Bada Bing

I am thinking ahead to my dream car in the future and I am very intrigued by the 2016 A8 L 4.0T Sport. I just love the way this car looks with the Sport body panels and the optional 21" wheels that come on this particular highly loaded eBay car. The color combo of Florett silver on black interior is perfect too. Again, I am not in the market to buy this car or another one just yet, but I thought I might ask my questions anyway:

The sticker page on this particular car (photo 59 of 60) shows that this car has $25,950 in Audi Exclusive options. I checked the 2016 Order Guide and as best as I can guess, that sum is made up of the following 3 Exclusive option packages: $18,450 Valcona Leather Package 4, $6,650 Alcantara Headliner and $850 for leather steering wheel.

- Is it normal for the factory sticker not to spell out what Exclusive packages are installed on the car? I am surprised that when they charge such an exorbitant sum for the $26K in Exclusive options, you still have to pay $5,500 for the Full Leather Package. What exactly does one get for $26K in Exclusive options, just choice of leather color and inlay options?

- The wood trim on this car is listed as "poplar brown silver inlays" which I have never seen before. It looks like a very dark, almost black, shade of brown which is much darker than the walnut wood trim found on most A8s. This particular car also looks to have piano black dash trim where most other A8s have a metallic silver dash trim. Do you think the poplar wood trim and piano black lower inlays are part of the Exclusive package? I think I prefer the normal inlay combination of burl walnut wood trim and metallic lower inlays, but perhaps this darker combo might look stunning in daylight.

- The widow sticker lists the cold weather package (CWP) as a $750 option but there is a credit of $750 below the $138,175 subtotal. Is the credit applied because CWP is thrown in for free when you order an Audi Exclusive package or was CWP made standard at some point during the 2016 model year?

- How does one come up with a market valuation for a car like this which is optioned much more heavily than the average A8 L 4.0T which might sticker closer to $100-105K? I would think that the $26K in Exclusive options is pretty much wiped out once the car leaves the showroom. Am I wrong?

- My bottom line question: If you were to make an offer on this car, how much lower than the $78,500 asking price is the market price for this car right now?

I think I've only seen one 2016 4.0T Sport with a higher sticker price (about $148K) and that one had the rear seat entertainment package, rear seat refrigerator and the executive seating package for the right rear passenger on top of the whole suite of Exclusive options.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/2016-Audi-A8-L4-0T-138K-MSRP-Audi-Exclusive-Pkg/263313789493?hash=item3d4eb99235:g:PIoAAOSw9gRaBhT h&vxp=mtr

MP4.2+6.0

I guess I could poke at this more, but sort of a sinkhole of time to try to decipher. Special order exclusive package ones are rare, but skimming your post it sounds like this may be one. Often they are just an unusual paint at the most basic step, but from your mention of trim and such it sounds like someone may have mixed and matched things. Yes, the wood inlays and black lower trim is likely part of it. I looked at that before, and in a non S8 I would likely prefer the black to the brushed metal. But IIIRC the V6's have the black and the V8's have the metal. If correct, an example of how someone special ordered this. How one gets to the dollars though really doesn't compute to me. You mention various numbers adding to about $26K, yet sticker already has a bunch of upcharges that overlap.

I suspect other than for nostalgia, sentimental value, or truly unique, the go forward value of this stuff is close to zero to be blunt and honest. Or, maybe less harsh but still pointed, a lot closer to zero than anything remotely like $25K.

Here's an indirect way to value: Just find the Audi Exclusive packages on the models--not the special order ones but the pre-configured type. An example is the Vermont Brown interior on my S8. There is also a black exclusive interior that was out by the 2016's. Again, without parsing, my 2015 (pre Plus) S8 has essentially all those options you mentioned or I see on the sticker, save the rear seat recline stuff since as an S8 SWB you wouldn't find that. As a benchmark, find a 2016 S8 with the Exclusive Packages and pretty loaded. But in 2016 avoid the carbon ceramic brake option given that is both pricy and has nothing to do with vehicle you are looking at. But meantime, in plain English a loaded S8 of same year with the Exclusive interior packages (Vermont Brown or the black one, or the old Balao Brown one I guess) logically is worth more than most any max loaded 4.0T, with or without some barcalounger seat stuff and some unusual trim swaps. Pardon my French as they say, but trying to get from sales and car dealer happy talk to cold market reality. An S8 vs. this example are of course oriented to different buyers and markets (sport vs. luxury, SWB vs. LWB, etc.), but it seems to me in market supply and demand in stacked pricing order the S8 loaded will exceed this one, and most of the equipment will match up. You won't find hardly even one of the full on mix and match trim and paint element Exlusives (I would say somewhere between 1:100 and 1:1000) on the market at any time, but you can find the high end interior packages with some frequency, again especially on S8.

Later edit: I did actually come across one of these full on Exclusives once before. It was a D4 4.0T. Had the fancy rear seat stuff too. IIRC it had a non stock D4 paint, though from the Audi color palette used on some other models. A paint only Exclusive is something like $4K IIRC as an aside. Also had a non std interior fully trimmed out. For me unfortunately it was an extremely light one--almost off white. It happened to have a CarFax for it on line and when i poked at that I noticed the car was first registered in like Bloomfield Hills MI. What that told me was it was probably an Audi of America car special ordered. Probably was used either for a special show car or provided to some Audi USA top dog type as part of some executive comp package spiff. My guess was the latter. All sort of trivia, but helps explain some why someone might pay what seems to be a $25K almost pure profit apparent upcharge. In the Audi USA type scenario I sketch out, it was really just accounting book entry stuff and a DMV type fee and some taxes. If I remember it right from the CarFax, it just got pushed out into the auction network and next showed up here in CA at a low volume quasi exotic dealer. I never went to see it, but recall it sat for many months but did finally disappear. It was listed similarly to what I paid for my then prior model year very low miles CPO S8, though my sense was it was going to get discounted by some meaningful $$ to finally move it.

derfA8L

I think MP4 covered the valuation issue pretty accurately. So nothing I could add there. Below is the A8/S8 interior trim page from the 2016 Order Guide. The standard lower inlays on the 2016 A8L were Piano Black, so obviously not an element of the Audi Exclusive package, nor was the Alcantara headliner, which was also standard on the 4.0T Sport. Also below are pics of the Poplar Brown-Silver wood inlays on my A8L (was a no cost option in 2015). This wood selection was not available as a standard or no cost option in 2016, so I guess it is a part of this car’s Exclusive package. As for the seats, yup they are clearly Audi Exclusive light gray vertical center inserts and contrast stitching, but IMO a waste of money since they are essentially the same diamond stitch pattern sport seats that were standard on the 4.0T Sport, but with the different contrasting elements. For that kind of upcharge, IMO there are much more “exclusive” and more differentiated Audi Exclusive colors to choose from versus going with the black interior that is so close to the black trim on the car’s standard interior color palette. Additionally, Florette Silver was also available on the normal A8L color palette, so no Exclusive upcharge there.

From what I can see from the info on the Monroney Sticker, the Audi Exclusive package cost is covering only the contrasting leather seating elements (and perhaps upgraded to Napa leather versus the standard Valcona leather), as well as having the Poplar Brown-Silver wood inlays...But I really can’t see where that gets the package cost up to nearly $26K. When I ordered my car, I did get an Audi Exclusive paint selection at a $3,900 upcharge. And I did inquire re: an Audi Exclusive interior which would have added another $12K (didn’t go for that!), so it’s hard for me to see where the leather and wood upcharge gets you to the price point they’re showing. Perhaps there’s more to the Exclusive package that’s not shown, but...

lgball

I love that contrast stitching and inserts on the seats. I think the full leather package should have the upper dash in leather too, but I'm not seeing that,. So it is something of a mystery. Perhaps if you call Audi, they can look up the VIN. I know they will email you the sticker, but you already have that, but maybe they can tell you what the exclusive elements are too.

readheads

I just finished buying a 2011 A8L with a few nice packages. I found that using the VIN decoder program (link below) is very accurate. It will retrieve the Factory Sticker and after looking at around 50 of them, I find it to be very accurate. You just type in the VIN and follow the prompts. I chose to open it as a PDF even though it is not obvious in the prompts.

I'm sure you know the basics like buying certified from an Audi dealer will cost you $10K+ more than a private seller (but it can be worth it), maintenance history is everything (I had good success calling an Audi service place called out on a Carfax and after explaining myself, giving them the VIN they were fine with telling me what had been done to the car, including info that was not detailed on the Carfax), just call very early or at times when they shouldn't be crazy busy. Buying private can save you some $ but there are more risks involved.

As for price, its year, mileage, condition, history and special considerations. These cars depreciate ALOT ! My car had a sticker of $92K for a 2011 A8L with only driver assist (stop and go adaptive cruise works great) and the cold package. I paid $21.5K for it with fabulous proven maintenance history and 9 of 10 on the cherry scale (except for bad road rash on the rims). I found nice A8 rims & tires with 500 miles on them for $1,000 after giving him my old rims and keeping the 4 tires for spares. The only risk is that the car has 77K miles (not my preference but the history and owner (company exec car) offset it. Personally, if I were going to pay $40 - $50K+ for a used Audi then I would play true hardball with the seller. I figure there are not a lot of people willing to spend that kind of money.

BTW, I looked at and drove Lexus, BMW, Benz and Acura before again driving the A8 pretty much on the same day and NONE of them had the drive (+ sport mode perf) of the Audi. The amount of Aluminum on the car plus the special Aluminum Space Frame (https://www.audi-technology-portal.d...spaceframe-en) with the best torsional stiffness around combined with the Quattro drive yields an unbelievable ride. Its worth every penny.

Good luck and please share what you find.

VIN decoder: Window Stickers: Audi Vin Decoder and Audi Window Sticker Tool - Wikilender

Bada Bing

Wow, looks like you found a super deal on your 2011. Personally, I would look for buying a specific model: 2016 A8 L 4.0T Sport with 21" wheels and hopefully in any exterior other than black. I like the Sport model's front fascia and side rocker panels and the 21" wheels with 275 tires give it an almost S8 look. I actually prefer the NWB body of the S8, so looking at an S8 is also a possibility, even though the 450-hp version of the 4.0T has ample power. I would also be looking to pay more or a lower mileage car, hopefully between 25-30K miles. Maybe in a year or so, I could find something coming off its 3-year lease.

By the way, someone mentioned earlier that they don't see this ebay car having full leather with leather dash top surface. I think it does have it, as can be seen by photos of the MMI screen, unless the stitching is found on all A8's.

readheads

Checkout the VIN decoder