In early 2002, Carmax offered me $3800 for my 98 CSVT with about 51k miles at the time. It's probably because I told them I wasn't going to be buying one of their cars. I also came to find out that Carmax offers you wholesale value for any car you bring in.
Many dealers I've dealt with wouldn't pay over $100 for a car with over 100,000 miles on it. The dealer has to do something with your car after you trade it in, having over 100,000 miles and a manual transmission is a huge turn-off to the average sedan buyer, in the dealer's eyes.
About paying sticker price-- why would anyone do that? There's such a huge mark up on cars MSRP already, why pay over that? I refuse to pay more than 5% over invoice price. There's plenty of profit figured into invoice price for the dealer. I understand if a car JUST came out and you really like it, but wait a few months and get it for invoice price. I've owned 12 cars in 10 years of driving, and only got mildly burned on the Contour due to its atrocious resale value.
I'd say your best bet is to sell it privately. Dealers often look at mods as taking away from the car's value. Private buyers might look for modded cars.
