so, i haven't been entirely happy with my car and have played around with the idea of trading/selling it for something else. out of curiousity i checked kbb.com to see what it's worth, and i was very disappointed to find that its almost 10k less than the sticker price on the car! this is for a 2010 1lt with 17k miles on it. i mean, sh1t, i owe just over $17k on the car and have owned it for less than a year! is this normal? am i stuck with this thing until i'm no longer upsided down?

Sorry you haven't been entirely happy with your car. But the unfortunate truth is your car begins to loose value the moment you drive it off the dealer lot. There are several things that could cause your value to drop so drastically too, one is the fact that your car being less than a year old already has 17k miles on it, IMO that's on the high side for any car. Another is the number of Malibus already on the road, I don't know about you but I see a lot of 08+ Malibus on the road around where I live. So there's at least 2 reasons why your car is worth less than you expected.

Now as for the question "am i stuck with this thing until i'm no longer upside down?". No, you are not stuck with it. If you're truly determined you're never stuck with a vehicle you don't want. My recommendation if you really want rid of it is to try and sell it yourself or find someone who would be willing to take over your payments. If you want to trade it you would be stuck with rolling over the negative equity i'm sorry to say.

so, i haven't been entirely happy with my car and have played around with the idea of trading/selling it for something else. out of curiousity i checked kbb.com to see what it's worth, and i was very disappointed to find that its almost 10k less than the sticker price on the car! this is for a 2010 1lt with 17k miles on it. i mean, sh1t, i owe just over $17k on the car and have owned it for less than a year! is this normal? am i stuck with this thing until i'm no longer upsided down?

Too bad you aren't happy with your bu. I bought mine last month, it's a 2009 LTZ with just under 18000mi. The new price is around 30k and I paid $21000. I did have a 7k trade in so I am not completely upside down yet.

Yup, Malibu resale SUCKS. Hence why I got a Mazda for a daily driver this time and gave the Malibu to the wife. I was gonna trade the Malibu in, but we got a better deal trading the wife's car in. Thankfully I bought the Malibu when it was 6 months old and the original owner took the huge hit. Funny thing is my near eleven year old Camaro has a "blue book" nearly the same as my Malibu....

On a side note, someone said 17K a year is very high. It is not. The county wide average according to the Black Book is over 15K and depending on where you live up to and over 18K a year. I know in FL where people drive more they consider 17,500 miles a year "average".

you may not be stuck as a lot of dealers are offering to give you what you owe in trade...that way you could break even on that end of the deal

First of all, I hope that you didn't pay sticker for it? The salesman cut $5,300.00 from the price of my 2LT without even haggling. I guess if you didn't get a very good deal and didn't put any money or trade down, you are way over your head. After my GM rebate card I only paid $19,050 for my BU.

First of all, I hope that you didn't pay sticker for it? The salesman cut $5,300.00 from the price of my 2LT without even haggling. I guess if you didn't get a very good deal and didn't put any money or trade down, you are way over your head. After my GM rebate card I only paid $19,050 for my BU.

I paid, after dealing discounts and GM rebates, approx. less than $6,000.00 off of the sticker. Checking kbb values, I have 11,500.00 miles, I see

Trade in value, approx. $3,800.00 less than what was paid,
Private party sale, approx. $2,000.00 less than what was paid, and
Retail, approx $500.00 less than what was paid.

Seems to be resonable to me. :)

I agree, the Malibu Trade-IN Value Sucks. It is one of the worst in it’s class! As for Dealerships giving you more than it is worth , is not going to happen without it costing you more on the New Car! These dealers are not going to eat the depreciation, you are going to pay and take the lost. As for their being many Malibu’s on the road in any area, I am sure many Car Dealers are aware of the Current Generation Malibu Problems! If anything that puts any dealer a higher risk / responsible for possible repairs at their cost and expense, especially if the car is beyond the 3/36 warranty! I truly love My Malibu but with all the problems that I have had with it, I almost traded it until I found out the HUGH lost that I would had to take to get rid of it! Think about it, there has to be a reason why the Value is so LOW as to compare to any car in it’s class! A Car’s History of Reliability Stands for a lot "Not Just Looks" in any car Market and this is one Area that GM needs to work on as for all their Car-Lines. GM makes a lot of great cars/trucks but I personally think they have slacked a lot lately! Don’t know if their financial problems had fell on our laps and expense? I think Ford is the Only American Auto Maker that comes close to the Foreign Auto makers Quality; Reliability, Resale Value right Now and Never took any Money from the Government! Don't take me wrong because I always liked GM Vehicles. Again I truly love the Malibu, even considering the issues that I have had with it. Now that I know what the lost would be on a Trade-IN "MY Malibu", I will be definitely keeping her for a long time!

PS. GM did a great job on design looks. It is a beautiful looking Car! I am hoping my Malibu holds out for a long time without any problems!

I was offered $21,000 on trade for my 2010 Malibu LTZ and surprised it was that high when you figure the rebates available now, $3,500 on 10's and $2,500 on 11's plus $1,000 Loyality, $2,000 GM card top off and about 10% off list you could buy a new LTZ for around $22,000. I bought a new truck instead and that also had a $2,000 Ally Finical rebate and I don't know if that is available for the Malibu.

I bought my 2LT during the GM Total Confidence time - "make your loan payments for at least half of the original term. After that, if you want to buy another GM vehicle, just compare your principal loan balance (not including interest or any refunds on other products/services that were part of your vehicle loan) to the NADA clean retail price for your vehicle. If you owe more than the vehicle is worth, Vehicle Value Protection will help make up the difference."

My halfway point will be Nov - then thinking about trading it in on a SRX for the wife......we shall see what its worth.....:confused: