Autotrader.com Reviews

Autotrader.com is a joke to sell a vehicle! Costs $9 but the supposed filter that keeps scammers and low-ballers out doesn't work. That was ALL I got when trying to sell an old vehicle. The cost of selling THROUGH the site is an additional $99!? Didn't know that until AFTER paying the $9 to list the vehicle. Very disappointed in the outcome of the "service" (so-called). Will never do it again! Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.

I put a car on Autotrader this morning and have had nothing but scammers since I posted my ad. This used to be the place to sell a vehicle. They are no longer who they used to be. I am sorry I got taken by these folks! Don’t do it!!

AutoTrader has gone downhill. Years ago, it was a great alternative for private sellers to buy and sell, but they have become an ineffective platform for private sellers (the new Private Seller Exchange sucks). I recently listed my car for 40 days (for $49) and although about 10 people tried to reach out to me, I did not get a single appointment. They used to allow sellers to pay a single fee, to advertise your car until it's sold. A great opportunity that costs Autotrader nothing. But they did away with that option. They want to the have to pay multiple times. AutoTrader appears to only care about the dealer customers. A very small percentage of vehicles for sale are from private sellers. The dealers don’t want people selling cars to one another, they want buyers to have to buy from dealers only, allowing them to charge exorbitant prices.

Just wish I had read these reviews before giving up $70! Just like everyone else is saying, only got 2 hits from Autotrader. Both were stated as being "verified"... Both turned out to be scammers! I thought since Autotraders has been a trusted platform, that I would be exposed to a higher quality pool of buyers. 2 Scammer hits from AT for $70, and 1 legit hit from Craig's List, and 2 unknowns from Craig's list, $5. I almost fell for the Scam...If it weren't for my CC company stopping the payment I would have been jacked. They got my money, but I am going to try to take down my posting as soon as I can. Just sorry so much of my info is out there now.

Autotrader used to be the best site to come to, but not anymore. When you set up a search and put in parameters for distance, price, miles, etc. don't bother 'cause the parameters mean nothing. They used too, but the site ignores all those parameters.

For the first time did a transaction with the help of finding a car via Auto-trader. Driven Auto of Dundee, Illinois was the dealership and Eddie ** was my sales representative. I personally am disabled with ALS Bulbar Onset and don’t have the ability to speak. This did not phase Eddie at all and all correspondence was done via text message. He kept on top of it all and the car shipped right away after the deal was done. Received it and everything I expected was done.

I bought my Jeep Compass from Autotrader less than 10 months ago. I also purchased the 4-year warranty... My car has already been in the shop three times!! I'm very upset about this, but I guess now I'm stuck with this lemon!! Please shop somewhere else!!!

I have not received one ligit inquiry and am almost at the end of my time paid the original $50 fee plus added another $15 to supposedly have my vehicle spotlighted. I never had any inquiry in which anyone asked to actually come out and see, much less test drive my car. When I contacted AutoTrader regarding why, I simply got a load of bull 💩! I honestly believe this is more a CON than a true site that helps you sale your vehicle!

Nothing but scammers! Trying to get me to buy a fake "accident report" and then one guy who wanted to do a test drive at 8:30 PM and wouldn't respond to my texts. Who test drives a car at night? The site looks like it was put together by an eighth grade computer science club. It would not even let me access it through my VPN. And they wanted a picture of the front and back of my title, what's up with that? I cancelled the ad, and fortunately still have my truck - which is still for sale...

Autotrader Private Seller is HORRIBLE, and you have NO choice anymore but to use it! They hold your vehicle hostage. There is no way a buyer can contact you directly. I didn't get one legitimate offer from a real buyer. All I got were low ball offers from them in the 4,000 to 5,000 range, for my car that was worth 16,000. They are a total rip off and a nightmare to deal with. I got many qualified buyers from Craigslist and Facebook Market Place, and sold my car with Facebook, which is FREE.

Full of scammers if you can even find used stuff. Has become a platform for companies selling new vehicles. There are 100 ads for new vehicles to every 1 used that's probably posted by a scammer anyway.

Unfortunately advertising on AutoTrader has turned into a constant battle of dealing with scammers trying to get to sign into their “car facts” site. They either want your credit card number or $39.95 for a report you don’t need. Imposing as serious buyers, I’m constantly battling to find out if they are real. After five days, five scammer and ZERO actual buyers. Save your $79 and secure a site with real buyers.

Not a single legitimate buyer! Five scammers trying to get me to buy their unique "auto report" and Autotrader's ridiculously low offer. Autotrader offered me $6000 for an $18000 car, why? This was a complete waste of time and money.

It was confusing, time-consuming, expensive, and it has been 2 months that I "bought" the car and still have no plates or title. Normally, if you pay with cash and go to the Vehicle Licensing business, it can all happen same day. They also charge you a $200 transaction fee, which I never saw until I got the final invoice. Good for sellers (maybe), bad for buyers in my opinion.

Watch out for actors selling you their car report service! They act like they want to buy your car but want you to buy the car report (from the company they work for). I explained this to customer service and they said once the ad went live (which is as soon as you list it) you can not receive a refund. So nobody gets a refund. $50 fee just to list your vehicle.

These people need tech help badly. The site is down nearly every day. How can I sell my car when the site is down and I’m stopped dead in my tracks while trying to chat with a buyer? Oh, and then there are the scammers constantly wasting my time, posing as buyers but really trying to get me to buy fake VIN reports. And to make things worse, the scammers are listed as “verified buyers” by Autotrader. Who is running this company anyway?

Autotrader.com is ridiculously slow. Browser keeps timing out waiting to load, probably from all the ads they promote. Go to ** or **, or anywhere else for that matter, for a better search experience. You're wasting your time, literally, trying to use autotrader.com.

If you want to throw money away list your car on this webpage. You’ll get a ton of people trying to scam you and steal your property? Then they also steal your photos and try and sell your car as theirs? Oh and get this, it’s 80.00 for 40 days of scammers contacting you for fraudulent transactions. Customer service is horrendous, they could care less. It’s a data collector reading prompts on a screen in Mumbai India? This company has lost all credibility. Don’t even bother buying or selling on Autotrader anymore. RIP.

I've had my truck for sale for 2 weeks priced very well. No legit offers, just tons of scammers on the site. Way more scammers than actual buyers. Complete waste of time and money. DO NOT USE!! WASTE OF TIME

I received nothing but spam on this site! Then Autotrader offered to purchase my vehicle for 1/3 of the value. Don’t waste your money or time. Put it in social media for zero cost. That’s how I ended up selling my car.

Every time I go to the site or look at my phone, I get a notification saying that I have a new message. I do not have one. I cannot reschedule my test drive. I cannot get a refund. All in all? It’s a scam.

Scammers paradise. How do they book my vehicle to drive if I never agreed to it!? Scammers can not be blocked and continue to harass. No way to block them, still shows you have messages from them. No real offers after paying them additional $15 to promote ad. Other folks complaining about same thing. Not happy at all with service. Their system is broken, you can't even set up bank acct (thank goodness!) to receive money for any sale. Attempted to contact them, via their app, their contact us page, even on their X account. No response. Don't use AutoTrader.

I have used Autotrader for years, bought and sold many cars using them. However, the last few times I have used them it has become clear they are in some kind of downfall in service and major security issues! I have been bombarded by fraud in so many different ways, even by people who have been "verified" by Autotrader. Also, in buying or selling cars through Autotrader it takes a very long time to get them to 100% complete the transaction, weeks if not months go by before the buyer gets the title in hand. On top of all this to my surprise they have changed their ad policies, only running the ad for 40 days. It had always been "run until it sells".

I've used AT in the past but this time the service has been anything but good. My ad was put up for review for some reason. That's just it. They won't tell you anything. Won't respond to emails. Why take the money if they are not going to post my ad.

I saw a car on Auto Trader that I really wanted and wanted to finance. I got pre-approved by Auto Trader and then made a few offers on this car! I spoke to the owner and went and test drove the vehicle. We came to an agreement, so I went home to finish the finance agreement. They said Westlake Financial said I was good to go. I even purchased insurance. I uploaded everything they requested and even gave them access to my bank account! And since I am self-employed and put all my profit back into my business, they denied me because of my daily average balance! Not only did they make me look like a fool, but they obviously don't understand good business decisions when growing a business! I don’t recommend using this site at all, you will be disappointed!

I have been a AT client as a buyer and seller for many years. I recently listed a vehicle two separate times at a good price. I only received a few responses. Then I went to contact a private seller and none of the links worked for me to become a verified buyer. Got me thinking maybe this is by design to discourage that private community to push business to dealers. Buyer Beware!!!!

They have dropped in value and ethics on how they do business. Phony offers with no responses, has turned into a free for all controlled by dealer member/owners ... Will never use them again. URGE move on...

Used to be a good place to sell your car. Unfortunately, things have changed. First when they changed the private seller format. Used to be able to deal directly with a buyer. Now they play middleman for a fee when you sell your car. The ads are no longer run till it sells. They expire in 40 days. To add insult to injury, I purchased an ad that was supposed to run til the car sold, but apparently my ad has now expired due to the 'new policy'. What a bunch of nonsense! I can understand that new policy would apply to NEW ads, but not for EXISTING ads! And lastly, customer service has the nerve to say that they would be willing to extend the ad for another 40 days as a "courtesy"! I have used their website for a number of years in the past, but no more. They've become greedy & I sincerely hope they end up with a class action lawsuit over how they're pulling a bait & switch on customers.

Don't waste your money or time. Just use Facebook marketplace. No one contacted me except low offers from Autotrader or a couple of scammers. I don't think legit people use auto trader. Wasted money!!!

I paid $160 to Autotrader.ca to receive 3 time wasting email inquiries over 3 weeks. Meanwhile I sold the sought after convertible car that I listed at 8pm on Friday night on marketplace by 7:30am Saturday to the first buyer for 50% more than Autotraders bot suggested sale price ($5k). The bot even offered to buy car off me for $5k to $7k before even listing the car on their site. (puzzled me) Worst online experience as it cost me money time and influenced my sale price. Friday night we had a wall of 80 separate enquiries between 8pm and 1am on Facebook marketplace. I'm suspicious of who actually sees Autotrader listings. Compartmentalized viewing scam may be at play, I'm not sure. But it sure doesn't make sense. Never again.

If you are a private seller, don't waste your money listing on this site. It is pretty much useless. My only responses were scammers trying to get my personal information for their use. The user platform looks like it was laid out by a 3rd grader, guess that's what you get when you hire the cheapest developer's bid. I had much better results from using the big social media platforms.

I wish I would've read reviews before wasting my money on this site. On Marketplace, I had over 25 interested people in a week, and on AutoTrader I had three...and they ALL were scams. Why can't this site screen people better? It was a waste of my time and money. I won't use them again.

Full of scammers sending you links to insert personal information or financial information to sell your car. Stay away. Much more secure sites than this. Not the Autotrader of old that you could trust.

Autotrader has turned into a piece of trash for listing cars. Like others have said below, ads expire which is not how it was presented. I used them for many years, but no more. The first thing they do is send you a low ball offer to sell it directly to them, which I think is their new model so they can wholesale it to a dealer. Then you can't connect with the potential buyer in an easy fashion. I got an email for a test drive request and a few hours later it expired, with only the option to send a message to the interested party. When I had this car listed 2 months prior, they have this scammy "someone just bought your car, prepare the title" garbage with no communication from the buyer, and no money, so I did not proceed with the sale since the offer was not funded. Just a joke, owned by Cox Automotive, it is now just a front to take your money and give you nothing for your car.

Terrible customer service — beware, they will take your money. I called within 10 minutes of placing my ad to cancel, and they refused. After hours of being put on hold, I was told a supervisor would call me back — that never happened. I called again a few days later and went through the same frustrating runaround. I eventually had to dispute the charge with my credit card company and am still fighting to get my money back. They’re unprofessional, misleading, and completely unreliable. I absolutely do not recommend this company.

This was the best car buying experience I think I’ve ever had. I made an offer, seller accepted and it was seamless the whole way. Getting ahold of a live agent was very quick and painless! Highly recommend.

If there was a ZERO rating, Autotrader has EARNED IT! I highly suggest don't even start with this complete WASTE OF TIME! You will get offers, accept them, chat with buyers and you will not get responses. I received over FIFTEEN offers. Ranging from asking price to lowball offers. NONE of them followed through! I suggested to all the "buyers" they call Autotrader as how to proceed. Still, NOTHING. So I called Autotrader and they ADMITTED to me on the phone they have lots of BOTS, which to ME means, their IT department can't manage their own servers (or customer data). Unless you have LOTS of time to waste, don't bother.

Do not listen with Autotrader unless you want to be scammed and charged a large fee. We listed our vehicle as unlimited until it sells, and after 1 month, they told us they changed their business plan and now our ad will cancel after 40 days. I called to get a refund for my paid ad and they would not give me my money back. THAT IS BAD BUSINESS. Also, we kept getting scammers and not real people interested. What a waste.

I purchased an Auto Trader ad that did not expire. You just had to confirm you still wanted it posted every 10 weeks. Now, I'm being told the ad will expire months after posting the ad. They are saying it is a new policy but it feels like bait and switch as any existing ads before the policy change had a different set of rules you were agreeing to. I'm filing with the FTC but hopefully there is a class action as a result of this.

Autotrader was a waste of time and money. I thought they would make selling vehicles easy, but I only got 6 responses to my ad and ALL of them were scams. They ALL tried to get me to purchase vehicle history reports from completely different websites that I've never even heard of. I even got a response from a "Certified Buyer" from a "car salesman" from a nearby dealership. When I called the dealer to confirm this, the guy I supposedly was talking to wasn't even there that day. It was all a scam. I would not recommend selling on Autotrader.

If you're a small pre owned dealer don't waste a dime on this website. I sell 10-12 vehicles a month and wanted to sell a couple 2018 Lexus GXs and a Sequoia. Good news only 200.00 but I'll never get the hours back responding to 9th party buyers. Zero Buyers. I'm priced 2k less than dealers. Seriously Autotrader is god awful.

AUTOTRADER.COM - I called the next after I signed up - was getting all spam messages of people interested in my car then trying to sell me some Carfax/Joto program along with other spam bots trying to sell me things. I called. The rep said give it another 5 days. I did and it's all spam. I called today. The rep said they would only credit me $15 out of the $49. So they tried to keep me another week so that they could only credit me the $15.

I use AutoTrader because it was supposed to be quick and easy. I was supposed to be done in 24 to 48 hours and be able to get my vehicle. I bought a minivan because I have four children. I get told today after it's already been 48 hours That I will have to wait like another 7 days which I understand is not exactly Auto trader's fault but I can't get a response from them

Wanted to contact a seller of a car, but Autotrader made this too difficult - then demanded that I take copies of my driver's license (front and back) and send it out to a party I know nothing about. Of course, nothing bad could happen there.... I would not recommend anybody to try to sell anything on autotrader - your really interested and qualified cash buyers are not going to go through this.

I have read a lot of negative reviews on this website AFTER using Autotrader.com myself, and I guess I was lucky compared to most buyers/sellers. I paid $9 to list my 2011 vehicle. I only had one obvious scammer in 24 hours, but that was because I got an offer in one day, and I accepted that offer. My selling price of $4800 was twice the trade-in value that any dealer would give me, so I did very well. My buyer did have trouble getting Autotrader to accept his cash offer, however it was due to his bank delaying his payment and the problem was solved within a few days after his offer. Autotrader did Mark My ad as "sold" during that time, so my sale was in limbo during the buyer's bank difficulty which would have been frustrating if he had backed out of the deal which he did not. Once he paid Autotrader the deal went smoothly and I received payment promptly.

After a couple hours, all of a sudden he contacted me and stated that the transaction was held up on my end. Though I work 80 hour work weeks, I got on this problem swiftly.

Autotrader Classic is a rip off. I only got messages From fake scam buyers. It cost me $150 to post there. Do not recommend! You also can’t reply to messages within the site, you have to reach out with your private email to respond to potential buyers only to learn it’s a scam and then they have your personal email.

I placed my first ad on Auto Trader and got a response almost immediately. They offered to pay full value but required an auto report first and supplied the link to the vendor. I didn't know it was a scam til after buying it. I didn't realize this was a thing until I googled it after. Got interest from 3 more buyers all of them asking for car reports from unscrupulous sites. Auto Trader is aware of these scams but takes no responsibility for allowing it to go on. They should be upfront and have a big warning for new listings about these scams. This would be very beneficial for new users of their site.

I purchased a truck from one of their verified sellers. You cannot speak to the seller as you have to text only on the AutoTrader system. We agreed to meet in Dallas to test drive the truck and sign the paperwork. I drove 10 hours and over 750 miles to meet up with this verified seller and he didn't show up. I called Autotrader and filed a complaint as they stated they would contact the verified seller. Haven't heard any word.

The concept of selling your car privately and have a business that will pay off your loan, except funds from the buyer, and send you a check, all certified funds is a wonderful idea. Being a small business owner, and buying and purchasing vehicles annually this would be an great help. However, customer service is horrible. The people that answer the phone are extremely incompetent, they will send you to another incompetent person that will tell you your funds are coming in 48 hours. They won't. they'll tell you the staffs in a meeting, their not. I have not got my funds yet, 5 business days past, and I won't until 10 business days if I'm lucky. I'll never do business with them again, and I urge my readers to find some other form of payment.

I have purchased 2 cars from the Autotrader private exchange. The customer service is pathetic. So far I left 3 messages with live agents and they always promised me a return call with information but I never get a call back. It’s been 4 weeks since I paid and got my vehicle but I have not received any paperwork for registration. Every time I call the lady that does this work in Cleveland Ohio, is at lunch, in a meeting or away from her desk. Do not use this service!

Unfortunately Autotrader's site cannot be trusted. This is a scammers haven and all I received are bogus messages and con artists trying to scam me. I will never post there again. Sad to see how far Autotrader has fallen.

After listing a vehicle for sale the only responses were from scammers, wanting you to send them different types of VIN reports. Not one single legit response. There is no way I would give Autotrader my account info, and then pay a addition fee for them to supposedly help verify the buyers. In my opinion the worst site to sell for a private seller.

I just posted my Ad for selling car (it cost me $79). 4 people immediately wrote who simply insisted on going an additional check of my car on different paid sites and they all looked like real buyers. Also, 2 test drives were planned. No one showed up! There are scammers!!! I do not recommend this site! Please, check reviews before!!!!

The biggest problem I have with this site is that there are people who lead you on and act like they are interested in purchasing just to sell you an online site to purchase a VC, VP, or vehicle report. This is something Auto Trader has said they provide for free already. Unfortunately, you get more of these lunatics messaging you than you do people who are actually interested in buying. I would stay off this site and not use or post something in the add that serious buyers only and not interested in online sites to purchase reports. Good grief!!!

Terrible website. Do not list your car here. Paid $80 to list my car and all I got were scammer, no legitimate buyers. Called Autotrader to try and work things out and they offered me $30 back and to take down the listing. Won’t ever use this site again. Completely waste of time and money

There is always an issue with this website. Nothing ever works correctly. I think the people that run this are on TikTok instead of doing their job. Don’t waste your time. There are plenty of other websites to buy a car from.

I appreciate AutoTrader's platform, but my experience was disappointing. Within 48 hours, I encountered four scammers attempting to trick me into purchasing fraudulent vehicle history reports from known scam sites. This not only wasted over two hours of my time but also invalidated any potential value the platform may have had for selling my car.

I have always been pleased with Autotrader.com to locate vehicles and using site to sell cars. I found the private exchange very challenging. You can only communicate via messaging and cannot share contact info experience where test drives people would not show up or could not find me at location. I had no fewer than 3 people "buy" the car, but they did not make payment and in follow-up all Autotrader could do was share my contact info with the buyer. Very frustrating that I ended up going to a different site to sell the car for smoother process. Car listed on auto trader for 5 weeks with lots of activity. Once I moved to another site, same level of volume but car sold in under 5 days. I appreciate the safety aspect auto trader put in place with private exchange, but I found it limiting and controlling. I would not recommend Autotrader to sell cars if you are a private seller vs. dealer. There are other alternatives that also offer safety but not as controlling.

This is a good source for doing research, but I would not recommend using them for selling, usually only get lowball offers from dealers, if you are selling something out of the ordinary, like a collector car, then this is a good place, but if you are selling an average car or truck, list it on Marketplace, you will be surprised as to the hits that you will get, now with that being said, I do believe that a boosted add on marketplace, will get you some fraudulent hits, like is this still available, but you will get many inquiries that are legit, I am speaking from a little experience, have listed over 20 cars and trucks, and again like I said, if it is a really unusual sale, then put it both places.

This site has a terrible interface for consumers and awful delayed touch screen which takes way too long and skips around to the wrong areas therefore it is frustrating and takes too long to navigate.

Unfortunately we failed to undertake due diligence regarding this site. Cutting to the chase: Autotrader is not the DMV, FBI, the department of transportation, or a Bank. They might think that they are, however, they are not! They might try and get you to believe they are. However they are not. They are a data mining facility. The $9 paid to list your vehicle is simply the entrance fee to their financial rotary data milking facility. There are foreign and domestic entities that would pay considerable sums for the data Auto Trader collects if you are unaware of the potential risk of providing such detailed information.

I really hope my review helps even just one person from making the biggest mistake of your life by using Autotrader Private Seller Exchange. It started out great by me finding the car I have been looking for at the right price. I messaged the seller and set up a test drive through the dashboard. I became a “verified” buyer so the seller knew I was serious about purchasing the car. Apparently, when you sell on this platform you are bombarded with scam offers and calls at least that’s what my seller told me and also what I have read in other reviews of this. I met the seller at the location and test-drove the car. I loved it and proceeded to make an offer which was accepted. I needed to finance the car and had a pre-approval already. Once my offer was accepted the financing took a few days to go through since I made the offer on a Saturday.

I was directed while placing my ad to a site that said I needed to compete this information for my AutoTrader Ad.... I later discovered this is an optional upsell from Auto Trader but it never gives you an option to decline on the internet. I was told you need to call in to cancel that option's upsell which I had done but never was told it was optional. It said I needed a smog certificate, I called Auto Trader and spoke to a representative that never said these services are optional. I actually ask him if the Certificate was required for the ad and he confirmed it was but I had 14 days to do so. I never recommend misleading business that are not honest with customers.

Omg. Why I haven't seen all these reviews before I started wasting my time on this platform. Just DO NOT waste your money and time here and on FB marketplace! You're not gonna get any real offers for your car. All they need are your $$$. That's it. It's much better go to Carvana.

Yesterday I purchased a 2024 Jeep gladiator after having rude customer service elsewhere, the staff at Deland Jeep were definitely amazing and my buying experience was greater. I really don’t care for pushy salespeople so Mathew ** was perfect. He was sweet and polite and honestly the main reason I went ahead and purchased after only planning on test driving.

All that have responded to my ad are scammers. In my opinion no should be able to make contact without themselves being verified. They should go through some type of vetting provided by Autotrader to contact a seller. It has been a waste of my money for the ad and my time. Ridiculous!!!!

AutoNation Hyundai Valencia Stock#: DC529776|VIN: 1C4RJFCG2DC529776. Went to buy this car chk in hand. Called a day ahead and said I would be there with intentions of buying. Was told side mirror had been damaged but was replace, all points inspection etc. I asked for pics of the interior never got any. Mirror was broke, inside of car was filthy. Wanted to talk to someone about fixing mirror and detailing before I purchased. Nothing on the mirror and come back tomorrow if I wanted it detailed. I asked to talk to a manager to see about lowering price due broke mirror, nope corporate policy not changing price. I would not recommend buying from a company that so little regard for product quality/presentation, professionalism or their prospective customers. Price has been dropped, now I know why. Are you really in business to sell anything?

Spent hours on the phone with them to get the Report of Sale fixed that had the wrong address on it. Everything else was fine up until the the documentation part with the customer service team. They have two layers to these teams and the other team just didn't get the memo on the Report of Sale and kept telling me about mailing out the documents I wasn't even calling about. The Report of Sale needs to be printed out and signed. This took a couple of hours.

Thieves and liars. Stole money from me as a seller. Buyer paid my fees and auto trader stole it. Spoke to many many people and they don't care. Sell anywhere else. Don't get me started about the hundreds in fees they charge to the buyer. Grifters.

Used Autotrader for years. Soon as I missed an invoice due to business slowing down my accounts was cancelled. I called to reason with them. All I got was threats and attuite. Been with them for 5 years. Will take my business elsewhere. They have no customer support, nor do they like to help. It's purely money. They're only nice to you when they're at fault.

I've tried to use Autotrader for clients to find certain vehicles. There are 100s of listings where dealers consistently list their vehicle with the wrong transmission. Specifically, listing their vehicle as a manual transmission when the photos and VIN show that it's an automatic. I called a few of them to bring this up and most of them admit they are trying to get more eyes on their vehicle because they know the market doesn't want a tiptronic/automatic. The frustrating part is that there is no way to filter this any longer because Autotrader doesn't crack down on this behavior. I've sent countless (At least 50-60) reports to Autotrader to fix the issue for the last 6-8 years.

Updated on 03/04/2025: Quick update. I'm still selling cars and unfortunately Auto Traitor owns a large portion of market share. However, for the third time now my listed gets expired due to their system never recognizing my reactivation of my listing. I've had to spend nearly an hour with customer service validating my identity just in order to renew my listing. All the messages I've received so far are bots that all have the same lame approach. Pretty girl as profile phone. However none of them are creative enough to offer a different message. It sucks we have to use these big companies with such market share but just don't ever go into using them thinking they are on your side. They manipulate markets, show favor to dealers and make private party values seem higher than dealers. Do better Auto Traitor.

Autotrader was a legit site just a few short years ago. We just paid to advertise two autos $49x2. The only thing we have gotten is insulting offers from Autotrader, and all AI (totally fake people acting like they want to buy both of them). Same exact verbiage and same exact name for both listings. It is a waste of time and money to advertise with Autotrader. They have zero protections and do not verify the buyers before they allow correspondence with the sellers (which are required to be verified before they allow correspondence listing will be posted).

Nothing but scams. No real buyers. Just a bunch of stupid questions and bad English. They are easy to spot after a few exchanges. As a seller you have to verify your identity. Why don’t they make these people verify their identity so they can be filtered out.

Listed my vehicle and responses were trying to get me to provide a vehicle history report other than CarFax. They wanted me to go to a SPECIFIC WEB SITE which would collect my private information including credit card number. I would not advise using Autotrader. Other sellers have had similar experiences.

I placed an ad here for my Honda CRV. Nothing but scam people trying to sell me services. When I contacted AutoTrader just days later asking for a refund they passed me along to "help me improve my ad". Don't waste your time or money. Canceled the ad and sold my car on Craigslist for $5 a few days later.

My dad bought a lemon. We thought the cars had to be verified, but they only say that. DON’T USE THIS APP. My dad bought a car for 10k, was only able to fix half the problems for 4K. He needed another 5k to fix it. He lost 10k on this. Autotrader did nothing to help.

I tried to buy a vehicle that Autotrader advertised, and in order to make any deal with the seller they wanted me to send a copy of my ID and a selfie, which for me it's ridiculous, I had bad experience about send information over the internet, I think it's have to be a better way than that, I would not recommend anyone to use this site to buy a car, don't risk your personal information.

Terrible business. They want to be the broker for your car. No one wants that. They try to control communications for your protection, but that just leads to no interest in cars. What a waste. Use any other seller.

I’m giving AutoTrader a bad rating due to a highly frustrating experience while trying to sell my car. I received five different offers on my vehicle, and the process was nothing but a hassle. Four of the buyers never followed up after making an offer, leaving me hanging without any communication or next steps. The one offer I did accept resulted in a long back-and-forth exchange with a buyer who lived hundreds of miles away. After investing time and effort, she eventually messaged me saying she couldn’t afford the car after all. It was a huge waste of time.

Recently bought a vehicle off of Autotrader and NEVER AGAIN! The customer service is AWFUL, and you WILL have to contact them (several times). I bought my vehicle from a private seller and initially thought it'd be pretty cut and dry and a simple process (that's what Autotrader leads you to believe), but it has been nothing but a hassle and waiting game dealing through them!! They not only charge both the seller AND buyer extra fees, they have you go through extra steps (as opposed to just meeting at the bmv and boom, everything is done in less than an hour at the bmv with a private seller and buyer) and then you are in limbo waiting on them to send you your plate (it took a month and a half to receive mine!)!

I have the learn that 99% of response are from scammers. Example they all request car or truck maintenance report from unknown companies other than CarFax. Please cancel fake offer from fake scammer on my 2019 Ford Edge.

Please believe me when I tell you DO NOT PURCHASE A CAR ON AUTOTRADER.COM. I did, what follows is my experience. The first thing I want to say is and the most important if you buy a car on autotrader.com you will not receive the title or the paperwork to register the car for at least four months. You will have the car, but you will not have the title or the paperwork to register the car with your local department of motor vehicle. I purchased a beautiful car in June of 2024. I just got the registration information and the title on October 15th 2024. I called them every single week during those four months to find out what was going on. Every week they said someone would call me back. No one ever called me back not once, not one time did I get a call back.

The worst platform to use for selling your vehicle. I have kept my ad for 60 days on Autotrader.com and got mostly scams. Not a single buyer. Platform is not user frendly either. Put my car on Facebook marketplace under auto tools heading and I got over 20 responses, vehicle sold within 3 weeks. Stay away from Autotrader, they are not what they used to be and clearly they are not putting any $$ in their site.

I recently took out an ad on AutoTrader.com. I had received zero responses from interested private party buyers. I got some responses from the dealerships that will give you a purchase price but usually against trade and very low ball. I think AutoTrader is a total rip off. I used similar social media that didn't cost anything and had my truck sold in a day. I'm totally waste of money. Third little buyer protection gimmick. Look out for it's a scam. Also they don't verify nothing. I think for them to charge what they charge for the services way too much plus what they want to take with the spire protection program. What a racket.

Also listed my car on AutoTrader a weeks ago thinking it would lead to more qualified buyers than Craigslist and Marketplace for my car ad, but all I've gotten is "bots, spam, and VIN report scammers". Site seems to be pretty much a breeding ground for scams these days and AutoTrader is difficult to work with and apparently has no means of controlling these scammers. FYI here is their typical process; 1) They ask if you're still selling. 2) They ask if anything is wrong with the car. 3) They ask to see it "tomorrow" around 3 or 4:00. 4) They ask for a meeting place (give them a phony place and you will know they are a scammer). 5) They will ask for a VIN report (often from Garage Browser (GB)). If your text chain looks like this THEY ARE SCAMMERS, BLOCK THEM!

Listed my car on this website on hopes to sell it, I got attacked by numerous fake buyers who all wanted me to purchase verification report from various websites, probably from which they were getting commission. They kept insisting they could not take a Carfax report because it was not good enough. It was a total waste of my money, posting it on this website.

I bought a car on Autotrader.com and sold on on Craigslist. I want to compare the two. My ad for Craigslist was $5.00 for the month. Autotrader.com was close to $300.00 according to the guy who sold me my current car. The secure email systems are the same. Meeting interested people and showing the car the same. When I sold my car it took 30 minutes for him to get a cashier's check. We meet at the licensing Department. It took 20 minutes to go in and sign over the license. He got a new certification of ownership and his new plates. It took 3 weeks to get my plates from Autotrader.com and an extra trip into Seattle to pick up the car. They got the address wrong on the paperwork the first time. Then they sent the plate to the same wrong address. It was frustrating. I say try Craigslist list first. For $5.00 you can't go wrong.

I'll echo most of the other reviews here... Save your money and steer clear of Autotrader. Listed my car there a couple weeks ago thinking it would lead to more qualified buyers seeing my car for sale, but all I've gotten is bots, spam, and VIN report scammers. Site seems to be pretty much a breeding ground for scams these days...

Made recent purchase of pre-owned truck from Laura CDRJ in Sullivan Mo. Truck was a year old and sold as clean title and clean CARFAX with no accidents. After purchase and brought home I noticed trim piece on rear bumper was loose. After closer exam I saw the bumper had actually been hit and was damaged underneath. After back and forth conversation with salesman I brought truck back to be looked at. Met with sales manager and after looking at it I was told it’s a used vehicle and I signed for it. He then told me to get off his lot. This is not how any respectable dealer should ever treat a customer. I would not recommend buying from CDRJ store.

They don't let the buyers talk to sellers over the phone prior the purchase. Just pay here full amount + tax and their fees and wait 2-3 months to get a car with tons of problems that were not disclosed, I don't get how they can you sell a car and register it in CA without the emission test. As a seller you will waste $49 for listing that you will not be able to find any buyer for your car. Autotrader will not let you post your phone number on listing, and will not let the interested people to send their contact info messages. They force the buyer and seller keep texting through their messaging platform, which is very inconvenient. Buyers want to talk and hear the seller voice before buying the car, but you can not talk anywhere else but here. They used to be ok, but new ownership have ruined autotrader. Go post it on Craigslist, Facebook marketplace, Neighborhood, Cars.com, CarGurus and etc.

A useless site. Autotrader was the best way to sell personal cars when I was younger (in the 1980’s). They had the magazines in all gas stations, etc. The current version of Autotrader is terrible. I have sold cars using Craigslist, Facebook Marketplace, etc., all are easy to use. Autotrader is not easy to use, wants you to input your VIN then can't find the car. Anyway, don’t use this outdated site. It's mainly just for dealers today and they could care less about private sellers. Should change your name to dealer trader.

I would give zero stars if I could. If you plan to place an ad, DON’T. You will get nothing but illegitimate inquiries. Scams. AutoTrader does NOT screen these inquiries. I placed an ad in the morning and within an hour my email was blowing up with messages from AutoTrader about an inquiry. All fake or scammers. They would not refund my $49 for the Ad.

Ditto on all other negative reviews, Autotrader,com is a huge scam when either buying or selling cars. I posted an ad and automatically had a test drive sign up which never showed so knew at that point I was being scammed then had 4 scammers trying. When I messaged Autotrader they gave a # to call so I called and was put on hold then disconnected 4 times. BEWARE OF THIS SITE, WHOEVER BOUGHT IT ARE SCAMMERS!!

I sold my car through a direct offer on Autotrader. They gave me a better offer than other comparable sites and the process of selling was overall pretty easy. I can't comment on buying through autotrader but the direct offer process was pretty smooth.

I have had nothing but a great experience with everyone at Autotrader. Very professional, very thoughtful, very kind and knowledgeable staff. Everything has been on the up and up, everything has been smooth sailing so far. Couldn't ask for a better, easier, more stress free sale.

My experience and transaction with Autotrader.com was quick, easy and smooth. I received payment as promised in a timely manner. I would recommend using them. I sold my vehicle through Autotrader Direct Offer.

#1 Auto selling scam artists on the web. They'll take your money, and give you nothing but headaches in return. In the weeks since placing our ad, we have had nothing but scammers reach out about the listed vehicle. Customer service/support is abysmal at best and obsolete at worst—and it's worst.

I posted my truck on Autotrader and FB marketplace. All I received from Autotrader were scam email. The service doesn't work now and it didn't work 5 years ago when I sold my other vehicle. I forgot how lousy they are. I will say this for them, I requested a refund of my $49 dollars and they gave me $20 bucks back. I did sell my vehicle through FB Marketplace. I received a ton of hits.

Beware of purchasing a vehicle through Autotrader. I recently purchased a vehicle through the online app. The seller did not have the title in his name so the transfer couldn't take place unless we went through the WA State DOL. I cancelled the purchase and requested a refund. It took 7 business days for me to get my money back causing me to miss out on three vehicles that I wanted to purchase. The first call I made to Autotrader, they said I would get the money in 24 hrs., the second call they said 24 to 72 hrs., and the third call they said 5 to 7 business days. They use your funds for seven days period. They charge $200 for documents and $200 for the transfer of title. They are very slow to process refunds and do not flag the fradulent sellers.

Bought a car of them, thinking they had a reputable business only to get scammed by the seller. I was told that Autotrader should be able to help me as they have a duty of care. Tried to contact them thinking they could be of help but all I got was, "We will try to contact the seller to get in touch with you to sort it out." We were promised a perfectly working car and all we got was a box with everything needing replacing. Save yourself the stress and buy a car elsewhere. These guys won't do anything if you are scammed by a seller they did checks on.

I would give 0 zero stars if it was an option. I bought a car 3 days ago and still trying to get the temporary tag so I can pick the car up. The seller & I have been getting the runaround. I’m beyond frustrated.

I don't believe it was even listed. I sold a very sought after work van. I had too many messages to respond to on FB Messenger. The 1st person to come look picked up a certified check on the way for the full amount before even seeing the vehicle. I forgot to remove the listing on Autotrader and never received the 1st call. What a joke!

BUYER AND SELLER BEWARE. After driving an hour I test drove and made an offer that was accepted by the seller. First warning sign was difficulty getting the transaction to process through the app. Before the transaction was complete the seller assured me that I could take the vehicle home and I would receive an email with the title/registration and temporary tags. I ignored his suggestion and waited for the transaction to complete before taking the vehicle home. Second warning was the email from Autotrader only included a link for the invoice, which didn’t work. It was Sunday, so no one answered when I called. I slept on it and parked the vehicle in my driveway, assuming the email would come to complete the transaction the next morning. I got nervous and called the next morning and was transferred to accounts where I was connected to a man who was insulting and condescending towards me when I inquired about the documents.

I listed my car three weeks ago and the only inquiries were five different scammers within the first three hours. Autotrader no longer allows you to share contact info. News flash AUTOTRADER, most of your demographic is old school individuals that prefer old school communication. Save your time and money and list elsewhere. Personally I would never sell a car to anyone without speaking to them. I listed and sold two sports cars in January 2023 on auto trader before the platform went south. Back then you could list your phone and email so you could have the old school communication that we grew up with. Do yourself a favor and sell elsewhere.

My husband purchased a car for our grandson through Autotrader. Paid through Autotrader by card. Got charged $200 for their paperwork and another $200 for using a card. Rip off! Secondly, the temp tags they supplied are fake. Fraudulent! My grandson got stopped and the tags were run. Highly recommended running VERY far from Autotrader! Scammers.

What a different company, a real PIA. They get another seller fee on top of the AD fee now, 1% of the selling price, they want bank information, you can't talk to the seller on the phone- I used to advertise here, NO MORE! Not worth the hassle, you don't even get the cash, it's wired to your bank-NO!

It's FULL of scammers who think they are smart, but are very stupid. Do NOT use this site and it attempts to take you to other scam sites. I will not use them again. I wasted over one hour dealing with them and the scammers wanted me to unlock my security settings. I am reporting them to the Attorney General for fraud.

Waste of money. Only responses I got for weeks were scammers or dealers trying to low ball the price. They say they verify the users, but obviously don't. Sold the car through a free ad. Will never use again. Save your money.

I have run my ad for a used convertible for 10 days and the only inquiries are scammers telling me their brothers are looking for a can and I should click on a link to contact him or other variations. No one of the 10 or so inquiries had questions that made me believe they ever read my ad. Auto Trader will not address my concern. I just get computer generated responses that they verified all the people on auto trader. Save yourself the money and aggravation and skip Auto Trader, it's not the valuable tool in use to be to a seller.

Auto Trader review!!! Has engine ever privately sold a car on autotrader, I'm questioning that. All I got so far are scams. Is it them??? Do they make you call one of those Carvana type. If so is carvana the only honest one out there.. Had No one ask to look at the car yet been days...

I purchased a vehicle from Autotrader Private Seller Exchange (PSE) on March 22nd 2024. I paid upfront in full $78,230. before even seeing the vehicle. One of their fees was for plates and title. After 30 days I called PSE looking for the plates and title. It's been over 2 months now and there's no title or plates, even worse, there's no answer when I will get it. I have called PSE 2xs/week for the last month (8 times!) trying to resolve this issue without any progress, I have spoken to Lu, Kelly, Stephanie, Kevin (which was very rude and refused to let me know or give a call back any info about the title) and Ciara. Now PSE makes up all kinds of excuses and blame everyone but do not give an answer of when the title will be in our hands. At this point BBB is my only option before taking a legal path

Paid $49 and all I got were a half dozen scam messages and zero legitimate buyers. Complete waste of $49. Stick to CL for selling a car where it only costs $5 and you will have much more success there.

I am 65, I had some friends that are in their mid 70s. They wanted to sell their SUV but were afraid of being scammed online. I offered to help them and thought Autotrader.com would be a safe place. I placed the add, made the mistake of putting my phone number in the comment section. The first response wanted me to get them a VIN report from **, which I was happy to for $10. Sent the report to the gentleman, he said he never received it. Started cussing at me and continued to do so. The next response, wanted a report from **, I then realize that it was just a way to get people to use their services.

The technical aspects have many, many flaws. People feel safer on this platform—YOU'RE NOT. I was almost scammed several times, but now I am TERRIFIED. I sold a vehicle to someone AT verified and he claims I ripped him off (mechanically/purposefully) and is sending me threatening messages. I was 100% honest about my son's truck condition. This sketchy guy never test drove it. Because he was an out of town person I never communicated with until they told me over the phone he 'seemed' like solid choice. Thank God I got his driver's license and met him with a male friend. He claims to have my info and coming after me. I am a single, small framed woman and now terrified. This has NEVER happened when I sold to a local person.

I purchased the 59 dollar ad. After about 3 weeks the only response I've gotten are from a scammer. I've seen some ads on this site for over a year, which should have told me something. So if asked if I would recommend this site, my answer would be a resounding noooo!

This is nothing but a Yellow Pages for Scammer! DO NOT USE AT ALL! I have had NO legitimate contacts, all scammers. A total and absolute waste of money! I complained in three first 2 hours to the Company to NO AVAIL.

I too had a horrible experience with Autotrader. Constant stream of scammers. An exhausting experience dealing with the scammers' con jobs. No legitimate buyers. I wish I would have read the Consumer Affairs reviews before wasting 49.00. DON'T USE AUTOTRADER! In fact, after reading the reviews I deleted my add and account from Autotrader.

I too had a horrible experience with AutoTrader. Constant stream of scammers. No legitimate buyers. Customer support doesn't give a crap. Refused to give refund. A complete waste of my time and money. DON'T USE AUTOTRADER!

These people are desperate looking to get your money. I placed an ad and everything went perfectly. Then went to place ad 2 and the site told me, "Oops a problem with your card." So I entered 3 more cards with one my debit and two more one Visa one M/C. Every time the same prompt oops. Then I looked at my bank account and saw 2 charges both paid? Upon calling them they offered no help and claimed the one charge was only pending and would fall off in a few days. Lie!!!! It had already paid the hard charge at my bank. So now I have to waste a half a day to file a dispute because they are so dishonest. Don’t wast time here. They obscounded with your money and all replies you get are scammers wanting to send you a cashiers check to get your vehicle. I have a printer too .

Back in days when Autotrader was just a magazine, I thought it was a good place to buy a car. So I paid the $49 to place a private ad. All I am getting is scammers that want personal info (email address, mailing address, phone number, etc). It is terrible. Not one legitimate buyer in two weeks. I called Autotrader to try and get refund. They won't do it. If you are a dealer, this site might still be ok. If you are a Private Seller, beware. Avoid using Autotrader.

Signed up to list my auto and had what appeared to be a legitimate offer to sell my car, but discovered it was a scam that asked me to go to various sites on the internet that were blocked by my on-line protection. Please beware of this site! Also, when reporting this to the company the day following my activation that I wanted my auto pulled from the site and to refund my payment was told that there would be no refund! User Beware!

VULTURES AND CROOKS. I paid for an ad, I live in Orlando, FL. The ad kept appearing as Daytona Beach, FL, an hour away. When I asked for a refund and to cancel the ad, the rep refused to let me speak to a supervisor, and refused the refund, even though I did not at all get what I paid for.

I purchased a vehicle on the private seller exchange at the end of June. It is now the end of October. According to the website, the company would make the process seamless by handling all paperwork. It’s been 4+ months and I still cannot get my title from Autotrader. I have called, emailed, called and emailed again. I’ve been promised gift cards and refunds and follow up that literally never comes. If I call after 5, it’s too late to talk to anyone but if I call before 5 everyone is always in meetings. Or off for the day. Or any other bogus excuse to not do the very simple job of processing my title.

Selling on Autotrader has been a DISASTER. I received FOUR spam inquiries trying to get me to either use a 3rd-party (not CarFax) technical assessment product that was clearly intended only to get me to pay them money or to use a payment method that was phoney. All were from buyers located 2,000 to 3,000 miles away and had no intention of coming to see the car. They stopped asking once I questioned how far away they were. I then got an offer from Autotrader Private Seller Exchange which I accepted.

The website made no promises for a sale. All I received in responses was two scammers. I posted the exact same ad with the same on Craigslist and sold the vehicle within 24 hours. Not sure what the problem is with Autotrader but the person who purchased my vehicle said he stopped looking at Autotrader a long time ago.

I have sold a couple vehicles on Autotrader back when it was decent to use, although it had its glitches then too. NOW!? Autotrader.com is pure garbage. Both on the buying and selling side. Seems like they’re trying to milk you for all you’re worth, and giving you a worse experience while doing so. Do you Like talking to someone on the phone about a potential vehicle purchase? Or perhaps to someone looking to buy yours? Too bad. When buying/selling a used car, Autotrader no longer allows you to share contact info. News flash AUTOTRADER, most of your demographic is old school individuals that prefer old school communication. Save your time and money and list elsewhere. Craigslist is still very effective.

AUTOTRADER CHARGES $49- WITH NO REFUND POLICY! They do not divulge to you that you can not include your contact information in your listing eg. phone number, so no potential buyers can call you direct. They also do not divulge that they want to charge you a percentage of the sale ($$$ hundreds of dollars) of the vehicle sale price, until after you have paid them. Read the reviews before paying them. They speak for themselves.

Autotrader is a joke. There are so many other places to sell your vehicle that are reliable and want your service like Car gurus. I was trying to sell my mother's car. She's 78 and can't hear. She doesn't know about scams or people out to take her money. Auto trader refused to sell her car for me. I made the mistake of putting the add in my name but it flagged that I wasn't the owner of the vehicle. I showed proof of title and offered to send any documentation they needed to show that my mother and I live together and that I would be handling the sale of her car. They refused allow my mother to put the add in her name.

I recently had an experience with Auto Trader that left me feeling frustrated and disappointed. I want to share my experience to help others make informed decisions when considering their services. I signed up for Auto Trader with high hopes based on their promises of finding great selling on vehicles and making the process of selling a car easy. Unfortunately, my experience did not align with these promises.

There is no option to disable or opt-out of their Private Seller Exchange, where the buyer pays AutoTrader, who then takes $480 of the selling price $48,019.00, plus the $49 listing fee. Site very misleading, says I can "Earn $10,866 more with our services". This is NOT true! Site also says "Selling With Us, You Get $48,019" which is $480 less then my asking price. They have a no refund policy. Not the same AutoTrader from years ago. I susgest you do not waste your time or money.

AutoTraders Private Seller Exchange is one of the worst auto-selling sites. After having to pay for the listing. Did not get a proper advertisement for my vehicle. Customer service was not helpful and just told me to review their policies and did not provide any actual help. Continued to get spam messages and never received any real buyers. Only was connected with unregistered buyers and people who were never serious about buying a vehicle. Not a good experience. Definitely better off using another site or FaceBook, it's FREE, and they do not charge any other fees. Would give zero stars if I could.

Autotrader used to be fine before it teamed up with Tred, now it seems like it's only a money grab, facebook is a lot easier than autotrader to buy and sell, they need to disban from Tred and become their own company and let customer sell to dealers which sometimes are the only legit buyers, reason why facebook marketplace is on top. It's free and it doesn't block communication.

By far the biggest SCAM currently on the For Sale vehicle market place. You pay money to be placed in tiny print or in the back of the line, but wait there’s more, if you spend a little more, we might make you visible for 5 mins. DO NOT waste your time or money on this SCAM advertising. Private Sellers are treated like garbage and we DO NOT get the notoriety that dealerships do; not like we did back in the day when Auto Trader was legitimate, honest and treated people equally.

As a buyer I was frustrated by the dominance of dealer posts. Used to be this was the place for the regular Joes to swap cars. Not anymore. Even some of the supposed "private party" ads are dealer ads. I had very a difficult time getting private parties to respond. Some never did at all. Finally gave up, found and bought a car off Craigslist.

They buy and sell and take your money but when it comes to getting your title and plates forget about it! My temporary registration is about to expire with no notification of when it will ever come inside! When you call customer service they treat you like absolute crap and hang up on you! Have I just gone to the DMV with all of them done in one day instead I paid them and trusted them to get this done! I feel court action is on the cards! Never again!

I purchased a vehicle on June 8, 2023 and today is July 17th and I still don't have the title. Initially they blamed the seller for not getting them the paperwork but the seller provided me a confirmation from Autotrader indicating they received all of the documents. On 7/7/23 I'm told I'll have the title by 7/12/23. I call them again on 7/14/23 and am told they don't have the paperwork from the seller. I tell them about the confirmation I have and Tracy asks me to hold. Returns to the call and says she'll send it out 2nd day delivery. This morning I get tracking info that says it'll be delivered 7/20/23, 7 WEEKS after the purchase date. All the while the vehicle sits in the garage, undrivable.

Site is horrible. Broken links, difficult to use, VERY FEW LEADS. Instant sale is a poor tool as well, especially adding photos. Overall a lame site with poor options, no leads & costs you $50 to list. There are free sites to sell on that are MUCH better & sites that only charge you if car sells. All better options than Autotrader.

Placed a truck for sale in AutoTrader used KBB as a pricing guide and prostate below KBB value! AutoTrader rates it as a good price but I have looked at exactly the same vehicles that had 22,000 miles and one had 15,000 miles that were priced 4000 above mine and they were rated as a great deal I’m not sure how they determined your standard but I don’t think it is fair, also, private party sales are listed way down below dealer sales I had placed mine and I went looking for it and I could not find it unless I used very specific details of the vehicle. It was nowhere to be found within 10 miles or 25 miles of my ZIP Code I have gotten a few inquiries the first day that ended up not responding back and I have not got any more. AutoTrader is a waste. I used it before and they placed my vehicle upfront with extra pictures for an additional price I paid the extra price this time and still I cannot find the don’t waste your money.

Our Ad has been in for 1 week and all we have had is scammers. Don't waste the $$, not worth the headache. They say they "verify" buyers, but so far I have not seen they are doing a very good job doing this.

I was buying a new and was at the dealer on 6/16/2023. I agreed with the dealer on a vehicle and was awaiting loan approval, we went home and agreed to pick up the car on 6/17/2023. Before leaving we discussed a trade in on a 2012 Camry and I decided to sleep on it. I was interested at what the fair market value was so I went to the AutoTrader website. The value was listed for several thousand more than the dealership offered so I created an account, built an ad and followed the directions. The next step was payment so I entered my credit card and according to the actual directions I had two more steps to complete the transaction. The first was an identity verification (verify I was who I claimed) and finally I was instructed to take a picture of my title front and rear and send it to autotrader. I did not want to do the last step and decided not to use the service.

I paid $49 for a system that doesn't work, trying to upload photos but impossible and yes I did make sure that the size are correct. The system is not friendly at all, they ask for a lot of personal information, supposedly to avoid spam and received to scam on the first day and nothing else since but still cannot download any pictures. Really bad experience, will try others! Thierry

Car was listed per normal process. Got scammed two times. Got agreed price from two mega used car companies but no pick up. Very slow server handling communication. Sold the car on Facebook Marketplace. Will not come back here again.

I paid $49.95 to place an ad for my used car on AutoTrader. The only inquiries I received were from scam artists pitching cashiers checks and other weird ways of payment. My ad clearly said cash only. I placed an ad on Facebook marketplace for free and sold it for the asking price the next day from a nice, local couple paying cash. I'm not shilling for FB as I'm not a huge fan, but in this case it was far superior. Autotrader only gave me grief for my money.

Received 9 sales leads over a 4 day and all were scammers. All with the similar story about being from another state, wife will mail certified check, don't need to see car, look good...just give me your address!! Not one real inquiry. What a magnificent waste of $49. And when I contacted AutoTrader about the scammers, they were of NO help.

I purchased an ad from Autotrader Classics for 6 months @ $99.00. I had numerous scammers trying to contact me via email. They all said the same story, they agreed to the price and would even pay more via a cashiers check then send someone to pickup the vehicle and title. They all have very poor grammar and basically sound as though they are in a different country.

Anytime you start editing options the site goes haywire... I wanted to look at Ford mustangs and it kept showing me BMWs.... Extremely frustrating to say the least.... Garbage, considering what they charge dealers to advertise.

I tried Autotrader three years ago. Same result then that I am getting now even though they "have new software". SPAM, SPAM and more SPAM. And yet, the new company would like you to upload your title, driver's license, etc. but their software cannot control SPAM. WHAT A JOKE? Save your money.

I advertised with classic auto trader. All I received were scam buyers. The other reason I ayes them low are all the ink emails from received. Up to 35 per day and it only stopped when I cancelled my ad. FYI, autotrader.com will not refund any of your money. I signed up for 6 months and cancelled before one month was up. They are a total rip off and you won’t sell a thing on their site.

We tried to sell our car on Autotrader and like everyone else, we just received responses from scammers who were too busy to see the car but they were happy to send a cashier's check plus $500 if we would hold the car and send them our personal information. So disappointing! We did not receive one legitimate response and took the ad down after a few days because it was a complete waste of time. I might as well have thrown my $49 down the toilet. So sad that the once reputable Autotrader has been reduced to this thanks to all the bad apples in the world.

I have been looking a new cars but have been frustrated at the amount of useless data that populates Autotrader. It would appear most of new vehicles listed are not actually for sale. The cars are already pre sold by the auto dealers. With the shortages in new car supply this is just a scam run by both the auto dealers and Autotrader who posts these useless ads.

Do not use to sell your car. Save $49 and post on FB Marketplace. I posted on Autotrader and received one inquiry after 6 days. I posted on FB Marketplace and received 10+ inquiries on the first day and sold my vehicle to the second person that reached out.

This Company is just like every other Used Car Sales Online site that does not promote or help the Private Seller. Put your vehicle on Marketplace and save yourself money and frustration dealing with this Dealer Friendly only site!

This is not the Autotrader of yesteryears, the only inquiries you will get is from scammers, nobody legitimate. We ended up taking our car to a local dealer. Also, the car we posted was a Tesla but Autotrader did not classify the car correctly so if and that's a big "if" real buyers had been searching our model with the longer range mileage, our vehicle would never have shown up. Needless to say we got zero valid inquiries and ad was still incorrectly listed, I removed it, called their customer service. They declined to give a refund so I will be disputing on my credit card. Seriously, stay away. This is not a viable service to sell your car.

Just like another car sales website, plenty of scammers and tire kickers and few legitimate buyers. I sold my car on Facebook for FREE…Could have used this wasted money for a good meal for the wife and myself. Might as well have thrown my money out the window which is why I’m giving them a 1/5 and that other cars website got a 2/5. At least their useless service costs what you get out of it…Nothing.

I posted on Autotrader.com thinking my ad may reach more people than Craigslist or marketplace. Well, I was wrong. Autotrader states that they filter out who messages you. If that is the case, I cant tell. The only messages I have received have been scammers. Save your money, and if you have already wasted it on Autotrader, demand they give a refund.

I listed my used car on Autotrader. I sold it in about a week, but Autotrader was not a good investment. I wouldn't have minded paying $49 if I got legitimate leads, but the only folks who contacted me were scammers and dealers who wanted to purchase the car cheap. I also listed on Facebook and Craigslist, and I got more contacts from Craigslist than any other. Don't bother with Autotrader. I wish a bunch of us could do a class action lawsuit based on similar comments from others.

Spent $49 to list my car on Autotrader. Did not receive a single legitimate contact; every message received was from a scammer. First they tell you that they don't respond to the Autotrader emails, and ask you to contact them directly. Then when you do you get a message like this: (I've received at least 10 messages like this.) "I'm currently not in town for now, so I won't be able to meet with you due to my work frame. I will be making payment via Certified bank check and will be delivered to you in 1-2 days. I don't mind adding extra $30 for you to hold the vehicle for me. Kindly get back to me with your Full name, Full Address, Last Asking price & Phone Number. I will also make arrangement for the pickup as soon as the check clear your bank." I contacted the Autotrader fraud department but received a canned response. Don't waste your time. There are better ways to sell a car.

I paid my 49.00 for an ad. Looked for the ad many times over 5 days and never found it. Only dealerships selling cars are shown. I sent three emails to company with no response. Do not trust this company. Now I have to go to my CC company to fight it. Scammers.

I was able to see past the janky functionality of the website & app, and even the $50 listing fee if the site actually got me real leads. The only messages I received were from scammers. I got zero interest from real buyers! I did better with OfferUp, Facebook Marketplace, and Craigslist. If I'm going to have to deal with scammers, I'll use Craigslist, for $5 and least I'll get some real buyers on there. Save your money. Autotrader is washed up. They can at least use their listing fees to pay some developers to make their site work.

I don't even mind having wasted 49 USD to get an insight of how bad this online "service" is managed. After getting strange ads offering full asking price without seeing the car, if I just kindly remove it asap, it was removed without my permission and NOT by me. After reporting to "fraudwatch"@autotrader, I needed to call them only to hear that they wanted proof of title. Next thing I know I see, my ad got marked SOLD (?? Not by me, either). Further, after uploading a proof of title the ad was still removed "pending review" and remains that way even after 48 hours. Please, somebody help us running this outfit out of business! Now, 3 days later, ad is still "under review". Now a question: who would most likely benefit by removing this ad??

Maybe some people find real buyers on this site but I the responses I received were from bots and scammers. Beware of seller trying to send a certified check and have you ship a car to him. This is a scam. Your bank will initial accept the check and then get the money back from you when it turns out the check is fake.

Used to think Auto Trader was a decent place to sell a car back in the day when they had an actual magazine out. Now online only, Turns out they bury your listing under 1000s of listing from dealers. Only responses I received were from Bots, not one responded to my response. This site is a true waste of time. If you're looking to buy it may be a different story but be cautious. My effort for a refund failed, not even a discussion. I will spread the word that this site is not worth trying.

Not only did Autotrader take 4 days to post my car for sale but the only responses I received were scammers. 4 Different names but same email address. Only offered a check for more than my asking price. I send a gift card for the difference. No thank you. I should of listened to my friend. It's a waste of $50.

I purchased an ad on Auto Trader to sell my vehicle. It specially says the ad will be good for a year until the vehicle sells. After not getting responses other than from dealers lowballing; I went to update my ad. It was no longer listed. When I called customer service they said it was inactive. I asked to reactivate the ad since vehicle had not sold. That is when they said one must reactivate ad every 30 days or otherwise I would need to start a new ad and pay again. Bait and switch, not to mention I never received 1 legitimate offer even though the vehicle was priced per their recommendation. Scam. Don’t waste your money.

In 2 weeks I have not received any legit interest in my ad. Not even lowball offers because I said in the ad that dealers need not respond. I've received several phishing texts and a scam offer to send me a check via UPS and buy the car sight unseen. Autotrader has multiple articles on their site to discourage buyers from buying from private sellers. Wasted $50. Today I started receiving spam to my gmail account that I've had for years and almost never use. The only new use was autotrader and I've gotten several Fitbit and Best Buy scams to reset my password, I don't even have accounts with Fitbit and Best Buy.

Waste of time and $49. Fake responses. Odd responses. And those that are actual response are always low ball offers over the phone for thousands less than advertised price. So they are wholesalers looking to flip your car. Waste of time and money. No credibility here. I wrote Autotrader and asked for my money back and told them why. No response of course.

Listed a car on Autotrader, Craigslist and Cars.com. On Autotrader 90% of the inquiries were scammers and a few low-ball offers. The scammers want to communicate via text so they can limit their exposure on Autotrader. The technique is "I will send you a certified check, car unseen, by UPS.." Anyway that's how it starts. Be very careful using this site and if you decide to sell, only accept cash or direct transfer via Zell. Odds are you just threw away your $50.00 on Autotrader.

Don't bother with this "service." You will lose $49 just to have scammers bombard you with messages. They don't do a thing about them. You will have better luck with a free local marketplace ad. So disappointing!

Very disappointed. Had my Ad up for not even a week. Just cancelled my ad. ALL I GOT was SCAMMERS who responded. People who sent messages asking me to contact them outside of Autotrader. I paid for my AD and got ZERO interested people. I feel like Autotrader took my money and did not provide the service they advertise. VERY DISAPPOINTING and more so since their site says NO REFUNDS. So I am out my money and now have to sell my vehicle elsewhere. I lost time and money.

I completed the information required by the site to sell my automobile. I received an email saying everything was fine. I checked a few days later only to find that the listing was "pending". I contacted their support team via chat. They couldn't help. They said I would have to call. I called and got put on hold twice. Then the person said she would have to contact someone else. Clearly, none of these individuals had any idea what happened. I asked for a refund and explanation. So far, I have received neither.

They allow dealers to post listing of cars that are sold with ridiculous low prices just to get you to call and they also allow dealers to list cars that are certified that are too old to be certified. I emailed them about this and never got a response.

I will never use Autotrader again and will actively discourage others from using it. It was a complete waste of time and money as all I got was scammers. Autotrader needs to screen potential buyers in some way to prevent this from happening. I did learn about a few new ways scammers try to suck you in so there is that - I hope that is not the secret motivation of Autotrader?

I have sold two vehicles in Autotrader so it's not totally bad. I had listed my 3rd vehicle on the site recently and got so many scammers (at least 26) that I just let it expire and will look elsewhere to sell it. Autotrader does not have a way to deal with scammers. Does no good to report them as they will say to just delete them. I would not recommend site to anyone.

I listed my car on Autotrader for a week. I received about 50 messages over the week via the autotrader relay, and another 20-30 on my phone via text message (I had chosen to allow inquiries through text). Not a single one was a real human trying to buy a car. I went through dozens of longer conversations, wasting hours of my time, with scammers who ended up trying to scam me into buying fake VIN reports from specific sites, wanting all my personal info to send me fake certified or cashier checks to have me ship the car to them, people who started non-stop text messaging me trying to get me to mail them the title, changing phone numbers as soon as I could block them. And, there's no way to report the scams to Autotrader!

Purchased an ad to try & sell my 2017 Ford Explorer. Had a ton of messages flooding my message box, 95% scams (some pretty clever ones). I do not have time to sort through & deal with scammers, especially when I am paying for an ad service. I guess I will stick with the free add places that have less scammers. They got their last $50 out of me.

This is the worst place you can try to sell a car. I had over 60 offers/inquiries on my car, sounds great, but everyone was a scam. I did not have one solid offer to buy the car or even see it. The vehicle was priced well under Kelley Blue Book so it was not a pricing issue or quality of the vehicle itself. What ended up happening as well is that I got offers on the vehicle from the dealers who prowl this site that was 2-3 times what they offered when I brought the car in. DO NOT waste the $50 on this. Side note the free vehicle report was not accurate in the least bit in relation to accidents or even owners of the car.

Paid $49 to place ad. All it got me was fraudulent offers and an email inbox full of spam. All reported to Autotrader fraud alert system. The offer made by Autotrader/KBB was one of the lowest offers received from dealers. If you have $49 to waste, list your vehicle here.

I placed an ad for an electric car. It inserted a range for the car that was wrong. It was taking forever to fix and then they blamed it on the manufacturer. I know FOR A FACT that the OEM does not list that range for the model I have. There was no way for me to change the listed range. There was no way for customer no-service to change it either. The range was so low anyone looking for my vehicle would have eliminated my ad. I would strongly avoid. Also, mostly scammer responses, but that is to be expected.

Paid $49 for scammers to offer me fraudulent checks for the sale of my car. Autotrader is defining themselves by allowing this to continue and perpetuating a trend just to make money by their own false advertisement of services they provide.

$49 buys you non-stop scams and spams of fake buyers. I had a 'too good to be true' kind of offer, so I played along, only to have my instincts verified. A fake certified check arrives via FedEx overnight. Called the owner of the company listed on the check, they had no idea what was happening. I submitted a formal complaint to the IC3.gov fraud reporting site with all of the details. After a week of getting bogus inquiries, non-responses, and a solid scam, I sold my car to a local dealership, no hassles, 100% safe and a very fair deal. Lesson learned cost: $49.

It cost 49$ to list my car for sell, privately. 100% of the responses are scammers. This is absolutely exhausting to go through this over and over each day. What a sad society we live in where there are no consequences for these criminals. Autotrader.com is responsible for managing this. But it's clear they put no effort into protecting their clientele.

I have had my car listed for 2 months now, received over 2 dozen inquiries of which 95% or so (1 legitimate) were scams/Robo initiated contacts. I've also sold other cars on this site and it has gotten worse over the last couple of years. It has become a waste of time. DealerTrack, the parent company does nothing to trap these scams and does not police the site. The common scam is to "pay by cashier check" and pick up the car when the "check clears". Cashier checks can be faked so Buyer Beware!

Autotrader charges $50 to list your vehicle but CarGurus only charges $5. Almost every inquiry I received from Autotrader was a scammer. Managing your ad is frustrating to say the least. It very much seems catered to dealers. Overall much better experience and more user friendly ad management over at CarGurus. I do not recommend Autotrader for private sellers. Please research where to sell before using Autotrader. Save your time and money by posting elsewhere.

My experience with Autotrader hasn't always been positive. But the team I've been communicating with recently actually listens to your requests and goes above and beyond to make changes that improve your dealer site and inventory - which is extremely important because it's essentially the face of your business online. Nick **, my account rep is always available and eager to help. Every conversation I've had with him ends stress-free and my issue/request resolved. David(?) in Support/Sales was extremely helpful, relaxed and knowledgeable. He took time to explain the why behind their site rather than just pitching the upsell. Because of the two gentlemen above, Autotrader has by far been the best experience for advertising cars we've had.

The website is purely designed to dealers, I spend $50 to advertise my used car as private seller, but the tools are not friendly at all, I had pretty much just 1 message (compared to competitor that I got 15 + sold my car), you don't receive a note when you got a message neither to navigate and manage your ad is not easy. Sounds like they encourage you to give your call to a dealer (which all of us know that is another challenge). So my overall rating here is 1 star, do not recommend use Autotrader to private seller.

Went on 8/7/21 to look at a car that was advertised for $4999.00. The salesman that helped us was Cory. Said the car was being sold by John **. That it was his Aunt’s car. We made a offer of $4500.00. On Monday 8/9/21 Cory texted me and said that they would only take the $4999.00 Firm. So I texted him back and said we would be there between 4-4:30. He said they would be there. Then as we are getting ready to leave I get a text saying that they sold it. That someone offered them more money. Yeah, when you repost it for more money. Shady shady shady!!! This is why used car sales get such a bad name. I definitely would not recommend anyone using them and if they do this I wonder what they hide on these cars. Also, when you test drive it there was no oil in the engine. NONE. I believe that John ** Cimino was behind all of this bad business.

When I listed my car for sale, I based the asking price on what other sellers listed for. I came to realize that for private sellers, the site doesn't give the same "Great Price" or "Good Price" tag unless it's listed for much lower than what dealers list for. Example: A vehicle listed by a dealer for $35k with 35,000 miles will get a "Great Price" tag whereas a private seller listing same vehicle (year, make, model, trim level) with lower miles and lower asking price. Will not get the same tag. My same listing had no tag indicating great or good price. Only when I reduced asking price by $3k, was my ad tagged as a "Great Price." KBB gives private sellers a false sense of value in their vehicles, then AutoTrader charges $49 to list on their site.

From start to finish a great place to buy vehicle. Customer service is super. They do everything they can to get you in the perfect vehicle. They answer all your questions to the end result. After your purchase they make sure it is to your 100% satisfaction. Purchase your next vehicle here.

Autotrader is where you can see 100s of vehicle fast and easy. Screening tools help you see only what your looking for or you can make it more expansive. The virtual tours give you that test drive feeling. I have bought and sold several cars, motorcycles and boats over the years and it has always been a pleasant experience.

A lot of the trucks we looked at were at low-end, used dealerships or they did not have the vehicle listed when we called or drove over. We ended up buying a truck from a local dealership. We ran into bait and switch ads often using this site.

This is the worst site to sell a vehicle. 1. We can’t respond to sellers. We can’t edit the ad. 2. The pictures we posted are gone and now it takes you to two car dealerships. 4. We can’t delete the ad. 5. Had a tech guy work on this and he couldn’t do it. 6. Customer service is only a request to send an email. 7. Finally called the Quebec number. They said, “We have no customer service in Alberta!!” Truer words were never said.

I've used Autotrader to buy and sell many cars over the years. There are plenty of options to list your vehicle, including pictures, highlighted ads, etc. When searching for a vehicle to purchase, you can be very specific with many search options. They include mileage, production years, colors, engine size, drive train (awd, fwd, etc), trim levels that help weed out those vehicles without option packages that you want.

It's been a good experience to use the Autotrader websites. In terms of reliability I rate it a 8 out of 10. It is quite quick and understandable to use it even accommodate those who do not understand the internet well. I recommend this website as must use web if you need any latest cars and you are wondering where to find it...You don't need to stress. Autotrader got you now.

The car I was looking for was not the sites priority, the site kept trying to push vehicles I was not interested in. I would search for my selected vehicle, then other options for vehicles I had no interest in would keep popping up. Also had to many pop ups from other sources.

I have tried to post my ad about my car several times through several devices using several different browsers, yet the process always ran into the same website glitch, an eternal spinning sign of "in process". NO ONE from Autotrader gets back to me with a solution and a phone call is not possible. What kind of service is this?? They don't deserve any clients, I recommend avoiding them. (Just for the record, I'm not web illiterate, I used to be a web developer and am an engineer.)

I had an amazing experience with finding my current vehicle. The pictures were vivid and detailed and the website was accurate with its information regarding each car I viewed. I like how you can view multiple vehicles by a particular maker as well as compare models.

Our family has relied on AutoTrader for decades now. The selection, price range and reliability are consistently up to date and accurate. AutoTrader does not rely on a bunch of marketing gimmicks, pricing hooks or fancy word play- they don't have to! By providing a well rounded, concise format for every level of shopper, we are assured a positive experience each and every time.

I love it. It made it easy to look inside the cars to really give you an overall view of what you were buying. Before you actually want to look at it you can tell if their prices were high or low or in a neighborhood up what they should be. I think it makes car shopping very easy, very simple.