Where do we find cars to sell?
We buy cars from customers.
A majority of the cars on our lot come from our customers who are either selling or trading in their car.
Recently, over 70% of all the vehicles we purchased came directly from customers.
Fun Fact: We have appraised 37+ million cars for our customer since we opened our doors in 1993.
We buy cars from vehicle auctions and dealers.
Along with buying cars from customers, we have teams around the country dedicated to expertly finding even more cars to bring to our lots. We buy cars at auctions and from other dealers who are typically selling them because their customers aren’t normally looking for those types of cars, or the vehicle isn’t in their usual expertise.
What happens next?
We inspect and recondition every car
Auto Technicians perform a 125+ point inspection process on each vehicle. A small sample of our inspection includes checking engine components and associated systems for proper operation, leaks, abnormal noises, corrosion, bad connections, or excessive wear. We spend hours replacing parts, fixing major dents or scratches, and detailing to make every car feel like new. Once a vehicle completes this process, it's officially CarMax Certified, which means it meets or exceeds our high standards for quality. Some CarMax cars have unrepaired safety recalls; here's what you should know about that.
We take photos and create the car listing.
After the final quality check, we take 360-degree images of the vehicle’s exterior and interior. When vehicles are ready for sale, they’re added to our website and lots at 240+ stores nationwide.
We help customers find the best car for them.
Whether it's in-store or online, customers can find the vehicle that makes the most sense for them and their lifestyle.
Since 1993, we have sold 10+ million cars to customers.
Cars that don't make the cut get sold to other dealers at our auctions.
Millions of cars are ruled out by our vetting process, and we never sell cars with flood damage, frame damage, or salvage history. Cars that don't meet our quality standards are sold to other dealers at CarMax hosted vehicle auctions, the 3rd largest vehicle auction house in the U.S.
