What sort of hit in value would you expect due to Cat N?

B0bbyEwing

Needing a car & wife sent me a photo of one she's seen which is CAT N.

Audi A1 Sport, 2012, 112k miles, MOT expires in Jan, 1.6 diesel. £2.7k

Looking on auto trader, valuations seem to vary quite a bit anyway (the min to max window seems quite large these days on anything second hand)  but they're all in & about this price range, roughly. Which makes me think the seller is probably being unrealistic.... Depending on who's accurately pricing in the first place.

What should you expect to be knocked off due to being a Cat N?

The advert doesn't even say what caused it to be Cat N & we obviously don't know to what degree it's been repaired.

Also read that getting insured on a Cat N can be a problem. In what sense though? That they may not insure you? That it just may cost much more?

Mildly_Miffed

On a low-value 13yo car? Not by much at all. Value is all in the condition.

It could easily have been written off as CatN for something utterly trivial that, in a more valuable vehicle, insurance would have repaired without blinking twice. Maybe a scraped bumper. Maybe it was the requirement for a hire car that tipped the insurer over.

Herzlos

I always assumed that a write off would knock about 1/3rd off the price compared to a clean car. 

You need to check what the difference in insurance wiill be as cat cars can be higher, and if you can find out why it was written off it may help too. Being written off at 13 years old means nothing, but if it was written off at 3 months it'd have been bad. 

Also in the interest of being MSE, why are you looking at an old, high mileage tiny Audi which is going to have a price premium and high running cost. You could get a newer, lower mileage, lower running cost small car from a less "premium" brand. A VW Polo is essentially the same car with a different badge. 

Nobbie1967

At that age and mileage it will have little impact on price. The sort of knock that would have been repaired on a younger car just gets written off on a car that old. Just check the bodywork over carefully to make sure the repair has been done well. There’s no problem with insurance, doubt it’ll cost any more. I had an old Boxster written off as Cat S which I repaired and insurance was little different the following year.

Mildly_Miffed

Herzlos said:

You need to check what the difference in insurance wiill be as cat cars can be higher, and if you can find out why it was written off it may help too. Being written off at 13 years old means nothing, but if it was written off at 3 months it'd have been bad. 

If it's Cat N, rather than Cat D, it can't have been before late 2017.

If insurers cared that much, they'd ask. They don't.

Aretnap

At that end of the market and price point any difference that the cat N market makes will be within the normal variation in prices that you get between sellers anyway. Les than the difference between a "keenly priced" car and an "optimistically priced" one. 

It's quite normal for the advert not to give details about what caused the write of, and it's entirely possible that the seller will have no idea, especially if it happened a couple of owners ago. 

It will not make any difference to insuring the car. Has any instead ever asked you if your car has previously been debated a write off when you took out insurance? Didn't think so. It's not something that you have to declare or that they're interested in. They know full week that a car if that she can be written if because it had a cracked bumper - why would they not want to insure it? 

But ultimately if your not comfortable then don't buy it. There's no shortage of cars for sale.

Myci85

A cat N write off on older cars can be ridiculously minor. My old Audi got rear ended at very low speed, there was literally a tiny scrape on the bumper, and the insurers wrote it off without any inspection. I bought it back for scrap value, was worried it would impact insurance premium, but my insurers confirmed no difference at all. 

B0bbyEwing

Thank you all for the info. Helpful.

Herzlos said:

I always assumed that a write off would knock about 1/3rd off the price compared to a clean car. 

You need to check what the difference in insurance wiill be as cat cars can be higher, and if you can find out why it was written off it may help too. Being written off at 13 years old means nothing, but if it was written off at 3 months it'd have been bad. 

Also in the interest of being MSE, why are you looking at an old, high mileage tiny Audi which is going to have a price premium and high running cost. You could get a newer, lower mileage, lower running cost small car from a less "premium" brand. A VW Polo is essentially the same car with a different badge. 

Aretnap said:

At that end of the market and price point any difference that the cat N market makes will be within the normal variation in prices that you get between sellers anyway. Les than the difference between a "keenly priced" car and an "optimistically priced" one. 

It's quite normal for the advert not to give details about what caused the write of, and it's entirely possible that the seller will have no idea, especially if it happened a couple of owners ago. 

It will not make any difference to insuring the car. Has any instead ever asked you if your car has previously been debated a write off when you took out insurance? Didn't think so. It's not something that you have to declare or that they're interested in. They know full week that a car if that she can be written if because it had a cracked bumper - why would they not want to insure it? 

But ultimately if your not comfortable then don't buy it. There's no shortage of cars for sale.

We're not looking at an A1 in the sense your posts suggests as it reads that we're specifically looking for one.

We're just looking for a car within budget & going from there.

You're quite right there's no shortage of cars for sale. There's also no shortage of sellers I wont deal with either & cars on a bit of digging I wont deal with either (keep coming up with oil leaks being mentioned at the moment & I'm not sure whether I'll entertain that).

The problem with things like Polos, Corsa's etc (and A1's too I guess - although this one was roadside so no idea of owner) is that young folk tend to own them. Check out their profile and it's often some little darling with his hands down his pants with his pitbull on a lead or some other lad throwing up 'gang signs' with all of 'my boys innit' surrounding him ....... I've no interest in dealing with these people.

Likewise foreign sellers (& this seems to be a huge proportion of cars for sale here even though when you walk around the area you don't see a lot of foreign people). Been there, tried that (against advice from a number of friends, family, co-workers) & then found out why I was advised against that. Not worth the hassle & they tend to be a nightmare on both the buying & selling side, moreso than English folk in MY personal experience.

Then there's sellers taking the wee-wee wanting £2k for 21 year old bog standard Fiesta's. Not even the ST model. I know the second hand market has gone silly but that's ridiculous. 

Goudy

I have always tended think about Cat cars as "do you have to".

I sort of get it if someone decides to buy something usually out of reach and want to take a punt or they take a punt on something much newer they wouldn't normally afford.

Plus they tend to always have the tag attached to them.
When buying you are convinced (by yourself or the seller) it doesn't matter much.
Come to sell it and that tag means much much more (less in money terms).

At this price point and car, it probably wouldn't interest me unless it was mine pre accident and I bought it back from the insurance and repaired it myself to use myself or it was something I really wanted and bought it damaged from Copart to repair myself.

Regarding the question of what it's worth. It's worth what it's worth to you.
Yes it's usually a ball ache buying a used car with plenty of trip hazards. Often having to travel miles and deal with all sorts of people.

I've done a fair share of both buying and selling and nothing ever goes as imagined but if you have the time and inclination, then enquire about it if it's not too far from you.

MyRealNameToo

Mildly_Miffed said:

Herzlos said:

You need to check what the difference in insurance wiill be as cat cars can be higher, and if you can find out why it was written off it may help too. Being written off at 13 years old means nothing, but if it was written off at 3 months it'd have been bad. 

If it's Cat N, rather than Cat D, it can't have been before late 2017.

If insurers cared that much, they'd ask. They don't.

Dont need to ask questions to which they can source the answer themselves, that said I've not seen anyone use it as a rating factor. 

B0bbyEwing said:

Needing a car & wife sent me a photo of one she's seen which is CAT N.

Audi A1 Sport, 2012, 112k miles, MOT expires in Jan, 1.6 diesel. £2.7k

Looking on auto trader, valuations seem to vary quite a bit anyway (the min to max window seems quite large these days on anything second hand)  but they're all in & about this price range, roughly. Which makes me think the seller is probably being unrealistic.... Depending on who's accurately pricing in the first place.

What should you expect to be knocked off due to being a Cat N?

The advert doesn't even say what caused it to be Cat N & we obviously don't know to what degree it's been repaired.

Also read that getting insured on a Cat N can be a problem. In what sense though? That they may not insure you? That it just may cost much more?

Do you know when it was a cat N? Given its current age and mileage any claim would be a write off, even the most minor scratch, as such there are probably plenty of other cars with more damage that arent cat Ns simply because the policyholder didnt claim. 

If it had been written off in its first year of life you'd know it had much more damage but we can say for a fact it isnt because back then it would have been a cat D not a cat N

Impact on price varies depending on the age of the vehicle, as they get older it makes less and less impact. 

lincroft1710

What would deter me is "MOT till Jan". In 2/3 months time how much would you be paying out in repairs if it fails?