After just a couple of months with the Maestro, we decided that the best way to turn a profit was to simply sell the car on after a quick spruce up. After a good weekend spent with the T-Cut and Turtle Wax, she was looking very sharp. In order to make it look as attractive as possible to potential viewers, we also carried out an oil service, topped up the anti-freeze and generally got it ready to go to market.
As we wanted to make a profit on the car, we didn’t advertise it on PH’s classifieds. As you all know what we paid for it and at least half of you thought we’d lose our collective shirt on this particular deal, it didn’t look likely we’d get the best price for it.
Instead, we decided to list it in the specialised classic car press and as profit was the name of the game, it was the free ads of Classic Car Weekly which appealed the most. We had several calls, of which two were time wasters, hoping it was a turbo and we’d forgotten to mention it. The others were serious bites who wanted to come and inspect the car.
Our favourite however was the first, a chap who was coming to England from the Irish Republic and wanted a Maestro to replace his aging Metro as everyday transport. Unlikely as it sounds, he arrived as agreed, gave the car a cursory glance over and declared it better than he expected. He handed over the asking price before steering the MG off of our driveway towards the ferry at Holyhead. We got a call the following evening to say that our man had got to Eire without incident and the car ran like a bird. Subsequently, we’ve had three more calls and we’re confident that we could have sold the car a couple of times over.
All of this means that our original £500 sum has swollen to £755, and put us back in the market for a pokey motor with a profit margin. Overall, we made a 75% profit on the car. That includes £310 for the car and £30 for the oil, filters and belt. We already had some old polish and T-Cut in the garage so haven’t charged ourselves for that. Our £340 investment got us £595 back from the successful sale. Added to the £160 balance from our original £500 stake we currently have £755, giving an overall profit of 51%.
We already have the new car- it's fast, French and very, very exciting. But more on that next week.
...and you thought it wouldn't sell
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