4.2
5.2
Overall Score
Author: Kaitlyn Short
TRED is a used car marketplace for customers to buy and sell cars. It was founded in 2011 and is headquartered in Seattle, Washington.
Tred often offers lower prices than other peer-to-peer seeling sites. Tred also helps with authentication and paperwork like title transfer, registration, taxes and fees. It also helps to facilitate any payments between buyer and seller and, in some cases, handles delivery.
Dealers can’t sell through TRED. They can buy wholesale cars in the partner instant offer program, but you will not see dealer-listed vehicles on TRED. Tred acts as the middleman by taking the broker's place and not charging the typical brokerage fee.
There are three simple steps to buying cars through TRED:
- Shop: search for cars online and ask sellers specific questions about the cars
- Buy online: once you decide on a car, you can pay for it directly through TRED
- Get the keys: you can pick up the keys directly from the seller or you can have them mailed to you directly
Keep reading our TRED reviews for pros and cons of working with this service.
Top Ranked Companies
The Good
- Added Assurances
- Savings
- Sell Your Car
- Protects Users from Fraud
- Facilitates Payment and Paperwork
- Monthly Vehicle Value Report
Added Assurances
What really sets TRED apart is its offer to let you independently sell your car and control the selling price, while giving you assurances that are normally only available through a dealership program.
TRED Assurances:
- Facilitating loan repayment, if you still owe on your car when it sells
- CARFAX vehicle history report
- Vehicle inspection
- Buyer financing
- Extended warranties and service contracts
- GAP insurance
Did we mention that this marketplace does an inspection? This combines the professional assurances of Carvana with the personal independence of Craigslist.
Savings
The TRED business model uses a thinner transaction margin because it facilitates car sales without having to pay for local real estate or salespeople.
The whole point is that when you sell through TRED, you get the highest price possible. At the same time, your buyer will be getting the lowest price possible. TRED even keeps a real-time tally updated with the last 60 days of information. On average, sellers make over 40 percent more than the Kelley Blue Book Trade-In value, and buyers pay an average of 28 percent less than the typical dealer list price.
So, whether you use the product to buy or sell a car, you will save money.
Sell Your Car
When you sell through TRED, what do you have to do?
- List your car
- Get an inspection
- Coordinate test drives
- Accept an offer
When you sell a car through TRED, your email address is privacy protected, but your listing still goes to over twenty car sites. After it’s live, TRED will help you get your car inspected. Once inspected, you get an instant offer price from a TRED wholesale partner. If you accept, your listing will be closed and they will come to pick up your car. If not accepted, the listing goes on as usual.
The service makes it easy to schedule and conduct any test drive requests at a FedEx location. Sellers will get a TRED packet in the mail to help with test drives and paperwork.
When you sell through TRED, what does the company do for you?
- Helps with pricing information
- Advertises on over 20 websites
- Verifies potential buyer information
- Handles fees and paperwork for your state
- Helps with buyer financing
- Coordinates the whole process
- White glove service — they will do DMV title transfers so you don’t have to, saving you time.
Protects Users Against Fraud
TRED helps to ensure trust by doing an identity check of both the buyer and seller, as well as a vehicle history check, and vehicle condition check.
To be TRED-Verified:
- Download the app on a mobile device
- Take a photo of your driver’s license (front and back)
- Take a selfie
Once uploaded, this information is encrypted for privacy.
Facilitates Payment and Paperwork
TRED facilitates payments. This isn’t the case with several other marketplaces. This is super helpful because it adds another level of trust to the peer-to-peer sales process that isn’t always available.
You can buy your new car with an ACH or with a credit or debit card, or via financing through TRED or a third-party. When a seller accepts an offer, payment is collected by TRED. Funds are wired to the seller’s account.
Each payment is guaranteed, and TRED insures the transaction amount.
Then, TRED even does the paperwork for both the buyer and seller.
Monthly Vehicle Value Report
Consumers can sign up for a monthly report to track your car’s value and see how it changes, plus see what similar models are being actively sold for. It will include the dealer trade-in value, private party sales data, and the TRED suggested list price.
The Bad
- Selling States
Selling States
Currently, the TRED marketplace platform only facilitates sellers from the following areas:
- Portland, Oregon
- San Francisco Bay Area
- Seattle-Tacoma, Washington
- Southern California
- San Antonio, TX
- Austin, TX
- Dallas, TX
Despite this, users can buy a car through TRED from anywhere in the United States and have it shipped to their home or office.
Hopefully, this platform will be more widely available for sellers soon within the next few years.
The Bottom Line
TRED combines the peace of mind of buying a car from a dealership with the ease, convenience, and price of buying from a human. You are guaranteed to get a CARFAX report, a physical vehicle inspection, and assurance that each customer has passed the identity verification.
The downside is that users aren’t yet able to sell a car through the platform if they don’t live in the following service areas: Southern California, San Francisco, Portland, Oregon; Seattle, Washington; San Antionia, TX; Autin, TX; or Dallas, TX.
We definitely recommend trying out this car shopping and selling app. Let us know how your experience went with our TRED reviews below.
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Janice Radical Columbia, SC
4 years ago
