Mechanic Inspection for Private Sale?

Birroc

Would you normally get a mechanic to give a car a thorough review before agreeing a private sale? Or would you check the basics yourself (oil, brakes etc) and take the risk?

-Corkie-

It depends on your knowledge as in are your nails painted with oil or paint??.

goz83

depends on car value too

Stained Class

I'm too proud to do it, but it's a good idea.

I know a fair bit about cars, but I don't have the knowledge of an experianced mechanic.

Sure, I can spot a car that's been in a crash & all that, but I wouldn't know the kind of problems to watch out for in modern cars.

Each brand and model has issues & potential issues to watch out for that only an up to date experianced mechanic can know about.

If your'e paying a lot of money, it's a good investment to bring one along.

Yakuza

When buying a car privately (from a mate who was selling in good faith) for €20k, i was of the opinion that spending €120 was a good investment. If only spending a few k on a runaround, it might not be worth doing. Still, my brother-in-law-to-be spent €600 on an '00 Rover 75 without getting it checked out and it has cost him that and more again to replace the head gasket and clutch cable which went about two days and a fortnight respectively of his having bought the yoke. If he'd had it looked at, he could have saved himself a good deal of bother.

MetzgerMeister

Yakuza wrote: »

When buying a car privately (from a mate who was selling in good faith) for €20k, i was of the opinion that spending €120 was a good investment. If only spending a few k on a runaround, it might not be worth doing. Still, my brother-in-law-to-be spent €600 on an '00 Rover 75 without getting it checked out and it has cost him that and more again to replace the head gasket and clutch cable which went about two days and a fortnight respectively of his having bought the yoke. If he'd had it looked at, he could have saved himself a good deal of bother.

Where did he buy that rover?

Esel

Yakuza wrote: »

... my brother-in-law-to-be spent €600 on an '00 Rover 75...

At that price, he should have known he was taking a risk.

Del2005

Birroc wrote: »

Would you normally get a mechanic to give a car a thorough review before agreeing a private sale? Or would you check the basics yourself (oil, brakes etc) and take the risk?

It's always better to have 2 sets of eyes look it over. It also depends on your own knowledge of cars, if your good at fixing them then it may be OK if you need a mechanic to check the oil then definitely bring someone. If you like the car you may not notice issues an uninvolved person may spot.

Personally I'd get any 2nd hand car, and if I ever bought new, checked out by someone with more knowledge then me and I can give any tyre a good kick.

biko

No but that doesn't mean you OP shouldn't get a mechanic to view it.
It really depends on how confident you are around cars, and even then you could end up buying a bad car.

Yakuza

MetzgerMeister wrote: »

Where did he buy that rover?

I'm not 100% sure, I'm fairly sure it was a private sale. I'll ask him when I'm back from holidays.

Esel wrote: »

At that price, he should have known he was taking a risk.

Agreed, it's not the first banger he's bought that has ended up giving trouble. I might gently hint he takes his time before selecting his next "bargain".

MetzgerMeister

Yakuza wrote: »

I'm not 100% sure, I'm fairly sure it was a private sale. I'll ask him when I'm back from holidays.

Is it a 2.0 V6?