How to Negotiate a Car Price When the Same Truck Varies 34%
"Fair price" gets talked about like a single number. I checked how far apart identical trucks are actually listed, and the spread is wider than most people's entire negotiation.
Today's Honda Civic Outweighs a 1981 Mustang
A 2026 Civic weighs 3,223 lb. A 1981 Mustang weighed 2,643 lb. The commuter hatchback is now heavier than the muscle car it used to park next to — and it is not the worst case in the data.
Used EVs Cost $4,000 More Than Gas Cars. Except They Don't.
Every used-EV conversation starts with "they're still too expensive," and the raw numbers agree. Then I filtered for age and mileage, and the gap almost vanished.
The GMC Sierra Costs $5,600 More Than the Identical Silverado
The Sierra and the Silverado are the same truck with different grilles — GM builds them on one line. So I checked what the letters on the tailgate cost. On an eight-year-old truck, $5,600. On a new one, $24,366.
"Excellent Condition" Is Just Another Word for Mileage
Every used-car site makes sellers choose a word: like new, excellent, good, fair. I pulled 310,383 listings to see what those words are worth. They turned out to describe something real — just not what you think they describe.
84% of Private Sellers Won't Show You the VIN
I run a free VIN decoder, so I read used-car ads from an odd angle: not "is this a good price," but "can I even check this car before I drive two hours to see it." So I counted all 310,383 of them. Just over half include a VIN. Which half is the whole story.
The Same F-150 Costs $9,700 More in Oregon Than Florida
Same year, same engine, same mileage — a truck should cost about the same anywhere. I sorted our listings by state and the gap turned out to be almost ten thousand dollars.
The Lexus Tax Is Real — But Only on Some Models
"Just buy the Lexus, it's the same car with better seats." Half true — but nobody says what the badge costs. So I lined up the twins at the same mileage and checked.
I Looked at 27,000 VIN Checks. People Check the Wrong Cars.
Everyone assumes a VIN check is for a beaten-up old sedan with a suspicious title. Our own lookup data says the exact opposite — and one model gets checked four times more than anything else.
How to Get the Original Window Sticker by VIN
Every new car left the factory with a sheet of paper taped to its glass listing exactly what it was. Then it got peeled off and thrown away, and three owners later nobody can tell you whether that sunroof came from the factory or from a shop. That's the gap a VIN can close.
The Same F-150 Costs $10,791 More in Michigan Than Florida
A truck is a truck. Same badge, same years, same miles on the clock — and the price still swings by more than ten grand depending on which state it's parked in. I always assumed that was noise, so I locked the filters down and looked at what our listings actually say.
Cars That Actually Reach 200,000 Miles, Ranked by Data
Everyone has an uncle whose Toyota hit 300,000 miles. Nobody counts the ones scrapped at 140,000. So I stopped asking people and asked the listings instead: what share of each brand actually turns up with 200,000 miles on the clock?