Car Cadets Takes Selling Your Car to New Level

By Mark Diaz
Imagine trying to sell a home without a real estate agent. It can be done, and people do it, but it’s a hassle. It takes a lot of time, energy and patience. Now imagine selling a car and all the time, energy and patience it takes. People sell and buy cars all the time without any representation and without integral knowledge of how the car business actually works. You probably have even done it yourself. But what if you had an automotive agent that could go through hassle negotiating or finding just the right car for you?
It was this idea that lead Bobby Barajas and Kyle Smith to start their business, Car Cadets Inc. “It’s really exciting when you buy a car,” Barajas said. “The process it takes, though, is what people hate. We’re a real estate agent, but for cars.”
Car Cadets is carving out a niche in the automotive market on the Central Coast. Just like a real estate agent, Barajas and Smith find the vehicle you are looking for or find a buyer for your vehicle.
“This market doesn’t really exist,” Barajas said. “There are brokers out there who will find your car and there are businesses out there who can sell your car, but there is not someone out there who can do both and have you do absolutely nothing. (We) make you more money and save you a heck of a lot of time.”
After Barajas graduated from Cal State Long Beach he got a job at a Santa Maria dealership selling cars. “It was a tremendous experience,” Barajas said. “Nothing against college, but I learned more in the year and a half that I was in that dealership than I have ever learned anything in my whole life. It was an awesome eye opener.”
Eventually, Barajas grew tired of working at the dealership and the job’s lack of upward momentum. “The dealership is a grind. Always. From the first day of the month to the last day of the month, it’s literally thinking about nothing but closing car deals,” he said.
Smith, who graduated from Cal State Fullerton with a business management degree, had a lot of experience facilitating automotive transactions for friends and families.
Barajas and Smith brainstormed about business ideas when it finally struck them. “How could we find a problem in the car business and how do we solve it? It was simple. People hate buying and selling cars,” Barajas said.
For the trade-in aspect of the business, Car Cadets never owns the car. What they do is facilitate finding a buyer for your vehicle on an agreed upon price. If the car is sold at a higher price then Car Cadets receives the difference. The company does more than simply find a buyer. “We clean it. We take pictures.
“We take videos. We list it on sites. We take phone calls. We do the leg work,” Barajas said.
Car Cadets also will find the car you want. A father wanted to purchase a DeLorean for his son who is an avid Back to the Future fan. Smith ended up flying to Florida to test drive a car that was in the buyer’s price range and had it shipped to a Central Coast dealership to finish the transaction.
Car Cadets maintains a broker, wholesale and a dealer license. Among other things, these licenses allow them to interact with dealerships on a business to business basis, as well as, give them access to auctions. Barajas and Smith are currently working on acquiring their retail license that allows them to buy the car from the customer and in turn sell to another customer.
“We’re going to be able to bring a product to your house at any time and you will be able to do the paperwork straight through me. In a sense, we are bringing the dealership to your house.”
For more information, check out their website at https://carcadetsinc.com