Second hand car haggling

eezyrider7

I'm about to go out looking at second hand cars with a view to buying one around £10,000. How much below this price can I resonably expect to get the garage down to?

EZ

s_b

well £9999 sounds good to me:D

eezyrider7

s_b wrote: »

well £9999 sounds good to me:D

Lol well that would be a start I guess. Maybe I could get them down by 10% - or 20%. Or maybe (probably?) I'm being way over optimistic.

EZ

tim9966

I expect the garage paid about £8,000 to 8,500 for the car, then would have spent a small amount fixing any problems, and giving it an MOT, then they need to make a profit.

£9,000 to £9,500 I would expect them to take.

Credit_Crunched_2

eezyrider7 wrote: »

Maybe I could get them down by 10% - or 20%. Or maybe (probably?) I'm being way over optimistic.

EZ

Only if the car has been overpriced IMHO.

I think if you can get anywhere near £500 off the screen price you will have done well.

Credit_Crunched_2

tim9966 wrote: »

I expect the garage paid about £8,000 to 8,500 for the car, then would have spent a small amount fixing any problems, and giving it an MOT, then they need to make a profit.

Indeed... Not forgetting VAT on the profit (If VAT registered) and the cost of a Warranty.

Joe_Horner

s_b wrote: »

well £9999 sounds good to me:D

Plus a £2 admin fee for the negotiation time

colino

Sadly with the economic downturn, if you can turn your budget in to cash, there are an awful lot of bargains to be had from private sellers in nice areas who are already beyond their financial limits. Nothing like wafting £7000 under the nose of a £10k private seller who has been advertising for a couple of weeks his BMW/Jag/Mercedes with little interest and seeing the cogs click into action.
Check it thoroughly, or pay someone who can, do a proper HPI and do a deal.

fivetide

Work on the basis that the dealer will have about 1 to 1.5k in the car.

Out of that needs to come the servicing and anty bits needed so if it needs a major service then don't expect a lot of wiggle room.

Sales head at our local dealer said as each part of the business has a seperate profit and loss line the service dept sting him for everything he sells. He reckons they'll replace as much as they can (like tyres) if allowed because the sales dept has to cover the bill!

5t.

StrangelyBrown

I bought one recently and went to several dealers before I settled on one.

When trying to negotiate, the one thing they all mentioned was the internet - they simply don't get away with inflated window sticker prices these days as they are instantly spotted and undercut by the guys down the road who can price-check the entire area in minutes.

So there's just not as much wiggle-room as there used to be.

In the end, I got him to knock £200 off a £3,750 starting price (about 5%) and got a year's MOT plus he went off to the DVLA to sort out the tax and documentation on my behalf.

Your best bet is to combine a modest discount on the price with some added extras that would otherwise have cost you money - extended warranty, road tax, MOT, new tyres, tank of fuel, wiper blades, floor mats, that sort of thing.

Have a bit of banter first, show him you'll definitely commit to buying if the price is right and you may just get lucky.
But equally, be prepared to walk away - that nearly worked for me too.
I went to see a dealer who was wanting an extra £800 over the one I eventually went for. He said he had someone coming to see it later that day so it didn't make sense to come down in price any further. So I left him my number and told him to call me if the deal fell through - sure enough I got a message on my mobile the next day inviting me to come and make an offer.

By that time, the missus had her heart set on the other car so I had the pleasure of turning him down - but just goes to show, it can work out to leave them hanging instead.