Docs/The math

How the verdict works

Audience: dealers who want a clear understanding of what AuctionMate's verdict is doing — without us laying out the proprietary math.

TL;DR: the verdict turns four things you already know — your bid, your costs, the car's market value, and the title brand — into a single read: Strong Margin, Thin Margin, Below Cost, or Parts Only. Every input is editable. Disagree with a number? Override it. The verdict updates live. The verdict describes the math — it isn't a recommendation to act.

The four verdicts

Verdict What it means
Strong Margin The math projects a healthy margin at the current bid. Worth pursuing.
Thin Margin Margin is positive but tight. Worth a second look — verify the title, the damage, and your assumptions before bidding.
Below Cost Projected margin is negative at the current bid.
Parts Only The title document says the car can't be rebuilt — Parts Only, Non-Repairable, Junk, Dismantled or Certificate of Destruction. Its value is in components.

The thresholds between Strong / Thin / Below Cost are configurable in your settings — you can tune them to your own risk tolerance.

What goes into the verdict

The verdict is built from inputs grouped in two buckets:

What we pull — the auction listing details (current bid, damage, title brand, odometer), market value for the year/make/model/trim, recall and complaint history, and (when available) past auction outcomes for the same VIN.

What you control — your buyer fee tier, shipping zone (set once via your zip code), default reconditioning bundle, and your projected sales price. Plus per-lot overrides for any of the above.

We take those, apply discounts and adjustments based on the title brand and vehicle class, subtract your costs, and compare the result against your bid to compute the verdict.

Every line of the math is shown on the lot page, on every surface. If a number surprises you, you can find out which input drove it.

Title brands matter — but not all the same way

A salvage Lexus and a salvage Toyota don't lose value the same way. A flood-damaged car holds more value if it's a fresh-water flood than a saltwater flood. A theft-recovered car with no body damage isn't a salvage car.

AuctionMate handles these differences automatically by adjusting the discount for each title brand based on the vehicle class. The result is a more honest projected resale value than a flat one-size-fits-all discount would give you.

You can see the resulting adjusted retail in the panel, override the title brand if your research disagrees with the auction listing, and re-run the math.

When it says Parts Only

Parts Only comes from the title document, not from the math: a Parts Only, Non-Repairable, Junk, Dismantled or Certificate of Destruction title means the car can't legally be rebuilt, so its value is in components.

A heavily damaged car with a rebuildable title gets the same verdict as any other — the profit at your bid, after your repair number. When the damage type makes the repair hard to size (burn, flood, rollover and similar), the lot says so and asks you to inspect before bidding rather than guessing a dollar range.

Editable inputs

The verdict isn't an opinion you have to accept. Override:

  • Title type — if your DMV check says different than the auction listing.
  • Damage and recon estimate — increase for ugly damage, decrease for cosmetic-only.
  • Sales price — drag the marker on the profit bar to where your real-world resale comp lands.
  • Buyer fee — adjust to your actual rate if you've negotiated something custom.
  • Shipping — override per-lot if you have a real quote.

Anything you change gets a yellow highlight so you don't confuse your override with the auto-pulled value.

What it isn't

  • Not a guarantee. The verdict is the math's opinion based on inputs you can change. Treat it as input to your decision.
  • Not an inspection. We don't physically inspect vehicles. Verify damage and condition from photos and (if you can) in person.
  • Not a title certification. The title information we show — the auction's published status, the VIN's own auction history, and the free Carfax/NICB links — is a research signal, not a substitute for an official state DMV check.
  • Transparent at the core. A rule-based calculation you can trace. AI assists where it helps — reading photos, for example — always as labeled inputs you can see and override. Your numbers stay yours.

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