Every service in this category shows you the same thing: a box for your plate or VIN, and a number a few seconds later. What sits behind that number is not the same business in each case, and the difference explains most of the spread between offers on an identical car. There are three shapes here, and knowing which one you are talking to tells you roughly what to expect before the offer even arrives.
Retailers buying stock for their own forecourt
Carvana, CarMax, EchoPark, AutoNation, Driveway and webuyanycar.com are all buying cars they intend to sell on. EchoPark is the used-car retail arm of Sonic Automotive and Driveway is Lithia-affiliated; CarMax redeems its offer at a store appointment or by home pickup and pays on the spot; webuyanycar pays same day after an in-person inspection at one of 87 US branches or via its mobile buying service.
The pattern worth noticing is the offer window. CarMax's offer is valid seven days. AutoNation's is good for seven days or 500 miles, and EchoPark's is seven days or 500 miles with an extra $500 if you sell within 48 hours of receiving it. A retailer is pricing a car it will retail, so it wants a clean, saleable vehicle and it wants an answer quickly.
Salvage and cash-for-cars networks
Peddle, CarBrain, DamagedCars.com, Cash Auto Salvage, CashForCars.com and Cash for Junk Cars Online are buying at the other end of the condition range, and they say so. CarBrain describes itself as a specialist buyer for less-than-perfect vehicles — totaled, non-running, blown engine, collision-damaged — with free towing. DamagedCars.com buys damaged, wrecked and totaled vehicles nationwide on 90-second offers. CashForCars.com is Copart-powered and buys in any condition with free towing. Cash for Junk Cars Online is the former Junk Car Medics, whose domain now redirects there, and covers 45 states with free removal.
If your car runs and is undamaged these will still make you an offer, and it will usually be the wrong one — you are being priced against parts and auction value rather than retail. If your car does not run, they are the part of this list that will collect it without charging you.
Brokers and marketplaces that never take ownership
The third group does not buy the car. Kelley Blue Book's Instant Cash Offer is free and no-obligation and shows what dealers will pay, redeemable for cash or trade at any participating dealer. Cars.com offers a dual path: an instant cash offer from a local dealer, or a free private-party listing on its own marketplace. PrivateAuto is self-service infrastructure for a private sale — ID verification, e-signed paperwork and secure payment transfer — rather than a buyer, and it is the one service here that charges the seller, at $29 per listing and $150 per closing. Dealr is an AI deal broker whose agent values the car in around 30 seconds and then negotiates across hundreds of buyers, and its own recorded trade-off is that it is built to maximise price rather than speed, with a typical sale completing in under two weeks.
That trade-off is the honest summary of the whole category. An instant offer from a retailer is fast and certain and priced for the buyer's convenience. A broker or a private sale takes longer and asks more of you. Nothing in our data supports a claim about which one nets more on your specific car, which is exactly why the offer windows matter: several of these are valid for seven days, and nothing stops you collecting more than one.
Every fact above comes from the service's own site as recorded in our verified dataset, with the date we last checked shown on each entry card.