking over the car, make sure you’re pointing things out and telling them the benefits. Answer all their questions. If you have a folder full of receipts of things you’ve had fixed, then have that in the car. Buyer will like to see that it was taken care of.

Haggling Over the Price

Your ad already stated the price, so there’s no need for you to start lower than that. Stick to your price. They will most likely start lower. If it’s too low, then don’t even counter it. I like watching the shows like “Pawn Stars” or “American Pickers” and you can watch how they (the pros) do it. You can learn quite a bit. You should already have some wiggle room in your price, so you can come down a little.

The Final Sale

Before you have people come to see it, you should have everything ready. Here’s what you should have:

• The title along with any lien releases. Put this in an envelope (not sealed, of course) with the VIN number of the car printed on the outside of it. Make it look like you know what you’re doing.
• A “Bill of Sale” document. Have two of these printed out. These state that you have sold the car to the buyer without any warranty, etc. These are the terms of the sale. One is for your records and one is for them. Both of your should sign each one.
• Only accept cash or a bank check. Do not take personal checks. If you do take personal checks, then do not release the car to them until it has cleared. If they don’t like that, then they can go to their bank, get cash and come back.
• Give them all the keys, the manual and anything else that goes with the car.
• Shake their hand, look them in the eyes and smile.

Used Car Bill of Sale

Sample Used Car Bill of Sale Document / Form

If you’re looking for a “Bill of Sale” document / template, then we have a whole article here about a used car Bill of Sale document that you should read. Make sure you do. There, I have one you can download. You are welcome to it but know that I’m not an attorney and make no guarantee that this document is legally sound.

There are websites that can help you create and print a bill of sale document. I’d suggest using one of those.

Conclusion

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Got More Tips?

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Good luck selling your car!