Just picked up a brand new Ford Focus 1.6 Sport for "her indoors"... I reckon I got a cracking deal, but no doubt someone on here will spot whatever it is that I missed......
Brand new.
Not pre-registered or anything silly like that
Metallic Paint (colour of our choice)
Sport spec (alloys, elecs, aircon, leather sw, front fogs etc etc).
List price (which I know nobody ever pays) was £14k + £350 for the metallic. What car/etc target price £11.5k (+£350). I paid 10k. Ford main dealer.
So go on then..... what am I missing?
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Brand new simply means it has never been registered. When was the car built? This could explain the need to discount heavily.
I found a 'brand new' Audi A2 at 30% below list - bargain. On closer inspection I found it was 2 years old!
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The only bit of trim I can easily locate with a date stamp/sticker on it is the boot floor mat, which says "04/2007". So the car can't have been manufactured any more than 3 months ago....
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I didn't realise that the boot mat was such an integral part of the car that it couldn't be easily substituted......
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"The only bit of trim I can easily locate with a date stamp/sticker on it is the boot floor mat,"
Is there no label sewn near the base of each front seat belt webbing with its date of manufacture on it?
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Probably just the fact that they hadn't had a serious buyer in for weeks. The state of the car-sales trade locally is dire; all the places that I go to are saying that it's as bad as it was in '92.
There's no consensus on the reason; but mortgage rises are definitely making people feel poorer and most car replacements were done because they "felt like a change." Not any more.
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You could well be right there......
Luckily for us we only have a relatively small mortgage (which we overpay anyway), so it doesn't influence us much.
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There's no consensus on the reason; but mortgage rises are definitely making people feel poorer and most car replacements were done because they "felt like a change." Not any more.
You could well be right there......
Luckily for us we only have a relatively small mortgage (which we overpay anyway), so it doesn't influence us much.>>
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How did you do it? You must have gone in with a very low ball offer? For a sport I would've thought that was impossible.
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How did you do it? You must have gone in with a very low ball offer? For a sport I would've thought that was impossible.
Firstly, I shopped around until we found a good deal. Must've been to maybe a dozen dealers before we came across this one.
I always take the nice and friendly but firm approach with the salesman, and basically let them know that I've been round the block enough to know the game, and that I'd much rather they cut to the chase with their best offer than play the usual silly negotiation tactics. If their first offer isn't anywhere near what I'm looking for, I tell them they've got one more chance to make a better offer before I walk away.
If they try it on with an offer which is worse than the promotions advertised on the Ford Internet site, I walk away immediately. I'm not an idiot and won't do business with people who try to treat me like one!
If they start the "let me speak to my manager to see what I can do" nonsense, I tell them that if they're not empowered to make a deal, then it'd be better if *I* speak to their manager (in a polite way, of course).
And if they get a form out and start asking me questions which equate to their market research, I walk out there and then. I'm looking to buy a car, not complete a survey!
This particular dealer came straight out with the deal (which was actually about £800 better than I was aiming for) and I shook on it there and then. All in all, took 10 mins to conclude - and that included the paperwork!
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Had an 07 Focus 1.8 sport as courtesy car - No outside temp gauge ie. Only basic instrument panel fitted. Often the sport spec is where you get some bits (mainly on outside of car) at the expense of other bits (inside the car) like outside Temp gauge, trip computer, mp3 stereo. Also the Car handling is identical to the Titanium and Zetec.
However Ford's net site NOW says Outside temp gauge is fitted on the sport focus, so I wonder if there has been a slight spec/option change earlier this year, hence selling off early built 07 Focus's.
Saying that price is good and if you have all the goodies you need in this model then no problems. Most items will have date on them, try looking on any labels on the oily bits.
Alternator is a good place to start. Or inside of fuse box lid.
Despite what others say I only found road noise an issue on bad surfaces, and then only a minor irritation.
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Had an 07 Focus 1.8 sport as courtesy car - No outside temp gauge ie. Only basic instrument panel fitted. Often the sport spec is where you get some bits (mainly on outside of car) at the expense of other bits (inside the car) like outside Temp gauge trip computer mp3 stereo.
Sorry to contradict you bud, but the Sport has always had a trip computer (incl outside temp gauge, MPG, range, avg speed etc).
I have a Focus launch brochure from 2004 with the specs in and it's clearly stated.
The one you had couldn't have been a Sport model...
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Still sounds like a good deal.
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Trip computers were only added in about 6 months ago to spec as were colour coded mirrors and door handles. I only got Mileage and a Trip Counter!
The Sport model has been drop from the range last month as spec between Sport and Zetec Climate were too close. May, June and July always seem to have mega Focus deals from dealers that you dont have to fight for.
I got a 1.8 Diesel 5 Door with Metallic, and multi change CD last July for £11500. This year I have seen the Sport S 5 Door TDi 1.8 with 17 Inch Alloys, Metallic and mini ST spoiler for under £11k.
Cheapest I saw any petrols for was £10500 plus Metallic....
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Hmm.. wierd. Like I say, the brochure for 2005MY lists trip computer as standard on the Sport. Brochure must be wrong - apologies.
Cheers.
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WW - There was a "sport" badge on back and I looked in the manual to find the computer/ temp gauage- the relevent selector was not on the dash.
I suspect that these types of features disappear off the car when they have a "special" Focus promotion, then re-appear when promotion is over.
There is always the small print at the back of the brochure "specifications may vary from those shown".
But if you got these features on your Focus sport, proves you got even a better deal.
Only trouble is that when it comes to selling a focus second hand, some buyers will wonder where some of the kit went on models produced at a certain times.
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The Sport is not a std model and is not featured on the online configurator, I think it comes and goes from the line up and therefore probably varies in spec.
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The Sport is (was) a standard model and has been in all the printed brochures and on-line configurators since the Focus launch. It's only just been removed from the configurator, as it's been replaced by the "Style" (virtually identical spec excluding alloys)
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Only trouble is that when it comes to selling a focus second hand some buyers will wonder where some of the kit went on models produced at a certain times.
Good points... oh well, win some lose some!
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We went to a Ford dealer to seriously consider a Fiesta a couple of years ago, and I was very put off by the way Ford has 200x.25, .5 and .75 model years, and the prices were different (by thousands) according to which model year car you ordered. The dealer said there were 'minor' differences between the versions, but couldn't say (didn't know / care) what they were.
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Bill Payer - almost all manufacturers do the MY thing, Ford just tend to stick big discounts on older stock, there is normally no difference between them, and if there is, it's often neglible (a different colour plastic screw cap covering the underdash screws). I worked with Ford day in day out for long enough and I've been racking my brains to think of an actual difference between 1 quater and the next and can't think of one.
The only time that there will be a noticeable difference between .25 and .5 for example is if the whole car has had a facelift or revision, (Fiesta MK6 has had at two revisions, one of them pretty noticeable the other more minor). It sounds to me like the dealer has done a carp job of explaining that the MY is simply a way of saying which batch of cars a particular unit has come from, obviously the longer a car has sat around the bigger discounts that Ford offer to shift it. The dealers have to pay full invoice price for them (that't almost the full advertised list price) after about 90 days IIRC. They borrow the money to pay for them from Ford Credit but the interest costs them dear so the'll do anything to shift an odler but perfectly good condition car.
If I were ever in the market for buying a new car again I would go out of my way to try and find some 90 day stock that I can get a hefty discount off.
Whoop Whoop - sounds like a fair deal that you've gotten there, the Sport is basically LX spec plus extras so quite a nice car really for what it costs.
Blue
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Check the tags on the seatbelts and the date stamps on the plastics.
Already checked the seatbelts (first place I looked) but there's nothing obvious that relates to a date.
Can't find any plastics that easilt detatch.
Under the bonnet would be the easiest place to look if it wasn't piddling it down with rain.
But as per previous post, the boot floor mat has a sticker on the underside which says "04/2007" so assuming this was fitted to the car when it left the factory, the car can't be any older than 3 months...
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