Buying locally & car priced to sell

fifomania

Firstly, is there much to be said for buying a car locally? So you have somewhere to go back to if something happens it? This is what I've heard since I can remember, don't know if there's much truth in it

Secondly, I plan to sell my car and don't know what value (if any) to put on it so some suggestions'd be appreciated:
'99 Corsa, dent on side, driving well, 100,000 miles, new battery, new tyres, new exhaust, regulary serviced. I've priced on some sites and they vary greatly. I'm realistic as well, I know it's not going to get a lot!

Saab Ed

I'd always suggest if you dont know or care much about cars then yes do buy local. Just makes life easy should you have a problem. Just make sure you get a decent warranty. And second the Corsa is worth about €400-€500 with some sort of NCT left.

aod2009

id say about 200 - 300

colm_mcm

If you buy from a main dealer and get a manufacturer-backed warranty (Nissan Gold Standard, Toyota Dealer Cover etc.) you'll be able to bring it to your local main dealer for warranty work regardless of where in the country you buy it.

If you don't know a lot about cars, it's good to build up a relationship with a particular garage, once you're satisfied they're competent and trustworthy.

dudara

You might be better off trading the car in with a dealer. I just traded my 99 Punto, 86k, Tax 06/09, NCT 01/11, with one mismatched dark green door and got €450 off my desired car.

TBH, I wasn't expecting to realise that much selling it myself.

colm_mcm

dudara wrote: »

got €450 off my desired car.
.

Did you get a discount off the advertised price as well as the 450 for the Punto?

bazz26

dudara wrote: »

You might be better off trading the car in with a dealer. I just traded my 99 Punto, 86k, Tax 06/09, NCT 01/11, with one mismatched dark green door and got €450 off my desired car.

TBH, I wasn't expecting to realise that much selling it myself.

Trading in a car of very little monetory value puts you in a disadvantaged position of not being able to negotiate a cash discount on the car you are buying.

OP try and sell your Corsa privately, there is always a market for cheap cars, now more than ever. If someone makes you a serious offer for the Corsa, take it. Then go and haggle a cash discount off of your new car.

If you know nothing about cars then make sure you get a good warranty with it (in writing) and try and buy locally for the easy convienence of getting the car to and from the place in the event of an issue. In other words don't buy a car from a garage 60 miles away where it is inconvienent for you to take a day off work and drive to them to sort an issue out.

dudara

colm_mcm wrote: »

Did you get a discount off the advertised price as well as the 450 for the Punto?

Yes! I let him make the offer for the Punto, and then I got some more off.

TBH, because of the different coloured door, I knew that it would be a little harder for me to sell the car privately and I additionally, I didn't want the bother of selling the car myself. Getting the door sprayed to maximise the car value wouldn't have been worth it.

rocky

Buying locally, I tried that last weekend, looked at Panda's, 06 starting from 3800 on carzone with dealers, local Galway has 6k+ displayed in the window, 5800 'internet price' :rolleyes:

I gave him a printout of all the 06+ Pandas , best he could do was 5200, and he'd call me back the next day after talking to the boss. Week later, no call - not that I would have payed more than 4000 for the priviledge and I'm also starting to look at bigger cars now.

I guess this dealer can afford not getting 4k ... I can afford to wait

Saab Ed

rocky wrote: »

I guess this dealer can afford not getting 4k ... I can afford to wait

So you still havent bought anything yet...and by the sounds of it you're not going to either. How many dealers time did you waste before you decided you were'nt gonna buy that size of car? Carsalesmen sniff you out you know;)....dont ever try to bullsh1t a bullsh1ter because you'll loose......you'll think you've won but you'll loose

rocky

I would have bought there and then for 4k... even though other dealers ASKING prices were 3800.

Yeah, in the meantime, I'm left with no car, and a Panda is not a bad car IMO, but at the right price...

colm_mcm

rocky wrote: »

I gave him a printout of all the 06+ Pandas , best he could do was 5200,

I guess this dealer can afford not getting 4k ... I can afford to wait

4k isn't much good to him if the car is costing him more than that.

rocky

Like I said, lowest he could go was 5200 before asking his boss; he also said he was going to call me no matter what, even if he can't do a better price than that - at the time I was considering around 4.5k, would have bought straight for less, would have thought about more than 4.5k - that's still 700 more than other non-local dealers, also SIMI registered (yeah, doesn't necessarily mean much - only that they are all expensive ). Why would he say that if he wasn't going to follow through with it?

As it turns out, he gave me time to think it through and after 2 days of thinking I would go for 4.5k, decided I wouldn't really want to buy from him, if even with a simple phone call he cannot keep his word, what'd happen if the car needed servicing etc?

Point is - little things matter .