Here Are The Best Places To Buy A Used Car In North Carolina

RALEIGH, NC — Memorial Day weekend is nearly here and that means a lot of savvy car shoppers will try to capitalize on the best sales. According to Autolist, an online service that helps compare car prices, shoppers in North Carolina looking to get behind the wheel of a used car this weekend may want to rethink heading to the nearest dealership.

Overall, the company ranked North Carolina 26th in the country for vehicle affordability. A car here typically costs $229 more than it would somewhere else in the country.

But within our state, Raleigh isn't a bad place to go for that shiny used whip. While Wake County overall ranked 14th in the state for vehicle affordability, Oak City came in at a cool No. 4. Those who buy in Raleigh actually save on average about $265 compared to the state average.

But the best city to buy a car in North Carolina is actually Charlotte and the best county is Lincoln County. Shoppers who buy a used car in Charlotte save on average $743 on a used car.

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And as for those who buy in Lincoln County? They save — get this — an average of $1,895 compared to a typical North Carolina county.

Here are the top 10 cities to buy a used car in our state:

1. Charlotte, average savings: $743

2. Huntersville, average savings: $705

3. Greensboro, average savings: $443

4. Raleigh, average savings: $265

5. Wilmington, average savings: $243

6. Cary, average savings: $166

7. High Point, average savings: $81

8. Winston-Salem, average savings $35

9: Durham, average savings: $10

10: Burlington, average savings: $3

Here are the top 10 counties to buy a used car in our state:

1. Lincoln, average savings: $1,895

2. Edgecombe, average savings: $873

3. Mecklenburg, average savings: $794

4. Orange, average savings: $564

5. Pender, average savings: $492

6. Robeson, average savings: $414

7. Granville, average savings: $315

8. Moore, average savings: $313

9. Stanly, average savings: $289

10. Iredell, average savings: $277

The prices of used cars can vary significantly in counties in the same general geographic area, Chase Disher, product manager for growth and analytics at the company, tells Patch. Knowing that information can empower shoppers.

“The buyer knows that they can actually go 20 minutes west or east or something, and potentially find a better deal on a car,” he says.

Those looking for the best deals might consider heading to an urban area, where there’s often more competition. That usually leads to lower prices.
“There tend to be more dealers, a lot more inventory and therefore more competition, so that tends to drive prices down,” he says.

But if you can, buy that sweet ride in Florida or California.

“Without a doubt, Florida tends to be the cheapest state consistently,” Disher says. “Often when I’m going to look at some of the top data I need to scroll past a bunch of Florida cities because that’s just single-handedly the best place to buy a car.”

The company aims to provide consumers and the automotive industry data to better understand local trends. Every month, the company refreshes its entire car-buying database and crunches the numbers for each city and county where it has statistically significant data. The firm compares the cities and the average price across them for different vehicles.

“I'm looking at California right now and I can see that, you know, Aliso Viejo is the cheapest city within all of California and the average price of a vehicle is $1,500 bucks less than other vehicles,” Disher says.

If you want see information for a specific city or county and see how it stacks up to others, head over to the Autolist website and type in the name of a city.

Autolist, based in the San Francisco area, is a metasearch automotive marketing platform. The company aims to provide the best search experience for finding a new, used or certified pre-owned vehicle.

The company has between 5 million and 8 million listings at any given time.

Disher notes the company’s data is based on listing prices and doesn’t include any taxes or other fees.

Photo credit: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images