hi,
is it a good idea to buy a used car from a main dealership without seeing or test driving it? any advice will be extremely helpful. Thanks
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Can't speak for all the legal stuff should anything go wrong (Lord knows there are better people for answering that) but do you really really want to buy a USED car without seeing it? New is a little different but you don't know what the car is going to be like.
If I remember correctly, did you post a while back asking what would be a good first car and does the 17 in "Nicole17" denote your age?
Personally, I think it's a bad idea. Would you ring up your local Ford dealer, ask them for a car and then do the deal over the phone?
That being said, I'm sure other people may have better experience with it - even if you test drive it after having viewed it on the site.
Hope this is of some use to you.
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Adam
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Adam is right.
Buying a used car over the internet is fine, if you have seen the car and like it and think you're getting a good deal.
Otherwise, it is for the very experienced, and I mean very. If you are only 17 then I doubt that you would have the requisite experience to even be close to getting it right.
I know a number of people who import cars from Japan. One chap said that he never sees them before he buys them. Usually he gets it about right. However sometimes he gets a real lemon. Fine if his good cars can compensate but if it's the only one you've bought, you're stuck. This chap has about as much experience as anyone could possibly hope for, even then he gets it wrong sometimes.
If you're thinking about E bay, then my advice would be to ask to see the car before bidding for it. Then it would be just like a normal car purchase from private seller or garage, but via a bidding process than haggling over it.
However you buy your car - good luck!
H
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No.
Sorry but it can't be a good idea to buy a car without seeing or test driving it unless the car is very cheap in the first place and the saving is enough to justify it. Even then I'd say you need to know what you're doing, or at least buy a car that's cheap enough that any potential faults don't matter.
At a main dealership the chances are that you will be paying more, rather than less for the car.
Very often main dealers' stock is accessible to the public online and you may even find that the asking price is less at the dealer that currently has the car in stock, if we are talking about transferring a vehicle between two branches. That gives you haggle room and the chance to evaluate the car before buying it.
If you are thinking about buying the car online or over the phone, sight unseen, from a dealer that has the car, then why not make a trip to see it? How far away is it anyway? In fact, what is the car and how much is it? It may not be such an unrepeatable bargain anyway.
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Adski - having read your post, we've done this before:
www.honestjohn.co.uk/forum/post/index.htm?t=25251
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Thanks for that David.
Nicole, to repeat what BobbyG said in the last thread, what car is it and what price range are we looking at?
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Adam
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So why is buying a car on ebay so popular?
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It's a good way to buy a private car, there's a transparent market, people have good feedback, and people can price in the risk of it. I can probably also view it, as I would with a private sale, if the car is worth anything or is going for near its private sale price.
For instance, if my local VW dealer has a Golf for £8,995 and the same car is £6,500 on eBay, I might think that it's worth a £2,500 saving - and I can probably eBay it for much the same as I paid for it, if it comes to that.
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Buying/selling on e-bay is becoming more popular than traditional autotrader/classifieds as you add a whole load more detail/photos than in classifieds, the cost of selling is reasonable and the end price is usually sensible (unless a bidding war has taken place).
Most cars you can view before bidding and in general most people are accurate in their e-bay ads by including details of bad points as well as good. This is in everyones interest as if you are the winning bidder on a car, go and do the deal and it is nowhere near as good as the ad then you walk away.
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So why is buying a car on ebay so popular?
Simply put, if both parties are up front about the transaction and condition of the vehicle etc, then this can be a very good way to do a deal.
Having said that, if the car is not as described or the buyer messes the seller about then the contract can break down. If the car is not as described then the contract is effectively null and void.
I have sold two vehicles on e bay, the last being my Renault Trafic Van with a knackered box. I was keen to describe it accurately and sold it for a very good price to someone local who was prepared to 'buy it unseen'. However I suspect that if it were not as described he would have had no difficulty in backing out. Nicolle might.
H
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>>If the car is not as described then the contract is effectively null and void.>>
The dealers have a similar arrangement when agreeing a buy/sell price over the phone between themselves.
If the vehicle is not as described then the dealer who has agreed to buy the vehicle is able to back out without penalty.
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What\'s for you won\'t pass you by
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PS
I would think that buying a used car unseen is, at best, somewhat foolish unless there are watertight conditions to be able to reject it if necessary.
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What\'s for you won\'t pass you by
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For something cheap enough, from an ebay seller with enough sensible looking feedback, then I'd buy unseen - on the basis that one can always reject it.
On the other hand, if you're paying a few thousand for something, you'd surely want to have a look at it, just in case the colour scheme was revolting, or there was some other similar problem with the vehicle - smell, maybe.
Otherwise, what do you mean by 'buying over the internet'? If you put your debit card number into a site you've never heard of, and expect a car to be delivered, then don't hold your breath! If on the otherhand, you fancy a car over the internet & then go to view, pay & collect it, that's using the internet as a source of advertisements, rather than 'buying it over the 'net'.
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