Yeah, trade-ins always suck. Suck 10x more with a VW as I see the value isn't the greatest. Bad for the seller, good for the buyer. Even private.
My buddy was able to get a private sold 2014 Jetta fully loaded with only 60k miles on it for $9200 I want to say nearly 2 years ago? Then he sold it to his mother who crashed it 2 weeks after taking it off his hands. She didn't even have the title over to her name yet, lol.