Selling Car Private Sale

jamesg123

I’m selling a car because gained company car, and have a question? Does private sale model still exist? Nearly ads on Auto trader and EBay are from traders? I got a valuation to sell privately from AT £4295 We buy any car.com £3310 and AT adverts for similar cars for sale are £4500-£5000. I decided to advertise on EBay for £4195 and haven’t had a single enquiry after a week!! 
I’m just wondering if a private buying market still exists? They are buying for cash(I don’t offer credit) sold as seen etc versus garage. I have risk of scams etc. I’m ready to give up and sell through car buying service? for £3310  Any thoughts or advice welcome

Martin_the_Unjust

They still exist, but you need to price to the market, list it at we buy any car starting price and hope for competition if you really want to sell it.

jamesg123

Martin_the_Unjust said:

They still exist, but you need to price to the market, list it at we buy any car starting price and hope for competition if you really want to sell it.

Thanks, so bids from this price on an auction style sale. I have mistakenly listed as a classified ad. 

HansOndabush

Classified ads are fine, as a private buyer I prefer them. Otherwise you waste time on a car that you might get outbid on. Just gradually lower the price each week until it sells.
You could try Gumtree as well.

jimjames

jamesg123 said:

Martin_the_Unjust said:

They still exist, but you need to price to the market, list it at we buy any car starting price and hope for competition if you really want to sell it.

Thanks, so bids from this price on an auction style sale. I have mistakenly listed as a classified ad. 

Classified ad is far better as you don't have timewasters bidding & winning. You just have people coming to view a car and decide if they want it. Just beware of any messages offering to buy without viewing that could be scams.

Private buying still exists but maybe also look at other free options like Facebook and Gumtree. For that sort of price private sale is no issue with cash sale, £20k upwards is more of a problem.

BOWFER

Facebook marketplace is the one to use.
Sold 3 cars in the past year using that.
It's free and, to me, the good thing is you can see the FB profile of the person you're dealing with, so it discourages dodgy behaviour.
I'd avoid Gumtree like the plague as it seems to be riddled with problems.
I kept noticing my car ad on there kept being changed, Gumtree kept saying it had been hacked and didn't seem to be able to do much about it (yes, I used very strong passwords etc.)

Biggus_Dickus

jamesg123 said:

I’m selling a car because gained company car, and have a question? Does private sale model still exist? Nearly ads on Auto trader and EBay are from traders? I got a valuation to sell privately from AT £4295 We buy any car.com £3310 and AT adverts for similar cars for sale are £4500-£5000. I decided to advertise on EBay for £4195 and haven’t had a single enquiry after a week!! 
I’m just wondering if a private buying market still exists? They are buying for cash(I don’t offer credit) sold as seen etc versus garage. I have risk of scams etc. I’m ready to give up and sell through car buying service? for £3310  Any thoughts or advice welcome

Selling or buying privately was the financially prudent method  years ago but things ain’t what they used to be;...thanks to the interweb and the ease of UK-wide ‘comparisons’ the dealers must ensure their used cars are keenly priced, which in-turn has squeezed the price differential between trade/private sales to a minimum. Autotrader has almost half a million cars for sale at the moment,...only 9% of which are ‘Private’ sales.

Private buying is a no-go area for many people these days for a number of reasons. A large proportion of the UK motoring public are wary of Private sellers,...and with some justification. For many, the services and security that dealers offer (such as they are!) more than outweighs the financial saving that buying privately offers.

Perhaps ‘Private’ selling will become easier as CV19 recedes but it will continue to be a challenge methinks;... there will always be Private buyers looking to save a good few quid  but most will tend to be ‘savvy’ buyers,... like the hard-nosed (and astute!) punters on this motoring forum. 😁

Grumpy_chap

This sounds like the level of car at which private sale is possible - I'd consider a private purchase at this type of level.
The OP has offer from WBAC at £3.3k
The OP has advertised at £4.2k, so would likely be hoping for £4k.
That leaves a £700 gap.
Rather than "giving up" and accepting the WBAC price, the OP can consider other online buying services (Motorway), try a couple of local dealers with a sign up "we buy cars for cash" and that may well close the £700 gap to a point that the OP is more happy with.  The other benefit of the local garages is they see the car and offer a price, so not knocking you down when you take it in after the WBAC quote.
I have never used them, but there was a recent thread where people have been pleased with a couple of large dealership chains:
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/78297090#Comment_78297090
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6265708/praise-evans-halshaw-sell-your-car#latest
The first post in the first of those two threads is really helpful as it describes the process that was followed really well - ignore the fact they were selling a end-of-PCP car, selling a car is selling a car whether PCP or otherwise.

ilikedrawing

BOWFER said:

Facebook marketplace is the one to use.
Sold 3 cars in the past year using that.
It's free and, to me, the good thing is you can see the FB profile of the person you're dealing with, so it discourages dodgy behaviour.
I'd avoid Gumtree like the plague as it seems to be riddled with problems.

This 100%. 
You could whack on Autotrader too. We've sold 2 motorbikes and a car over there lately. 

Print off the RAC private sale receipt for the sale too, it has all the legal jargon on there that you and the buyer can sign. 

LouiseAH

Its always a good idea to start advertising the car you want to sell a few weeks before you want to get rid of it. The last car we sold on gumtree was advertised at £3,500.00 to begin with. The webuyanycar.com quote was £2,600.00. Didnt get any calls at £3,500.00 so reduced it by £150.00, still no calls so 1 week later reduced it again to £3,200.00. A few enquiries at £3,200 but no serious buyers, then reduced to £3,100.00 and sold it for £3,000.00 so £400.00 more than the webuyanycar.com. Had arranged the purchase of our new car during this period and picked it up a day after we got rid of the old one. Some people may think its not worth the hassle for an extra £400.00 but really its just logging into gumtree a few times to change the price of the ad, taking a few phone calls and then dealing with the buyer which didnt take that long.

pinkshoes

I have sold 4 cars privately over the last 16 years.

Three have sold through Gumtree (although just accept you get quite a few time wasters)  and the other on Facebook. 

I priced them realistically for a second hand private sale car and didnt make any unfounded claims in the advert.