10 tips for running a successful used car buy center—straight from the dealers pulling it off

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CarMax and Carvana retail just under 3% of all used cars sold in the U.S. Yet, they acquire a whopping 13% of used vehicles from consumers. More than 2 million cars per year.

But to pull those numbers, they’re obviously working hard to intercept inventory from traditional franchise dealers, while stockpiling the cleanest, most profitable cars for themselves.

So, dealers are leaning into “off-the-street” purchases from everyday private sellers (and have been for a while). But there's one source of high-gross used car inventory that often gets overlooked by dealers: vehicle buy centers.

It’s not the newest concept, or the easiest, but it’s by far one of the most profitable.

And while many dealers dismiss them as complicated or outdated, the reality is that buy centers live or die on clear do’s and don’ts. Here are the ones that send the strongest signal…

Chris Taylor, owner of Certified Auto Brokers operates his buy center out of his dealership in a completely separate, dedicated space. The center has its own point-of-purchase materials, P&L, tracking expenses, and individual buyer grosses. 

The operational advantage: A dedicated buy center can complete transactions in minutes, freeing the main dealership to focus on retail sales and acquiring high-demand trade-ins specific to the local market.

David Long, general manager at Hansel Auto Group has helped open 96 buy centers over his career. And one of the biggest mistakes he sees is dealers overbuilding buy center facilities (expensive tech, elaborate marketing campaigns, etc.) But customers want speed and efficiency, not elaborate facilities.

His recommendation: Facebook page, Google reviews, basic signage. That's it.

Taylor's highest-producing buyer came from waiting tables at an Italian restaurant.

The reason: Car people bring preconceptions about vehicle values and market conditions that create analysis paralysis.

As far as comp goes, Long told me dealers need pay plans that produce outcomes not activity.

The structure: $250-450 per car bought, zero base salary. Meaning, a buyer acquiring 40 cars monthly at ~$300 each makes $12,000 per month. Not bad for a former barista. lol 

Brent Faron, used car manager at Bo Beuckman Ford runs a buy center too. And he tried having BDC agents handle both appointment-setting and acquisition calls. It instantly killed momentum. BDC agents excel at scripted, rapid-fire conversations while acquisition calls require more nuance.

As a result: Faron pulled all buy center functions from his BDC entirely and hired dedicated staff. Lesson learned.

Taylor's team scrubs Facebook Marketplace within a 50-mile radius multiple times daily, contacting every new listing regardless of price or vehicle criteria (generating 100 opportunities daily in Buffalo, NY alone). 

Their rule: no analysis, no hesitation, no time spent determining if vehicles fit their "wheelhouse."

The operational logic: A seller’s asking price has no bearing on actual market value, and what sellers list versus what they'll accept are often vastly different. 

When initial offers fall short of seller expectations, Taylor's team "simply makes a friend,” and they continue following up for 2-4 weeks so these sellers have time to adjust to market reality.

Many dealers are tempted to create "buy boxes" with rules like no vehicles over 100k miles or under $5,000.

But that puts buyers in a position where they're having to spend too much time analyzing listings. 

The risk: Missing profitable opportunities. For example, one of Long’s dealer friends wanted to wholesale an expensive vehicle, convinced it wouldn’t retail fast enough. So, Long took it off his hands and sold it retail in only six days.

Taylor uses predetermined recon estimates based on visual inspection:

The key: Management constantly evaluates "estimated recon versus actual recon.”

Remember, buy center staff get paid per car acquired, not per dollar of profit. So, they have financial incentive to lowball recon estimates. 

Higher estimates → lower purchase offers → fewer sellers accept → fewer commissions.

Customer urgency peaks at initial contact and decreases with every delay. And the extra 20-30 minutes for a full inspection “just slows down the process too much,” Taylor told me. 

So, only highly questionable or specialized luxury vehicles get brought to service bay for that greater visibility.

He reviews every appraisal through AI, provides correction feedback about local market conditions and dealership-specific constraints. The inputs build learning patterns that account for "risk tolerance and profitability requirements" that generic systems miss.

And between the lines: This is critical in used vehicle buying, where losing an experienced acquisition manager can be a big disruption. However, AI learns to replicate the dealership’s unique strategy, reducing reliance on individual employees and potentially saving a lot of onboarding resources.

Untrained AI produces useless outputs because its goal is to please the user by any means necessary. Even if that means making shit up.

The painstaking process here is telling the AI exactly what it did wrong every single time. Otherwise, it becomes another analysis layer that slows decision-making without improving outcomes.

The risk: AI that says ‘yeah, that's great’ to every decision, can give managers a false sense that their decisions are validated when they're not actually being analyzed.

But dedicated buy centers give franchise dealers a counterpunch. And these centers, when executed with precision, unlock a high-margin inventory pipeline that rivals the giants.

Looking forward, dealers who master this model will not only secure cleaner, more profitable cars but also build resilience against market disruptions.

This week on the

Shout out to CDK Global and Lotlinx for making this episode possible!

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Shout out to CDK Global, Repair360, and Cox Automotive for making this episode possible!

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