Three different things go by the word auction
Before registering a car anywhere, work out which of these you are dealing with. They differ in who bids, who pays the fee, and whether you are allowed to change your mind.
- Trade auctions. Registered motor businesses buying and selling stock among themselves. A private owner gets in through a dealer or a platform, seldom under their own name.
- Platforms that take cars from private owners and show them to the trade. You supply the description, the platform may send an inspector, and bidding runs for a set number of days.
- Marketplace listings with a bidding option, open to anyone. Closer to a private sale, with the price decided by whoever bids most.
The middle one is what this guide is about, because that is the route open to someone with a single car to sell.
The sequence on a platform built for private sellers
No two platforms run an identical process, so the terms they publish beat any summary, including this one. The shape is usually this.
- Register the car under its kenteken and fill in condition, mileage and damage.
- Upload your own photographs, or let the platform send an inspector who writes the report.
- Bidding opens to traders and runs to a deadline.
- The platform reports the top bid and says whether it clears the conditions.
- You accept, or refuse if your terms leave you that option.
- The winner pays, takes the car away and registers it at the RDW.
Three questions settle most doubts about a platform: who collects the car, from where, and on what day the money lands. Ask them before you sign up.
An auction runs on a clock, and so do you
A leaving date and an auction make an awkward pair. Bidding runs to a fixed deadline, and a round that closes under your floor price leaves you starting again with a week or more gone. Plan on one failed round. Keep the last week before the move clear of anything that depends on a stranger bidding.
Then there is the language. Dutch platforms publish in Dutch, their terms are in Dutch, and traders will write to you in Dutch. A browser translation is enough for reading pages and not enough for a contract, so have the conditions that matter explained in writing. One point of sequencing from our guide for people who are leaving: the car has to be off your name before you deregister at the gemeente, your municipality.
What the platform keeps, and what you may refuse
Platforms are paid in several ways. Some bill the seller, some the buyer, some both, and the amount may be flat or may track the sale price. Current figures belong on the platform's own page, so read them there. The number you actually receive is the bid less whatever you owe, and that is the only number worth comparing between platforms.
Four conditions decide whether an auction is safe for you. Whether you can set a minimumprijs. Whether refusing the top bid costs anything. What follows if an inspector or the buyer finds something your description missed. And who carries the loss when a winning bidder walks away. If a clause exists only in Dutch and you are unsure of it, ask for it in writing before the car goes on.
The RDW does not treat an auction differently
A winning bid changes nothing about the register. The company that bought the car registers it to itself and issues your vrijwaringsbewijs. Until that is done you are the keeper on paper, which means the road tax, the insurance duty and any fine are still addressed to you. The seller's half of the procedure is in our transfer guide.
So hold the kentekencard and both halves of the tenaamstellingscode until the collection lorry is on your street. The car goes when the payment sits in your account and the transfer proof sits in your hand. A message promising a bank transfer is a message, nothing more.
When one offer beats a room full of bidders
Competition is what an auction is for, and several traders pushing against each other is a real thing to want. You pay for it in uncertainty. The result arrives when bidding closes and not before, and the window you get for your answer can be short.
A direct offer inverts all of that. One buyer, one figure, and as long as you like to think it over. webuycar.nl works that way: request an offer with your plate, and it stays on the table until you reply. Say yes and we come to the car at no cost, anywhere in the country, do the transfer at the RDW on that visit, and hand the money over with the keys. The handover itself is written out step by step. Weighing the two routes against each other is a sensible use of an afternoon.