Ask a car salesman anything...anything at all (Vol. 2).

[Court_S]

HTP99 said:

bobsavage789 said:

Ah yes, I forgot about the old condition-based servicing.

What if anything does need replacing imminently? Would I have any sort of bargaining position?

Yes, you ask them to replace them as part of the deal.

BMW are usually pretty good at sorting that sort of stuff out. I looked at a few used cars and there were quite a few that has clearly has new discs and pads as part of their prep.

[soxboy]

Fast Bug said:

I was cars, switched over to our van side a couple of years ago.

Which do you prefer? Friend did MB vans>cars>vans, preferred the vans so went back to them after being lured to do shiny cars.

I used to sell houses and then moved on to selling commercial property, far better doing commercial as customers so much easier to deal with.

[Fast Bug]

soxboy said:

Fast Bug said:

I was cars, switched over to our van side a couple of years ago.

Which do you prefer? Friend did MB vans>cars>vans, preferred the vans so went back to them after being lured to do shiny cars.

I used to sell houses and then moved on to selling commercial property, far better doing commercial as customers so much easier to deal with.

Much prefer vans. I've sold vans for 15 years or so, it's more interesting and in all honesty, it pays better. I do miss the global training events cars do though

[Ron99]

Genuine question, not being rude, so please don't bite....

Over the years I have been told by a few main dealer managers that when a part-ex comes in, they keep the best ones (FMDSH, undamaged, not modified/mapped, not too old, not too many miles etc) and the rest get punted off to auction for smaller/independent dealers to bid on and subsequently fix or hope the next owner doesn't notice.

Occasionally a car sits unsold for too long so that eventually goes to auction, too.

The bottom line being that I've been led to believe, with some good explanations, that cars available at smaller/independent dealers are more likely to be problem cars.

I would be interested in what the car sales people have to say about the above.

There are always some apparently nice cars at small independents but I'm much more wary of dealing with them. In fact, right now there are a couple of independents with cars that interest me.

[jamoor]

Ron99 said:

Genuine question, not being rude, so please don't bite....

Over the years I have been told by a few main dealer managers that when a part-ex comes in, they keep the best ones (FMDSH, undamaged, not modified/mapped, not too old, not too many miles etc) and the rest get punted off to auction for smaller/independent dealers to bid on and subsequently fix or hope the next owner doesn't notice.

Occasionally a car sits unsold for too long so that eventually goes to auction, too.

The bottom line being that I've been led to believe, with some good explanations, that cars available at smaller/independent dealers are more likely to be problem cars.

I would be interested in what the car sales people have to say about the above.

There are always some apparently nice cars at small independents but I'm much more wary of dealing with them. In fact, right now there are a couple of independents with cars that interest me.

They could also be too high miles, wrong colour, wrong spec.

[Ron99]

jamoor said:

They could also be too high miles, wrong colour, wrong spec.

Interesting mention of colour. Over the years, a lot of the cars at smaller dealers that interested me have been unusual colours.

[spreadsheet monkey]

Ron99 said:

The bottom line being that I've been led to believe, with some good explanations, that cars available at smaller/independent dealers are more likely to be problem cars.

I would be interested in what the car sales people have to say about the above.

I think particularly with prestige brands, the rules on what they can sell as "Approved Used" are quite restrictive. It might be something like maximum 5 years old, 60k miles.

It's quite possible that you could find some good well cared for cars that just happen to be high mileage or whatever.

It depends on the car. If it was a low mileage 2 year old BMW or Merc, I'd probably question why it was being sold outside the main dealer network. But for older cars, I wouldn't worry about buying from a proper established independent dealer.

[spikeyhead]

spreadsheet monkey said:

Ron99 said:

The bottom line being that I've been led to believe, with some good explanations, that cars available at smaller/independent dealers are more likely to be problem cars.

I would be interested in what the car sales people have to say about the above.

I think particularly with prestige brands, the rules on what they can sell as "Approved Used" are quite restrictive. It might be something like maximum 5 years old, 60k miles.

It's quite possible that you could find some good well cared for cars that just happen to be high mileage or whatever.

It depends on the car. If it was a low mileage 2 year old BMW or Merc, I'd probably question why it was being sold outside the main dealer network. But for older cars, I wouldn't worry about buying from a proper established independent dealer.

I bought a five yeaar old, 61k miles Boxster that was a lot cheaper than it would have been had it been a few months younger and had done 2k fewer miles.

[Fast Bug]

Quite a few main dealers don't sell anything that's from another manufacturer, so part exchanges would be traded out or sent to auction regardless of condition

[Blakewater]

Manufacturer finance companies seem to sell cars that have been handed back through auctions. There are often plenty of low mileage nearly new cars going through them listed as manufacturer sales.

Then there are ex Motability cars that some independent dealers claim to specialise in. Ex hire cars, which people pour scorn on but are no better or worse than the average used car from one private user.

There are always plenty of cars going through BCA listed as UKCGR Premium which are We Buy Any Car. They can be anything from rubbish to quite decent stuff like this Abarth 124 Spyder.

https://auctionview.bca.co.uk/Results/LotDetail/c1...

Any of these can be bought by independent dealers.

[A1VDY]

Ron99 said:

jamoor said:

They could also be too high miles, wrong colour, wrong spec.

Interesting mention of colour. Over the years, a lot of the cars at smaller dealers that interested me have been unusual colours.

We pick up trade ins from the local dealer who specialise in nearly new cars. Most will be too old, oddball colours, high mileage mostly or cars that have problems that we get fixed.
Their remit is under 20k miles and under 3 years. We'll sell anything no matter the age or mileage but it's all priced accordingly..

[jamoor]

How will dealerships make commissions on this then?
https://www.engadget.com/bmw-connected-drive-store...

[Mexman]

Eh?

[HTP99]

Mexman said:

Eh?

Yep, eh?

[Butter Face]

jamoor said:

How will dealerships make commissions on this then?
https://www.engadget.com/bmw-connected-drive-store...

Nobody cares

[jamoor]

HTP99 said:

Mexman said:

Eh?

Yep, eh?

The car gets sold for 30,000 instead of £50,000 out of the door of the dealership. There’s less margin at the time of sale as the rest is put on a monthly subscription paid direct to BMW. The dealer sees none of that money. I can’t see a car salesman being too happy about that, if he doesn’t have the chance to upsell...

[BrabusMog]

Have a day off, Jamoor

[Mexman]

Make that a month off.

[jamoor]

BrabusMog said:

Have a day off, Jamoor

I said there would be a shift and it’s happening

[Fast Bug]

Not really, they're just going to make certain features subscription only. Much like navigation updates only last for 12 months now, after that you have to pay and the dealership doesn't see any money for that either.