My original review still stands so I will add a bit to it…read more There is more diversity here which is good. More women and races other than Hispanic so I didn't feel any outward hostility like before. The cars are still good if you know how to search for them. They seem more expensive now, most cars go over $1K. The key is in the car but you can't start it. A few people did and it was enough to see if the car is a bucket so take that risk if you dare, they aren't going to kick you out over it. The are only Porta potties there so use the restroom beforehand. Be prepared to pay for your deposit immediately after bidding. If you don't, they will make a big deal about it. Know your limit on a car and stop bidding when you hit it. It makes no sense to overpay. It's best to have 5 well researched cars. The pictures show almost no damage so be prepared. Do your research on the cars. Unlike offerup or Craigslist, you don't have to worry about someone actively concealing some horrible problem. Yes there are plenty of lemons being sold, you see them on the side of the road, but I've gotten 3 cars here and all have minimal problems.

We donated a non-operational Chevy S-10 truck to a non-profit organization, and they have a…read morepartnership with Otay Auto Auctions for towing away donated vehicles & auctioning them off, with proceeds benefiting the non-profit organization & a tax deduction for the donor. Here's a summary of how things proceeded- Saturday pick up scheduled via phone confirmation. I let the employee at Otay Auto Auctions know we wanted this taken care of ASAP. When Saturday afternoon rolled around, we didn't have an update. I called to confirm pickup, only to be told the driver was busy/not available. No call from them, letting me know. I had to call to find this out. I arranged a pickup for the following Tuesday 1pm - 4pm. Not wanting the same outcome as before, I called Monday to confirm Tuesday pickup and make sure everything would be set. Tuesday, didn't hear anything from Otay Auto Actions, again. Called around 2pm, and was told tow truck broke down, and they need a couple hours to see if another flat bed tow truck driver would be available. No courtesy call from them, for the second time. I informed the employee if this matter wasn't taken care of that day, I'd cancel & seek another towing company. Otay Auto Auctions called me, informing me pickup would arrive 5pm - 7pm. Once the tow truck operator arrived, it was a pleasant experience. He had all the necessary paperwork to sign, and even though the S-10 had flat tires, with a little help from me, it was loaded on the flat bed, and was off on it's way. Only memories of driving it in my possession. Otay Auto Auctions refused to notify me of pickup delays, causing loss of time. It's a simple matter of calling/texting, and a matter of good customer service. If I were to donate another vehicle, I would choose not to deal with Otay Auto Auctions. Don't recommend.

DO NOT BUY A CAR FROM THIS PLACE, YOU ARE WARNED. They sell bad vehicle with alot of issues. They…read moredont tell you about them. The people are awful to work with. Hope this place goes out of business

We recently donated a car to KPBS, and Express Auto Auction handled the transaction. Communication…read morewith them was excellent, by email, telephone and text. Within two business days of making the donation online with KPBS, I had an appointment with Express Auto Auction to pick up the car for the next morning. The driver called me within the pick-up window and arrived 15 minutes later. We exchanged paperwork, I gave him the keys, and off the car went on the carrier. Overall, i was extremely pleased with this experience with Express Auto Auction.

Hello. Last Saturday was my first attendance at this auction. It was raining and miserable weather…read morewise. I have attended Manheim, Otay, and Road One auctions for the past 8 years. And regretfully, I was mad at myself for not having attended this auction sooner. I did not purchase anything. But I just wanted to note the small details that that make this company stand out positively above all others. I am sure you'll realize these as well... - the girl with the glasses and clipboard was super friendly and helpful. Answered my questions with a smile. - the girl in the yellow rain shawl serving hot dogs and driving cars was super nice as well. When she drove each car down the block, she would smile at the crowd gazing at bidders. That's really calming to see when bidders are so anxious and financially strapped. -the auctioneer himself... I have never seen a morning ritual of welcoming new bidders by doing a fun, practice bid of the dodge charger. There were so few people in attendance that it was surprising he did that at all. And his approach at so few people... to treat the crowd as if there were a packed house is a testament to his professionalism. Also... he is much more calming than Mr abrasive Road One auctioneer guy. - No bidding cards? No need to pre-register? Couldn't believe that. Just sit down and bid based on the raise of my hand and honor system? Wow. I detest having to pre-reg and drop down $100 deposit and give them all my information. - The act of activating all power windows, convertible tops, running the car in drive and reverse. Again, Most auctions don't seem to go thru the trouble. Shows how how thoughtful this company is. I'd imagine heavier crowds on a busy sunny day may bring out a different chaos. But it seems like the employees and company itself has high honest standards that I've never seen before. I just wanted to acknowledge these points. Little details do get noticed. Keep up the good work. Often times, car auctions are filled with tough crowds. But its nice to see a company ignoring that stigma and treating the poor & needy with respect and dignity.

Today I had a lovely opportunity to waste my time. Their online website posts opening bid prices…read morebut when you get there they increase the opening bid price by thousands claiming it's a "reserved" price. For example: I was interested in a 2016 Chevy Cruze that was listed online starting bid at 5500. Well, when it was that cars turn to be auctioned the bid started at 7900. Yes, I'm just as surprised as you. When I confronted them (Mike and the auctioneer guy) about it asking if they usually raise the online price? They said it's the reserved price. What? I asked. Reserve price? There is nothing online stating that there is a reserve price. He said it's the buy it now price, it's the reserve price. Then told me to ask anyone, it means the same thing. I told him those two words mean two different things. Buy it now means buy it now I don't want to fight in an auction. Reserve price means even though you'll bid at this price, you'll still have to pay X amount for reserve. Common knowledge... or atleast I thought it was. Long story short: scam artists; they bait you in at a low price online, wastes your time while waiting for the car you want to see and then raises the starting bid by thousands. Then tries to gaslight you when you ask too many questions. I would give negative stars if I could, I'm being generous with 1 star. Guess I'll be taking my money to a dealership where I know it's safe. FALSE ADVERTISEMENT!!!

Easy place to dal with. Picked up my car, was promptly greeted and helped. I was in and out in a…read moretotal of 10 minutes. Far from SD, but not horrible

Took over 20 phone calls over 3 days to get someone to answer the phone. Did not get my car in the…read moresale and had to wait another week. Sell fee was very high and charged me for a detail, I drove the car to the auction from my detail shop! It was extremely clean and did not need a detail. Service at the front desk is awful! I will never use this auction again, no wonder this auction has only a couple of hundred cars a week! It once had 2,000 plus a week.

I've bought several cars from here. Sad truth is u take ur chances at this business. I bought one…read morevehicle and soon as I drove it out the gate I had the thought to look under the hood. Good thing I did. The engine was running but I couldn't see anything moving! Nothing! I realized the main pulley was broke so no belt movement. That blew me away as I had never seen that before. How could the engine be running as im hearing it clearly but there is no visible movement??? So, I couldn't even drive it home bcos if the belts aren't moving the water pump is not pumping and it would overheat in a few blocks. So I had to get it towed and the mechanic told me I was looking at a bill of approx 3800 dollars. I didn't pay but 800 dollars for the car. Do u think I got any money back? Hell no! I was screwed. Brownfield screws people every week. One guy came in the yard with a pistol to get his $ back but he just ended up in jail. I don't condone his behavior but I certainly understand. And this is just one of my experiences with these hoodlums and thieves. ​

well i too have had a bad experience. bidding online requires a deposit of 500, so i did that after…read moreyou win and pay for car you then can reques t a withdrawal of your 500. it has been over a month that i put in my withdrawal and it still says pending. i call auction and they told me that they would contact ip or it couldnt get that. it has been another week. still pending!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Next whom they use for online bidding doesnt have any contact info, says 24/7 support but no way to reach them

This is a busy mostly Insurance based auto auction so know what your getting yourself into. This is…read morenot a car dealership or somewhere with extreme customer focused service. That said, the staff is friendly and helpful if you need something. There are thousands of cars good, bad, projects, and clean ones. I recommend going to Copart's website and reading up especially if you live in California to follow specific laws.

If you have your vehicle sent down here, please don't hesitate to call law-enforcement. If your…read morebelongings are stolen I had a pair of Oakley sunglasses stolen by one of these two managers that went into my vehicle without my consent to remove my belongings after being spitted on by a Dispatch worker, which is a older female lady. Those two gentlemen, in the photo even had the nerve to make threats to me where I had to call law-enforcement

On a tight budget, I needed to find replacement for 2 of my old, high maintenance vehicles. No way…read moreI'm buying a new car and SUV. Forget high payments, high interest, and high insurance for 5 years. So, I came to 905 Auto Auctions. I've been to auto auctions in the past. Most experiences were okay. When I was here on Tuesday (auto auctions are Tuesday and Friday here), I was very impressed with the staff here. Friendly, great attitude, straight forward, and smiles! They all made me feel comfortable, even with me asking (probably the same questions they hear every day) them about what and how their auction works. I came last week to get a feel. This time I was able to make 2 purchases. What makes 905 also stand out, is that they let you borrow the key for the vehicle you want to look at (they hold your license), and let you check out the vehicle. Of course you can't test drive it, but now you get a chance to make a better decision than if you had gone to a different auction (some places won't even let you open the hood). I highly recommend this place. The auctioneer is bilingual and caters a bit to the huge Mexican clientele, which makes sense, but he does do enough English for the non Spanish speakers. I'll be back for sure.

I didn't believe the reviews felt like I had to experience the place myself and now the one star…read moretotal makes complete sense definitely some illegal stuff going on here I was somehow outbid by thin air and the price I bid for was bumped up a thousand plus by the thin air and once I "lost" the bidding I was then offered the car still by the auctioneer on the way out they don't try and hide it they are completely scamming if you aren't apart of their family I would completely avoid this auction and save yourself the time

Tried to sign up for their auction service. They tried to charge me $200 to activate my account…read morealong with some sort of ID verification when I have a few friends who had absolutely no hassle with their activations. Avoid this company.

I missed the "pick up" date the day after the San Diego location auction and the next day was a…read moreholiday and the yard was closed. I returned the day after (a Friday) and was told I needed to go to Escondido to pay for a vehicle that was sold and stored in San Diego. This was at 4:00 PM and the Escondido location would be closing in 30 minutes. That was on a Friday. The next possible day to pay for the vehicle was Monday and now there were going to be 5 days of 'storage fees' due at $25/day, adding $125 to the already existing buyer's fees. Altogether, the fees were more than I bid on the vehicle. This is just more bullshit to suck money from unsuspecting individuals who are not familiar with these con artists and thieves. This is the worst customer service I have ever encountered. They are not to be trusted. STAY AWAY!!!

Had a situation with a misunderstanding of a car I bought. I talked to the boss the next day and he…read moretook care of everything and I was refunded and will be back soon.

This review is for those considering selling a vehicle to a Kardona buyer. I have no experience…read morebuying from their auction. Summary: The buyer I interacted with utilized unprofessional sales tactics and took advantage of my lack of experience with the car salvaging industry. I understand the need to operate profitably but this seller simply lacks integrity. He does not deserve your business. I'm sharing the lessons I learned here so others can prevent sleazy buyers from taking advantage of them. In October 2020, our 2008 Subaru stopped working (radiator issue). Due to the age of the car, we did not want to hire a mechanic to repair the vehicle. So I began looking online for how to scrap old cars. There were two main options advertised online for people in our situation. The first was to donate the vehicle to charities who will either repair and giveaway the car or sell it for scraps to raise money. The second was to sell to "cash for cars" type of companies; most of which claimed the car should be worth at least $500. We found the Kardona buyer through the 2nd option. During the interaction, the buyer seemed like a respectful person. Negotiated hard but was still friendly. I knew he was negotiating aggressively, but since I wanted to get rid of the car fast, I was willing to undersell a little. I wanted $500 based on my online research. He used sleazy curbside negotiation tactics and lies to try convince me the car was worth only a few hundred dollars. When I told him I wasn't willing to sell that low and I wanted to contact a few other companies for quotes, he made up some lie about how all the buyers are tracked with GPS and any other buyer that comes out will see that we already spoke to someone and therefore not offer us a higher offer. He also stated that the car would not be repaired and would be sold for parts. This last statement was the ONLY reason I settled for his lowball $350 offer. I didn't believe his sales lies BUT as I explained to him, I had just renewed the vehicle registration early ($150) and would be entitled to a refund from the DMV since the new registration period hadn't started and if the car was scrapped. In my mind, his low-ball offer plus the money I could recoup from the DMV would satisfy us. The DMV refund process takes a while. I applied the same night I sold the vehicle to Kardona, but it was only a few weeks ago that I was informed by the DMV that I will not receive my $150 refund because the car was NOT scrapped for parts. According to the DMV, the car had been sold twice since I sold it. If you are in a situation where you need to get rid of an old vehicle conveniently and would like a reasonable offer (not the highest but also not offensively low), I recommend contacting the following instead of Kardona: 1. Local junkyards (iPull-uPull type businesses) 2. Webuycars.com (affiliated with CoParts (the company insurance company sell salvage cards to) and will give you a reasonable quote without needing to meet in person.) 3. Contact the different "cash for cars" type companies, obtain quotes and use them to compete against one another. Many will try to use "curbside negotiation" tactics to pressure you into selling without shopping around (similar to the Kardona buyer's tactics). Hold your ground and insist you only want quotes for now. My 2008 Honda was totaled in a car accident in March 2021 and I was able to sell it for $750 (still a low offer but reasonable for how much time I was willing to spend on selling it; insurance company's salvage value estimate was $950.) I learned through this process that most the "cash for cars" type companies operate with or under CoParts. You can browse CoParts auction site to see what price range they will be able to sell your vehicle for and use that to set a fair and realistic negotiation price. Don't ever let a car buyer convince you that your vehicle is only worth $500 or less. PURE LIES but happens all the time. If my totaled 2008 Honda could sell for at least $750, the 2008 Subaru with minor damage definitely should have been worth more.

I was recommended to Carpair from a car broker I was working with. I needed to trade my old Nissan…read moresedan and spoke to Britt about using her services. She explained to me how everything worked and the fees and different price points of service you could get. I decided to have Britt take care of the whole process, all I had to do was upload photos through the Carpair app. Within a day or two, Britt let me know they already had offers on my car and was able to negotiate a higher price for me, which in turn paid for the service fee for using Carpair. A win win for all of us. I met the buyer who purchased my car locally and paid me in cash. In my opinion, this a better option than trying to trade in your car at the dealership or going to carvana.

Not sure how this works but this person named Brittany contacted us to buy our car and seemed way…read moretoo excited and ready to pay over the amount we asked for. She claimed to be with this Car Pair Auction, X-dealer BS. Once I found this out I told her we weren't interested. You come here with cash or no deal. Then she sounded desperate and claimed she had some guy named Max from Norm Reeves in Escondido coming with money? Then I get a text from this guy claiming he is the auction winner and wanted me to send a scan of the title blah blah blah. I immediately stopped talking to them blocked them and sold the car on my own to the second person on my list. I don't know if this was legit or not, or if some scammer was pretending to be this group but the SCAM RED FLAGS were waving violently. Be very careful! With this group