Hi,
A good friend of mine is changing his car on Saturday. He is changing from a '94M 30k mile (yes thirty!) 1.6 Escort Mistral to a two year old Mini ONE.
He has been offered £200 token part-ex for his Escort as part of the deal, however i can't help thinking that this is a woefully low offer, and the dealer doesn't really want the car anyway.
The result being that after a quick check on Autotrader, these cars are going for at least £600 around my area, and i couldn't help offering him £300 for the car if he can get out of the offer the dealer has made him.
The Escort isn't in the best condition, but the low mileage will help it sell (god knows why).
Am i being sensible here? It just seems almost too easy somehow! If i do get the car off him, how should i sell it? By this i mean, do i re-register as the new owner, or would you recommend that i sell it on without officially owning it - to save hassle and time for V5 to come back etc?
The issue i can see here would be that i'm not selling the car from the registered address, which might put off some people, but my game plan would basically to be completely honest with the situation to any potential buyer.
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I can't see why the Mini dealer will not back away from taking a p/x he doesn't want.
Thereafter, simply act as your friend's agent. Sell the car with him as the owner, but agree that you keep everything except for the first £300 of the sale price. That way no need to mess around with the V5C.
Only problem is that people may be suspicious, so get a letter from your friend on his letterhead, authorising you to sell the car on his behalf and give a phone number (fixed line) so it can verified.
--
Espada III - well if you have a family and need a Lamborghini, what else do you drive?
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>Am i being sensible here?
No
>It just seems almost too easy somehow!
Its not. You are signing up for a load of unwanted hastle for a possibility (not guarantee) of £300 profit max.
for example, its another owner added to the car and all the registration hastle, you need to get it insured, you need to sell it and explain how you came by it, you admitted its not a brilliant looker so will be a pig to sell. and will you get £600 for it? just because thats what people put them up for does not mean thats what they get. You could end up with your fingers burnt
Leave the bloke alone to get on with his deal, he does not need the hastle of renegotiating with the garage and then selling it to you either.
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It does seem like a lot of hassle for very little potential profit. You buy the car for £300, spend £20 on advertising it in the paper and another £30 on cleaning it and tarting it up making a total cost of £350. You advertise it for £600, punter comes round and you settle on £500. Total profit = £150.
You will either have to sell it with your mate's name on the logbook and this will add suspicion and potential for trauma to the deal or you will have to wait several weeks whilst the log bog comes back from DVLA.
Like RF says - it's a lot of work and hassle for a hundred quid or so.
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Depends how much you need and/or want the money.
You might advertise it for a cost of £20 and sell it for the asking price of £600 in an hour. £280 for a couple of hours work wouldn't be bad.
Unless you sell it at a loss, which isn't likely, I'd think it was worth a go. You've only got your time to lose.
The minimum wage in this country is about £5 per hour. £150 to £280 profit would be somewhere between 4 and 7 days work at that rate - not too bad.
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£200 isn't woefully low, it's just what the car will fetch at auction where the dealer will certainly send it.
A lot of my customers used to expect that they could get the same for a part-ex as they saw the cars for in the paper.
I reckon £600 seems like a lot for this car, it's old model for a start IIRC, not the latest MK6, it has no decent level of equipment and is not in good condition.
I was looking in the Autotrader last week because after my saga with my BMW I'm considering getting an Escort as a replacement.
A 2000 W reg 1.6 Finesse with alloys, CD, Air Con, electrics etc. in a pretty colour and the most up to date shape was only £2000, and the same model was also available as low as £1600 with only 17K on the clock on an S plate!
I can't see anyone paying £600 for it unless they're desperate and can't scrape together or borrow a little extra, not when you look at what a little more will buy you.
Blue
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No point even bothering unless it's got 12 mths MOT on it, for a start.
Full SH, a good clean, four tyres with 10,000 wear left and decent bodywork (people are very vain!) and it might be worth £450-£500.
Why bother?
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You've made a good point there about the MOT - unless it's got a long one it's worth virtually nothing except scrap weight. The cost of putting an MOT on it will almost certainly wipe any potential profit.
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At this age the 30k mileage has nothing to do with it. For all anyone knows, and considering it's it poor condition as you say, it could have been clocked. It could have missed annual services, lots of short runs, etc. I'd accept £200 for a PX, but I think he should try selling it privately himself.
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Mike Farrow
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Again on the subject of clocking with it being a ford won't it have a hundred thousand mile speedo so it could very well be 130,000 miles.
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>>A good friend of mine
Keep it that way. Don't touch!
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tinyurl.com/cg29y - 1994 FORD ESCORT LX I with 12 mth MOT, although he doesn't give a mileage - priced at £475 on buy it now basis.
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Hmmm, interesting views, thankyou.
The £600 i said i could probably get for it was based on the cheapest comparable car i found on Autotrader in my area (Watford). I reckon i could get £530 in my pocket without too much trouble - the car certainly isn't A1, but for an 11 year old, i guess it's still in OK condition really.
There are still a lot of people out there for whom £2000 is too much to spend on a car, and there are plenty of buyers in the sub-£1000, and even sub-£500 range. My own very simialar Escort (Mk6 '95 LX) cost less than £1000 a year ago, and i've had no problems at all with it, it's a very straight car. I'd like something quicker/new/nicer, but i simply can't afford it.
I'm a student in my fourth year at uni, with a fifth year to go, so whilst i understand that £150-£250 quid isn't worth the hassle to a lot of you, it's definitely worth it to me at this point in my life!
The car has almost full service history, verified mileage and 6 months MOT remaining.
Like someone said, whilst i may not make much profit from this venture, its unlikely that i'll make a loss....?
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Six months MOT isn't enough for a £600 tag - and if the car's in good shape it's worth your while to get it MOT'd - it's the first thing a buyer will have to haggle over.
With 12 mths MOT it's worth about £300 minimum, as almost any car with a full ticket will fetch that. All someone is paying over that is on history (good in your case), looks (average you say) and repairability (good), as there's loads in the breakers, and every grease monkey can fix it. Still think it's worth £450, no more.
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