Mid last year I visted a garage to look at a couple of cars but in the end purchased a vehicle elsewhere.
Just out of curosity had a look at dealers website recently and some of the cars I looked at are still listed, one at £1600, was originally £2600 and DVLA website indicated vehilce was last taxed 18 months ago!
I thought that the general practice or best business practice was to get rid of cars that had not sold after a number of days for the best possible price even if it meant making a loss on that particular car?
Is there any reasons why a dealer would want to keep such old stock?
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Last summer I was looking for a car and thought of a Subaru Legacy Estate - under 2 year old and 15K mls immaculate with lots of extras. It is now a year+ older, still 15K mls and £9995. It is still sitting there although it has moved up/down and across the forecourt a few times - I notice when I am in for petrol some weeks
My offer of £12.5K, 15 mths ago, (top book + £500/£750 IIRC) with no trade in must look really good now
Salesman at the time " That's the price I want!" - "They are £26K (£22K+ extras!) new for that specification and they keep their value! Hence £15,000"
I eventually bought another car for £16K, so I was not penny pinching at the time, only looking for the right car at a fair price.
I know it happens elsewhere but Subaru franchise cars can take root to the forecourt for many months - not just my local dealer.
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Is there any reasons why a dealer would want to keep such old stock?
Was it a small dealer trying to look as if it was bigger (more sound) than it actually was? It would serve the purpose of boosting their stock level, and (being a cheap car) it would have the advantage of losing less than a more expensive car if it didn't sell quickly.
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L'escargot
Dealer has currently 43 vehicles in stock, so I would not say a small dealer, priced from £795 to £13000
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Dealer has currently 43 vehicles in stock so I would not say a small dealer priced from £795 to £13000
Small dealer, selling cheap cars.
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My local Subaru dealer seems to have stagnant stock with the exception of some Corsas, Punto and a Clio - unheard of for them to be sold from there, usually punted over to their Daihatsu or Ford franchise. Pricees still steep though.
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In May we bought a Beetle for my wife in a garage not a million miles away from you Falkirk Bairn!
It had been with them since the previous Sept and I had been watching the price coming down bit by bit. It is also very helpful when the dealer lists the cars on Ebay as well as this shows the date of posting!!
I part-exchanged my Fabia vrs and I see that is still sitting there. albeit they have knocked £500 off it but both the Fabia and Beetle were ridiculous high prices to start with.
Wonder if their salesmen get commission purely as percentage of profit as opposed to number of cars sold!
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In May we bought a Beetle for my wife in a garage not a million miles away from you Falkirk Bairn!
Would that be a RED one Central falkirk, not taxed for the last 5 months?
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Thats the one in Softies!
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Amazed that a general dealer, not a "classic" or specialist would have the footage tied up for so long. The absolute longest I had any cars for sale was 6 months - they were both Rover 800s right enough.
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Amazed that a general dealer not a "classic" or specialist would have the footage tied up for so long.
One of my sons bought a mini from a BMW Mini outlet - 2nd hand
That garage was privately owned (now a chain owned outlet), stock had max of 3 mths and then traded - Son spotted it at about and tried to buy @ 11 weeks (according to Salesman) and they did a deal - got nigh on £1,000 off and the same T/I deal.
He saved as did the dealer who made a margin / profit that he would not get at auction.
Sitting with dead stock is a is fatal.
BobbyG - Softies is a reincarnation of a former outlet - much the same people but a different FUNDER of the ££££s - the previous went bust after some 7/8 years on the same site.
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FB, yeah it seems a strange set up esp keeping cars for so long.
Having said that, I was disappointed that the salesman knew hee-haw about the car I bought, I had to show him various issues, I had to tell him it was due a timing belt change etc but I suppose that is common with salesmen all over and not just there.
At the end of the day, I knew the car, knew what it needed doing and knew that once I drove off I probably would never be back to the dealer!
As an aside, it was a strange buying experience. He very quickly realised I knew more about the car than him, through the advert on ebay I knew how long he had had the car, I phoned previous owner who told me when it was traded, reasons for it and price so I was armed with a good load of information when it came to bartering.
In fact, my last piece of negotiating was to try and increase the tax from 6 to 12 months and his answer was "well I don't really have a choice do I?" !
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Ive worked for a couple of large Ford dealerships. There standard policy was 60 days stock. Once the car had readched 45 days it would be marked down and a bonus put on it for the salesman to shift it. Com 60 days it would be off to the auction or traded with another dealership within the group. The second garage i worked at had a 90 day policy.
Though my friend worked at a large dealership in birmingham which subsequently went bust that never sent cars to auction. He said they once had a Ford Probe that had been in stock for 358 days!
You can normally tell how long a car has been sat there by looking at the brakes and seeing how rusty the discs are. Also the cobwebs inside the car are a giveaway.
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To me it just seems strange to have money tied up in stock that is not moving, surely better to get rid of the "dead" stock even if little or no profit is made or at worst a loss , so you can bring in new & hopefully profitable stock.
I do remember that one of the cars was being sold on behalf of the petrol station attendant who was on the same site as the garage,and perhaps the car dealer does not have the heart to tell them that their car is not selling?
Edited by Car on 18/10/2008 at 00:36
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There's a tyre-fitter type place near me that also sells cars (Stuartli may know of it - just think "It's Friday, it's 5 to 5, it's time for...!). They've had a 51 plate Jaguar X-type for the best part of three years. I just can't fathom out why they haven't cut their losses and shipped it off to the auctions. They've dropped the price by at least £3k and still nobody wants to buy the blighter!
Cheers.
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