Overview
Insurance Auto Auctions (IAA or IAAI) offers an extensive marketplace for purchasing vehicles at auction prices, though mastering their search interface takes some practice. This guide will walk you through how to effectively use IAA's search functionality to discover great vehicle deals while steering clear of common mistakes.
Key Points
- Main Challenge: Relying too heavily on saved searches can cause you to miss vehicles
- Best Practice: Focus on Make and geographical limiters to control costs
- Search Strategy: Avoid specifying models, use visual scanning instead
- Geographic Focus: Start with your state and nearby areas for reasonable shipping costs
Common Issues and Solutions
Search Box Limitations
Example 1: Sometimes you can search for a criteria and get the results you are looking for, but be wary. For example, if you search for 'Porsche 911', the IAA interface breaks it out into model and make. Take a closer look though, and you can see that multiple vehicles are listed with incomplete make or model information. Keep in mind that thousands of these vehicles are processed every day, and their systems are frequently designed to accept a wide range of inputs. When defining your search, stay loose, and trust that you'll need to scan the results to be sure you're not missing anything.
Model Classification Issues
Example 2: Using advanced search with Make: Porsche shows multiple options for 911 models (992, 996 911 New Generation, 997, etc.). If you select all the model variations and save this as your 'nationwide Porsche search', you have a problem. Future searches will be limited to the models you selected, and you'll miss vehicles that don't fit your saved search.
Geographic Strategy
Example 3: Focus on locations first. For example, in NC, consider southern VA, northern SC, and Atlanta GA for reasonable shipping costs. Don't choose the model first - this limits your saved search too much. In contrast to the Copart interface, the IAA website has great options for limiting by zipcode distance or by an entire state. Take care though, as relatively rare make and model combinations may artificially limit your saved search results.
Who is really selling this?
Compare with Copart, IAA offers a limited variety of sellers. They do not resell their marketplace services to individuals. They still sell literally thousands of vehicles a day. It's all straightforward from there, once the vehicle is truly ready to be sold.
You will find vehicles that are in the inventory list, and never go on sale. They meet all your requirements and simply sit there for month. This is due to paperwork hold ups like divorce proceedings, leins, title transfers, probate, etc. There is nothing you can do.
Who is the competition?
Set your bid amounts and be done. Do not worry about the competition, you can't win anyways. The amateurs sit and monitor the auction and click bid when they are being beaten. Just set your high bid and wait, never log in to the auction. Lets say you don't take this advice and instead you login. You're now going to see automated bids from control software run by the 85% of bidders. These are the remarkerters, dismantlers and exporters. You'll be looking at a $3k bid for a vehicle that's 10 mins away from you that you know will take thousands in repairs. You'll be outbid by someone from Guatemala, Lithuania and Nigeria. Yes, it is more cost effective for them to buy a broken car from the US, ship it overseas, than it is for you to get it back on the road when it's 5 miles from your house. It's the inverse of the modern american ultra low cost of goods from China. The cost of labor is so low in these countries that the economics are impossible to beat. Couple that with lower emissions costs and questionable importing incentives and you cannot 'get lucky', and win a bid in person.
On the other hand, you can leverage your knowledge and expertise and get a vehicle back on the road for fun. The author has done this many times, and for roughly 60-70% discounted off a clean title vehicle. See the 
BMW X3, 
2001 Porsche Boxster, and 
2005 BMW 545i examples in the guidebook.
Costs, Fees and Gotchas
IAA has invested literally millions of dollars to get the most value out of all the buyers at this point. Unlike Copart, the terminology is relatively straightforward. Just keep in mind that just because you 'won' the auction, does not mean you actually will get the vehicle. There are many options for the controlling seller and IAA to reject your 'winning bid'.
- The vehicle will not be like in the pictures. Prepare for surprises, from windows rolled down, to punctured body panels.
- Clean title vehicles are generally arbitrarily defined. A simple rule of thumb down here at the 'fun' cost range, is add 1/3 of the cost for clean title broker fees. Good luck trying to figure out why some vehicles are clean title and others are total loss.
- It's still the best buying experience. This and Copart have literally hundreds of thousands of vehicles to choose from, all of which can be delivered to your door. It's still better than getting an 80% as risky experience at a dealership, for much higher cost. On the other hand, the author here is known for being comfortable with very high risks, but if you're reading this you're probably as well.
- Real examples exist! Check out all of the blog posts on this site for some real examples of what to expect, including actual bid costs and fees:
- 2001 Porsche Boxster
2013 BMW 335i
2005 Audi TT quattro convertible
2002 BMW 325Ci
2006 Infiniti M45- 2013 BMW X3
- 2005 BMW 545i
Learning Points
- IAA's interface is optimized for dismantlers, remarketers, and exporters
- Individual buyers need a different approach focused on specific vehicle characteristics
- Location should be your primary search criteria, not specific models
- Visual scanning is more reliable than relying on model classifications
- Consider shipping costs as part of your search strategy
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