I wouldn't rely on what a dealer says trade in value on your vehicle is. Call and ask a dealer what they would WRITE YOU A CHECK FOR, rather than trade-in value. When dealer's present you number's on your trade in vehicle it may not be the ACV (actual cash value) they can inflate the trade in amount, so to get a good idea of what your vehicle is actually worth to a dealer ask them what they would write a check for it for.
When trading at a dealer it is all a number's game, manipulating them in a way that makes it more presentable to the customer.
As far as GAP protection, I would shop around for insurance as I have found many times than not that Geico is usually higher..many other insurance provider's offer GAP coverage. In addition, wherever you end up refinancing, check with them to see if they offer GAP...many CU's offer their own type of GAP coverage.
Kind of off topic, but on topic in a way...I have alway's personally thought that purchasing GAP coverage from a third party is better than purchasing it through your insurance company. My reasoning behind this, and I may be wrong, is that if you total your vehicle and it is borderline being totalled or not, a insurance company may very well not deem your vehicle totalled if they have to pay a GAP claim as well. Think about it, if you are underwater on your vehicle and have GAP, the Insurance company may very well take on less losses by not totalling the vehicle and just repairing it rather than paying out an insurance claim and GAP claim. Which is return leaves you with a vehicle that should have been totalled and may never drive the same.
In the early 2000's my mother had a bad accident in a Honda CRV and the insurance company didn't total the vehicle even though there was a ton of damage to the vehicle, after getting the vehicle repaired my mom had to trade it in a few month's later because it just didn't drive the same.
As far as NADA showing a lower value, it really depend's where you live and what region you are in, some region's do use other appraisal tools such as Black Book, KBB, or NADA. In my experience I have found that most lender's tend to use NADA because it a more national representation of a vehicle's value. Make sure you have the correct trim level selected, and option's, and pay close attention to NADA clean retail and NADA clean trade in values, let's say NADA clean retail is $25,000 then it would be very possible to get up to $30,000 financed on that with good credit and a lender willing to do 120% of book value.
