Automotive

Desking · payment, price and the customer's trade-in

The Desking tab is the math you do at the desk before any contract: what the monthly payment comes to for a given price, and how much car fits inside a payment the customer is willing to make. It walks through every field, how the trade-in and its payoff enter the math, and what the desk deliberately does not do.

What the desk is

Customers almost never negotiate price. They negotiate the payment. The Desking tab exists so the salesperson can answer that question in front of the customer, with the right number, instead of doing the math in their head or promising something that will not close.

There are two calculations, side by side. On the left, Payment from price: you enter the price and the desk returns the payment. On the right, Price from payment: you enter the payment that fits the customer's budget and the desk returns the largest amount financeable. The second one is the heart of the negotiation, because it is the conversation that actually happens on the floor.

The Payment from price fields

Price: the amount of the vehicle being sold.
Down payment: the cash the customer puts in at signing. It reduces the financed amount.
Trade-in value: what you are paying for the customer's used car. It reduces the financed amount.
Trade-in payoff: what the customer still owes on that used car. This adds to the financed amount, it does not reduce it.
Rate %/mo: the monthly rate, as a percentage. Type 1 for one percent a month.
Months: the term, between 1 and 120.

The math is straightforward: financed equals price plus fees plus the trade-in payoff, minus the down payment and minus the trade-in value. The result never goes negative; the floor is zero. On the financed amount the desk applies the level-payment formula and returns three numbers: Financed, Monthly payment and Total interest.

The trade-in takes two fields, not one

This is the point that causes the most wrong quotes. The customer's used car carries two independent numbers: what it is worth to you, which is the Trade-in value, and what they still owe the bank, which is the Trade-in payoff. When the payoff is larger than the value, the customer owes more than the car is worth, and that gap moves into the new loan. The desk shows it by raising the payment, instead of hiding it.

💡 The payoff is a number you enter, mirrored from the customer's lender. SellioCRM does not query the finance company and does not work the payoff out on its own; it uses what you type.

Price from payment, the reverse calculation

Fill in Rate %/mo and Months in the block on the left; they apply to both calculations.
In the Price from payment block, type the Target payment, that is, the amount the customer says they can afford.
Read the answer in Max financed: it is the largest amount that payment supports at that term and that rate.
Compare it against the price of the car. The difference is exactly what has to come from a down payment, a trade-in or a discount for the deal to close.

Example: A customer wants a late-model used car at R$ 96,000.00 and says they can pay R$ 1,900.00 a month. At 1.2 percent a month over 48 months, the desk shows a Max financed of roughly R$ 70,000.00. That leaves about R$ 26,000.00 to cover. The customer's trade-in is worth R$ 30,000.00, but they still owe R$ 12,000.00 on it. Entering a Trade-in value of R$ 30,000.00 and a Trade-in payoff of R$ 12,000.00 in the block on the left drops the financed amount to R$ 78,000.00 and puts the payment above the target. The salesperson sees at once that the deal needs R$ 8,000.00 down or a longer term, and negotiates knowing the number.

What the desk does not do

It is not a contract or a signed quote. It is desk math, ahead of any document.
It does not query a bank, does not run credit and does not approve financing.
It does not add taxes, insurance or fees on its own. Whatever you do not type does not enter the math.
It does not look up the market value of the trade-in. What the trade is worth is your call.
Nothing on this screen is saved to the customer automatically; the calculation runs on the spot, every time you change a field.

Frequently asked questions

Is the rate monthly or annual? Monthly. The field is called Rate %/mo and the term is counted in months.
Can I run it with no interest? Yes. Leave the rate at zero and the desk divides the financed amount by the number of months.
Why did Financed come out as zero? Because the down payment plus the trade-in value covered the whole price. The financed amount has a floor of zero, it never goes negative.
Does Total interest match the bank's number? The desk applies the level-payment formula to the amounts you typed. Fees, insurance and each lender's way of charging change the final contract number.
Can I pick the currency? The desk works with the amounts exactly as you type them; the currency is your operation's.

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