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Autotrader Twunts.


Father Ted

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Some adverts on Autotrader really boil my piss - take this "private" advert for a Nissan Almera....http://tinyurl.com/lno4p4Of course it comes in on my search criteria as its under a bag of sand, untill you get to the last line whic says...

real price £1695 not £999. £999 Plus VAT.

Twunt - I bet he isnt VAT registered oh, and he is using the old VAT rate too.
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I no longer bother looking at Autotrader - even for daily drivers - it is the dopmain of the dodgey car dealer and the eejit punter who thinks that his Mk 3 Gowf is worth £4k because it is....a Mk3 Gowf!last time I went to see a car advertised on Auto trader as:1999 Golf convetible, excellent condition, 10 months MOt, tax, 46,000 miles £1800I got there and the guy started giving me dogs abuse when it was:1999 golf convertible - wouldn't start, roof didn't work, and was torn, bald tyres, rustesd wheel arches, holes in the sills, petrol leak, no MOT no taxI offered the dealer £200 - pr1ck told me not to insult him - I told him that I would report him to trading standards as I pointed out on the phone that I would not appreciate being dragged to the other side of Lothian to have my time wasted if it turned out not to be as advertised.at that point I decided not to use autotwater again

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Some adverts on Autotrader really boil my piss - take this "private" advert for a Nissan Almera....

http://tinyurl.com/lno4p4

 

Of course it comes in on my search criteria as its under a bag of sand, untill you get to the last line whic says...

real price £1695 not £999. £999 Plus VAT.

Twunt - I bet he isnt VAT registered oh, and he is using the old VAT rate too.
This behaviour among car traders began at the start in the 'recession' to try to generate some interest in the overpriced chod they couldn't shift :?

 

This guy looks like a pikey anyway so I say avoid anyway...

Posted Image D'ya like dags??? :lol::lol::lol:

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This has been going on for a while, before the "recession", although if look for more obscure cars, as you should be doing, you tend to get less of it. If you`re going to look at fancy millionaire`s row stuff like Almeras you will come up against things like this, I hope you`ve learnt your lesson.

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Its true of Autotrader too, I've been to view plenty of "minters" only to find that "minter" was "shi*ter" with loads of really clear faults. I got my current Mk3 Gowf from a dealer on trader as it was an unwanted P/X and it wasnt in bad nick or a grand over its real book value. I must have gone to look at 10 cars which were nothing like the description including a Mk3 Gowf with barely legal tyres on a dealer forecourt and a crusty knackered BMW 3 series. I do agree that the bargain car finance adverts are really annoying though just because I skip page after page and worry that I'll miss a genuine bargain around the £150 mark.

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I find it more than slightly irritating when I describe my cars exactly as they are. If they've got issues, I tell people about the issues, and quite often get them sorted if a buyer wants them put right and is willing to pay close to my asking price. It's only right.Yet I still get timewasters and utter cocks turning up and wanting to haggle over cars that are already very cheap indeed. The Golf GTi I sold recently, lovely car, needed a few very minor jobs doing but I had a succession of people turn up, promise to buy it and then ring up a couple of days later with various spurious excuses.In the end it went to a motor trader who knew he was getting a lot of car for not much money. So much easier to deal with. I described the car, he put the money in the bank, I did a couple of minor jobs on it and he sent a minion up to collect it. Easy, simple and painless.From now on, I'm going to try and solely deal with the trade, the public are just pains in the arses who want £4k cars for £1400 (even when they're advertised at £2500), waste your time, make promises they can't keep, don't turn up and generally fuck you about as if they're the only people in the world who could possibly be interested in buying your particular car.When I buy a car I turn up when I say I will, inspect the car, check it's not got anything majorly fucked on it, haggle a bit if it has, pay the cash, do the paperwork and take it away. I'm only there because the thing is cheap enough to make spending a bit of cash on it worthwhile anyway. I don't want perfection, but I want something I can make damn nice for not much money.The fucking window-licking cunts who turn up to look at 30 year old cars expecting a concours winner for a tenner, want to go on two hour test drives, spend half the day obsessing about the fucking electric aerial being slightly sticky, 'provisionally' agree to buy the car (but won't leave a deposit) and then fuck off to 'speak to the wife' just boil my piss. If you don't like the car, say so and leave. It's a lot easier than fucking me about for a week and getting me to search the fucking country for the 'correct spec' washer nozzles or whatever, and then ringing with some bullshit about the dog having a stroke.

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Just flogged stepsons Focus ST via AT, and was frankly amazed at the amount of "I'll buy your car, just send me your bank details" type e-mails -probably originating from the same African solictor who reckons I'm due $1.5mill...Twas up for £10,699 in first week, reduced to £10,399 or "sensible" offers (meaning about £10k would be nice, thanks).Got an email from one bloke, sounded keen, asked literally 20 questions - Has it got Xenons, Has it got alloys(FFS!) blah de blah. I was 100% honest, he came and had a look, and wanted the price knocked down to £9250 because 1) the receipts for the recent tyres were'nt present and 2) there was a couple of small stone chips on the front (its a 23,000mile car!). he got really arsey when my son said no....Also got an email from some bloke which read "I hope you don't thik I'm taking the piss, but will you take £8000?" To which my reply was "No, you ARE taking the piss!!"Eventually sold it to a trader for £9900, everyone's happy.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Went to see a Nissan Primera last night, advertised through a trader as having 23K miles, one owner from new and leather and also being in "excellent condition" So when I get there its rusty as fuck, has cloth seats and has done 123K miles.Utter fucknuts - and i told him he was too.

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I bought my Primera estate through AT earlier this year, the trade sellers were friendly and helpful and the car pretty much as described. Out of the two others I saw through AT listings one was pretty poor, but the other was a decent, honest car again being sold by a pleasant seller, I just decided that it wasn’t car for me.For the £1500 or so I was looking to spend I was getting much more choice from AT within reasonable distance compared to eBay. Was other way round when looking for circa £500 stuff more recently, however.I agree the ad’s that state the monthly payment or whatever are a pain, but when searching for Camry, Bluebird or whatever that’s not usually something I’m troubled with...

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Of all the places to sell a car, I've had the most luck with Autotrader. The worst is Ebay and AdMag / Scumtree.I have a particular way of dealing with buyers. No tea and chit chat, just a very short and 'businesslike' manner. Point out all the faults such as small scabs and marks along with all the good bits. A very short (1 mile with me driving) run up the road and back."There you go. If you want it, make me a reasonable offer". Put them on the spot. If it's a fair bid, take a £100 deposit making it quite clear that it is not refundable - it will say so on the reciept I give 'em. Any 'I'll think about it', I'll just say 'That's a no then...", lock the car and walk away.These days it's easier to weigh £200 stuff in for scrap after removing a few ebayable morsels, and stick anything £400 plus into a banger auction.

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Of all the places to sell a car, I've had the most luck with Autotrader. The worst is Ebay and AdMag / Scumtree.I have a particular way of dealing with buyers. No tea and chit chat, just a very short and 'businesslike' manner. Point out all the faults such as small scabs and marks along with all the good bits. A very short (1 mile with me driving) run up the road and back."There you go. If you want it, make me a reasonable offer". Put them on the spot. If it's a fair bid, take a £100 deposit making it quite clear that it is not refundable - it will say so on the reciept I give 'em. Any 'I'll think about it', I'll just say 'That's a no then...", lock the car and walk away.These days it's easier to weigh £200 stuff in for scrap after removing a few ebayable morsels, and stick anything £400 plus into a banger auction.

Funnily enough I walked away from car last year because when I asked for a test drive, the guy drove the car for me - that says he is trying to hide something about it. When I sold my ST24 via Autotrader, I let the guy drive it round our estate (I went with) and when I flogged my Nova over Christmas, I let the guy go off on his own for a few minutes because it was going for so little. I agree Autotrader got the best results, Gumtree and eBay are just hassle you don't need.
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I've never managed to sell a car via AT. Advertised my Alfa and all I got was sales calls from agencies.Test Drives. Of the last two cars I've sold privately, with the Alfa the guy who came to look admitted he didn't have insurance that would cover it so I drove. With the Alto the buyer had insurance and only wanted a run round the block so I let him drive. Never had a problem selling a car on ebay although I've always ended them early and accepted decent offers off viewers before the auction end.

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As far as test drives go, I would only let the potential buyer have a drive if they had insurance and didn't come across as a bit of a tit. Moreso if it's a quick car.

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I went to see a lovely Lexus LS400 at Christmas, ideal for my 3k trip around Europe but from the first two seconds on the phone I could make out the seller was the biggest twat I've ever met, he didn't want me to drive it to start with before explaining to monkey-nuts that I wasn't about to buy a car for a long journey without driving it. The car was £990ono so I managed to convince the dickhead to let me drive it which then showed up a huge wheel vibration issue and a seized caliper and needs front and rear discs and pads amongst a few other minor issues so we get to the dealing stage, I mention it has two issues that need addressing and ask how much he'd take, he doesn't know so says make an offer, I offer £675 as a starting point on the basis that that it has a double wishbone set up and the wishbones are £300 each from Lexus so thats potentially £1200 right there although I would've been happy to raise my offer substantially so I was expecting him to say something along the lines of "No call it £850" but no he simply snatched the key from my hand and said "Well thanks for telling me whats wrong with my car" in a rather shitty way.Now I'm hardly going to say "Well theres loads of expensive issues with your car here's your asking price even though your ad states ono" am I?Anyway I offered £900 and he still said no! thats only £90 less than his 'or nearest offer' starting price. Man that tale still makes me angry.If I don't drive a car I don't buy it end of.With regards to making silly offers sometimes this has paid off in spades, as with the above anecdote this will not work if you don't get on with the vendor but if I see a car, I can see they need to sell and we get on like a VW Camper on fire then let the bartering commence! its knowing when not to take the piss that counts, I certainly wouldn't do it without seeing the car nor would I do it if I thought that the vendor had a good chance of selling it, I just do it with odd odd shite mainly.

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What else annoys me on autotrader is entering the incorrect mileage on high milers so they appear in search results. The number of cars that have 17000 miles in the search field and the text says "mileage actually 170k" in the description is as bad as the £75 car finance ads.

 

Its not like if you do it by accident, you cant go back in online and change your advert because you can.

 

Another of my golden rules, never bother going to look at cars where the photos are badly taken (only half 1/2 the car for example) or key things in the advert are spelt incorrectly. (new breaks, new exhorst, ally weels etc)

 

I took this in the window of a car I saw for sale on Monday.

 

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