Used Cars @ Dealerships WTF?

Raiser

Its tough times for the Dealers and hopefully they'll get a break soon....

- On the other hand the prices they are asking for the selection of high mileage, worn out excuses for cars they have on their Lots is just incredible.

The prices I was quoted for what basically amounted to scrap metal on Saturday makes me think they're hoping to pay the 2010 wages out of selling 10 year old crap for twice or three times its actual worth - The perception of value in used cars that is out there is a long way from what I've been seeing so far

Was going to buy from a Dealer to have peace of mind re. after sales - But is the only real value to be had in private sales?

Budget is 3.5k-4K mid-sized, small engine - mileage rated over year of manufacture.

Mc Love

Raiser start looking in the UK - at least they know how much cars should be priced (and thats with the VRT added on)

Gumbo

depends on what you call value and what you were looking at?

sparkysrovers wrote: »

Raiser start looking in the UK - at least they know how much cars should be priced (and thats with the VRT added on)

i think if you look here, depending on what your buying, its actually turned around and is cheaper over here now due to the CO2 VRT.
I know guys from England that are looking at BMW M3's over here now due to their value and England low VRT system, think its only like 25 Stg!

Source

Beta Ray Bill

Raiser wrote: »

Its tough times for the Dealers and hopefully they'll get a break soon....

- On the other hand the prices they are asking for the selection of high mileage, worn out excuses for cars they have on their Lots is just incredible.

The prices I was quoted for what basically amounted to scrap metal on Saturday makes me think they're hoping to pay the 2010 wages out of selling 10 year old crap for twice or three times its actual worth - The perception of value in used cars that is out there is a long way from what I've been seeing so far

Was going to buy from a Dealer to have peace of mind re. after sales - But is the only real value to be had in private sales?

Budget is 3.5k-4K mid-sized, small engine - mileage rated over year of manufacture.

remember they are dealers... they are in it to make money. They wouldnt be making much money if they were selling for cheaper than they were buying now would they?

But in saying that... I would agree with you in saying that ALOT of them are pricing their cars High.

I will NEVER buy from a dealer again.
I've bought twice now, with a warranty, and neither of them Honored the warranty when the car went wrong.

Your FAR better off buying privately.

c4cat

I have always gone to the ~UK and bought low milage 8 yrs old cars kept them for 2 yrs and sold them off in the Auction here, nett cost to me works out ar E500 per year to replace my car. The most I have ever spent on maintaining a car was E150 to replace a cat converter which was at the back end of my 2 yrs I had the car so I could put a new NCT prior to putting it into auction

Raiser

kceire wrote: »

depends on what you call value and what you were looking at?

Well its all subjective and of course perception varies...... I was looking at:

YEAR X CONDITION X DEPRECIATION/RESALE X MILEAGE

- In most of the Dealerships I visited on Saturday (Limerick and surrounds) the minimum price on the Lots was 4.5-5K and these Cars looked like they arrived 18 months ago and were destined to rust into the patch of tarmac they were dumped on.

I can understand a Salesperson not being too impressed by my budget - but of course 3.5K-4K should still be a substantial amount of money to a sector that hasn't exactly thrived in recent memory.

The cars they had assembled were in no way cars you'd ever retain in the hope of attracting interest - more like ones they got landed with against their will - with prices at variance to the laws of basic economic and common sense!

Is it common for Dealers to duck and dive and hide to avoid honouring used car warranties? I'd much prefer to buy privately now but herself is adamant that she wants after sales support.

c4cat

kceire wrote: »

depends on what you call value and what you were looking at?



i think if you look here, depending on what your buying, its actually turned around and is cheaper over here now due to the CO2 VRT.
I know guys from England that are looking at BMW M3's over here now due to their value and England low VRT system, think its only like 150 Stg!

UK does not even have a VRT so I can not understand what you mean, that after Ireland puts on its higher rate of VAT then VRT on top of that, the people are coming over here to pay Irish ferry fees to take a car back on the boat to the UK...does compute...!!!!!

Gumbo

c4cat wrote: »

UK does not even have a VRT so I can not understand what you mean, that after Ireland puts on its higher rate of VAT then VRT on top of that, the people are coming over here to pay Irish ferry fees to take a car back on the boat to the UK...does compute...!!!!!

UK residents still have to pay to register a foreign car. while it may not be technically called VRT, its the same principle but on a much lower cost. Source

the OP still hasnt told us what car he is looking for.....so how do we know if indeed the dealers are overpriced or infact the OP was undervaluing the cars he is looking at.

Saab Ed

All cars are now cheaper here than in the UK. Used cars in the UK have gone through the roof price wise. UK prices have been the wrong side of here since the middle of last year. Stop giving bad advice is all I can say to the people advising to go cross the pond. If as much effort was put into finding a good deal here as it is in going to England you'll land yourself a bargain in Ireland .

PS Any of the sales people that I know who post here give un-biased and honest advice while posting. To condem the very people who give that advice kinda negates asking for the advice in the first place...Not ment for you OP but some people here really are spouting sh!te

Raiser

Spoke to a Salesman in the past half hour who says that if he had a Lot full of Focus's, Corolla hatches etc. '04-'05 with reasonable mileage up they'd sell themselves. He reckons its a supply issue?

- Am going to have to go private now I reckon anyhow......

Mc Love

Saab Ed wrote: »

All cars are now cheaper here than in the UK. Used cars in the UK have gone through the roof price wise. UK prices have been the wrong side of here since the middle of last year. Stop giving bad advice is all I can say to the people advising to go cross the pond. If as much effort was put into finding a good deal here as it is in going to England you'll land yourself a bargain in Ireland .

PS Any of the sales people that I know who post here give un-biased and honest advice while posting. To condem the very people who give that advice kinda negates asking for the advice in the first place...Not ment for you OP but some people here really are spouting sh!te

Not what i have found. I have found cars in the UK to be 2,3 even 4k cheaper with the VRT included to prices i would find for used cars here from dealers.

Yet you havent mentioned what cars you have found to be cheaper here. Spec is better in the UK also. Examples I have found are golfs and focii

Raiser wrote: »

Spoke to a Salesman in the past half hour who says that if he had a Lot full of Focus's, Corolla hatches etc. '04-'05 with reasonable mileage up they'd sell themselves. He reckons its a supply issue?

- Am going to have to go private now I reckon anyhow......

Best of luck Raiser

smash

sparkysrovers wrote: »

Yet you havent mentioned what cars you have found to be cheaper here. Spec is better in the UK also. Examples I have found are golfs and focii

Up the game a bit and look at decent cars like an M3, various porsche's or a Lotus elise

Mc Love

steve06 wrote: »

Up the game a bit and look at decent cars like an M3, various porsche's or a Lotus elise

Ooooh no recession around here.com

copacetic

Saab Ed wrote: »

All cars are now cheaper here than in the UK. Used cars in the UK have gone through the roof price wise. UK prices have been the wrong side of here since the middle of last year. Stop giving bad advice is all I can say to the people advising to go cross the pond. If as much effort was put into finding a good deal here as it is in going to England you'll land yourself a bargain in Ireland .

PS Any of the sales people that I know who post here give un-biased and honest advice while posting. To condem the very people who give that advice kinda negates asking for the advice in the first place...Not ment for you OP but some people here really are spouting sh!te

That's absolute rubbish.

You can't complain about people thinking they aren't getting honest advice when this kind of BS is posted.

Certainly there isn't the massive gap there was a year ago in prices, but mostly that is because imports are available via dealers here now.

rccaulfield

steve06 wrote: »

Up the game a bit and look at decent cars like an M3, various porsche's or a Lotus elise

Get real will ya- the fella has a budget of 4k! Even if i had a spare 100k i wudn't waste my money so i cud look an eejit! Cars on that list aren't that quick either.

Gumbo

rccaulfield wrote: »

Even if i had a spare 100k i wudn't waste my money so i cud look an eejit! Cars on that list aren't that quick either.

:rolleyes:

i think your looking for the consumer - bargain alerts forum..........please forgive us if you wander into a motors forum and actually find us discussing motors, and damn fine motors at that!

although i agree they are way out of the OP's budget.

Saab Ed

copacetic wrote: »

That's absolute rubbish.

You can't complain about people thinking they aren't getting honest advice when this kind of BS is posted.

Just speaking from first hand trade knowledge and not just opinion. Used UK prices are off the wall at the moment , there's a complete shortage of good used cars over there and prices have soared. Now as I said I know this as fact. I also know lots of Irish dealers who no longer bother going to the UK for cars because they are to expensive. Also new cars aint selling here ,the retail prices are plumeting which is having a knock on effect on used cars although this is also changing as we suffer from the same problem as the UK i.e a lack of good used cars. Now you can bleat on if you want that im talking BS but the fact is you're wrong. Im not saying that for arguments sake , I really couldnt care less what you think but its best if you're gonna give advice to know what you're talking about first.

copacetic

Saab Ed wrote: »

Just speaking from first hand trade knowledge and not just opinion.

Yep, biased opinion. This time last year the people in the trade were telling everyone that imports were unreliable, clocked and warranties didn't hold in Ireland. Then they jumped on the bandwagon and started importing like crazy themselve.

Now, "ALL cars are cheaper here than the UK". Absolute rubbish.

rccaulfield

rccaulfield wrote: »

Cars on that list aren't that quick either.

M3 not that quick ? Elise not that quick ?

Saab Ed

Saab Ed wrote: »

Used UK prices are off the wall at the moment , there's a complete shortage of good used cars over there and prices have soared.

I'm telling people this for the last year or so, much better value to be had here if you can haggle. For Joe Soap going over the England who does the groundwork on the phone before going over they are already after getting a mild shafting. Folks think it's great value over there as they use carzone.ie in their calculations not a haggled price or a private sale shake hand price. Also the value used by the VRT folk is looney as well.

EPM

copacetic wrote: »

Yep, biased opinion. This time last year the people in the trade were telling everyone that imports were unreliable, clocked and warranties didn't hold in Ireland. Then they jumped on the bandwagon and started importing like crazy themselve.

Now, "ALL cars are cheaper here than the UK". Absolute rubbish.

In fairness to the trade lads here they give very unbiased views on here, they have nothing to gain on an anonymous forum. I've been pricing cars over the last few months and they are definitely going up in the UK. Decent, low mileage cars are thin on the ground and more expensive than this time last year.

copacetic

EPM wrote: »

In fairness to the trade lads here they give very unbiased views on here, they have nothing to gain on an anonymous forum. I've been pricing cars over the last few months and they are definitely going up in the UK. Decent, low mileage cars are thin on the ground and more expensive than this time last year.

Thats absolutely true, but this time last year you could save a fortune by importing on some cars. Even then, some high vrt cars weren't worth importing.

This year the difference is a lot less and a lot less cars are worth it, but for someone to say ALL cars are cheaper here than UK is crazy.

At best a lot of the cheapest cars available here are now only equivalent to imported price, there are still reasonably savings to be had for people willing to import. Also, somme dealers are still trying to charge way over the odds for second hand cars and their prices can all be beaten by importing.

copacetic

copacetic wrote: »

Also, somme dealers are still trying to charge way over the odds for second hand cars and their prices can all be beaten by importing.

Windscreen prices you are referring to surely. Also beaten by how much when the flights, ferry & sunsistance are factored in ?

copacetic

RoverJames wrote: »

Windscreen prices you are referring to surely. Also beaten by how much when the flights, ferry & sunsistance are factored in ?

Some dealers still have crazy prices and won't move on them. Generally now you can find a 20-25% differential between very similar cars, without even pricing imports.

As for how much, it'd depend on the car. Needs to be low VRT to make it worthwhile with current exchange rate and UK prices. Ddon't want to bring the thread further off topic but it'll only cost you €3-400 for flights, ferry and food/accom. Plenty of information on importing thread.

Mc Love

Dont forget NI sales though

daRobot

Try finding a nice clean car privately here first. A few do exist, but a quick browse on donedeal will alert you to the fact that Irish people are really really bad at taking care of cars.

With your budget, you're really looking at low grade dealers (Naas road style), who won't honour the warranty anyway, so no advantage whatsoever buying from them.

Going to the UK, is a decent idea aswell. The prices have gone up there in the past while, but the fact remains that the cars over there are better specced, and are far more likely to have been cared for throughout their lives.

The UK option may cost a few more quid, or not, depending on what you're after,but for the sake of a well sorted car, it will be money well spent.

johndaman66

I tend to find from my experience that in general if you go into a dealer with the same sort of money to spend as mentioned by the OP they don't really want to know you and you are made feel like a nusiance more than anything. Granted its not a hell of a lot of money to be spending on a car in the scheme of things but you would imagine all the same they would have plenty of trades in they took in with NCT and what not that they could sell on. Where do these cars go like, surely not everybody automatically trades up from a 07/08/09 to a 10 reg.

Thats not meant to be a blanket statemet as some motor dealers are indeed very good and helpful even if you are spending that sort of money but more and in particular franchised dealers tend to be pretty much useless in my experience. You might mention for example max engine is 1.4 litre for insurance reasons and either out of lazyness or just being in a world of their own they proceed to show you and try to get you interested in much bigger engined cars. If for example you asked how many previous owners car has had the typical answer might be "three or four I think, its there in the log book" and no effort made to check it up for you. If they don't have something in stock they may take your number in case something comes in but I've never heard back from them...are these guys trying to sell cars at all like?

I don't intend to tar all with the same brush, some are very good and thorough but quite a lot appear to be a dead loss in particular if you are in the sub 5k category market it would appear.

Raiser

Johndaman has given a fair summary of my experience so far.

You'd think they'd set up their stall to suit their potential customers by having few cars for buyers at every budget level?

- Then after that to actually chase sales through being interested and helpful?

Could anyone please recommend the best places to browse private sales of used cars?

Mc Love

Raiser, john according to his location is from limerick as am I and you are too if i am not mistaken. Maybe its just Limerick dealerships?

johndaman66

Raiser wrote: »

Johndaman has given a fair summary of my experience so far.

You'd think they'd set up their stall to suit their potential customers by having few cars for buyers at every budget level?

- Then after that to actually chase sales through being interested and helpful?

Could anyone please recommend the best places to browse private sales of used cars?

I agree the more cars the shift the better for business surely. Fair enough on the face of it there isin't as much profit in selling a car at the 4k mark as one being sold for 10k but there is no doubt a very strong market out there for the 3k to 5k cars also and money to be made, in particular now more than ever I would imagine. To me it appears dealers are turning up their nose at this market.

I find donedeal.ie to be very good for private sales Raiser. Gumtree not bad also but its moreso Dublin or Cork based people selling on it...Worth a look all the same no doubt if you are not next or near Dublin or Cork. Other than that the good old trusted buy and sell or one of your local newspapers. Worth checking the notice boards in supermarkets too if you happen to be passing them.

johndaman66

sparkysrovers wrote: »

Raiser, john according to his location is from limerick as am I and you are too if i am not mistaken. Maybe its just Limerick dealerships?

Your a fellow Limerick man sparkyrovers as is Raiser were thinking:). My experience would be from visiting dealerships in the Limerick/ Kerry area...Maybe it a phenomenon confined to this part of the country:rolleyes:

junkyard

If your buying a car for 3-4k your only wasting your time going to the UK for it by the time you go over and buy it and ferry it home and then the VRT has to be paid. You'll only save money if your buying something over the 10k mark really.

c4cat

kceire wrote: »

UK residents still have to pay to register a foreign car. while it may not be technically called VRT, its the same principle but on a much lower cost. Source

the OP still hasnt told us what car he is looking for.....so how do we know if indeed the dealers are overpriced or infact the OP was undervaluing the cars he is looking at.

Its an admin fee not a tax, twenty sick squid if you register a mini, a hummer or a rolls does not really affect the used price