How Do Online Car Auction Sites Work?

The concept of an online, or digital, car auction site is not new. Fleet managers and wholesalers have been using the auction marketplace to locate and purchase inventory for dealership lots since the early-2000s. And even retail bidders have had access to auto auction sites like eBay Motors for over 20 years, though back then the thought of buying a vehicle through an online car auction, without seeing it in person or performing a pre-purchase inspection, was considered risky at best.

The automotive world has evolved over the past two decades, and in that time eBay Motors has sold millions of cars, most of them to first-time online car buyers willing to take a chance on the digital marketplace. But we now live in a world where online car buying isn’t just common, it’s dominant, helped along in recent years by everything from a global pandemic to confidence-bolstering technology like high-resolution photos and vehicle history reports.

But the biggest shift in the last year or two has been the explosive growth of car enthusiasts turning to car auction websites like Bring a Trailer (or BaT) and Cars and Bids when seeking their next exotic or classic car. Everything from a vintage Chevrolet Corvette or Ford Mustang GT to the latest Mercedes-Benz AMG or Porsche 911 regularly change hands on these sites.

For these buyers, this isn’t like going to an Autotrader or Craigslist classified ad, where the used car pricing on a high-volume Dodge, Nissan, or Toyota might range from $5,000 to $25,000. These enthusiast auction sites often trade in rare collector cars or high-end coupes from brands like BMW, Ferrari, and McLaren, with the highest bidders regularly committing to 6 – or even 7 – figure price tags.

Is spending that kind of money on a car you haven’t seen in person a good idea? Do sites like Bring a Trailer and Cars and Bids have policies in place to ensure high-quality live auctions that protect buyers and sellers? Let’s take a closer look at the origins of Bring a Trailer and Cars and Bids and then consider their policies that protect users.

Bring a Trailer (bringatrailer.com)

Bring a trailer started in 2007 as a pet project for founder Randy Nonnenberg. As someone who obsessively hunted online classified ads, Randy realized his efforts to identify the most interesting cars for sale online were going to waste – only he was seeing them. So he started Bring a Trailer to showcase his findings, and over the next 7 years, BaT built quite a following of like-minded car enthusiasts.

Randy credits Bring a Trailer’s well-established community, long before it switched from a classified ads aggregator to full-scale auction site, as BaT’s greatest asset. “The community, which is central and first and foremost, and everybody that looks at a BaT listing and the type of discussion, the way we interact with the community, the level of expertise in the existing BaT community, is a huge differentiator,” says Randy.

This expertise shows up in the comments section of each BaT auction, which could almost be described as watching real-time forums, dedicated to specific special interest vehicles or sports cars, materialize out of thin air over the course of a 7-day auction. These comments come from the hundreds of thousands of registered BaT members, who organically find their way to the same vehicle auctions where they have the most interest and knowledge.

Additional Bring a Trailer factors Randy Nonnenberg calls out include the site’s listing descriptions, which he says avoid the hyperbole that pervades most car sales situations. Randy told us the car has to stand on its own and the virtues of the vehicle, and the community will help vet the car beyond that. Randy also called out BaT’s commitment to customer service. For example, the site doesn’t get a fee if a car doesn’t meet reserve, even if the seller finds a BaT buyer after the auction, and a deal is made below reserve.

Cars and Bids (carsandbids.com)

Cars and bids was co-founded by popular automotive YouTuber Doug DeMuro and launched in 2020. Doug’s reputation for describing not only interesting cars but interesting details about interesting cars plays well in the online auction world, where half the fun and enthusiasm for a special interest vehicle derives from the “quirks and features” Doug is known for identifying.

Cars and Bids has grown quickly, with over 220,000 registered users. Doug says he’s got data to show Cars and Bids delivers a higher sale price than its competitors on a wide range of models, which he credits to the site’s engaged bidders, dedicated focus on modern enthusiast cars from 1981 and up, and ability to get a seller’s auction live quickly, usually less than a week after receiving all the vehicle information and photos.