Buying from an auction?
Discussion
I understand you'd get no warranty at all.....
BUT, could I just go and buy my own warranty? Any recommendations?
Or is there more to it that I need to be aware of?
If I do buy from auction, do you have to pay all of it up front at the time? Or can you pay and collect a day or two later?
BUT, could I just go and buy my own warranty? Any recommendations?
Or is there more to it that I need to be aware of?
If I do buy from auction, do you have to pay all of it up front at the time? Or can you pay and collect a day or two later?
One thing you need to be aware of is the Buyer's Fee that the auction house will charge.
Not sure where you are thinking of going (BCA?), but the prices that cars sell for will probably be surprisingly high, especially for anything desirable in decent condition. Then there is the Buyer's Fee on top which is high for private buyers at BCA and the other national auction houses (I believe). Trade buyers get discounted buyer's fees based on how many cars they buy per month / year.
You might still get a bargain on a quieter day, but you will often find that the total price you would have to pay would not be far off a dealer price, and may well be more in many cases.
IIRC, you will need to pay a deposit (£500 last time I did it, maybe more now) on the day and then you will have a few days available to pay the balance and collect the car.
Not sure where you are thinking of going (BCA?), but the prices that cars sell for will probably be surprisingly high, especially for anything desirable in decent condition. Then there is the Buyer's Fee on top which is high for private buyers at BCA and the other national auction houses (I believe). Trade buyers get discounted buyer's fees based on how many cars they buy per month / year.
You might still get a bargain on a quieter day, but you will often find that the total price you would have to pay would not be far off a dealer price, and may well be more in many cases.
IIRC, you will need to pay a deposit (£500 last time I did it, maybe more now) on the day and then you will have a few days available to pay the balance and collect the car.
In my experience, you don't get much of a warranty from all but the big dealers. You normally also pay an indemnity. The auction houses do prep cars, and give comprehensive appraisals so the trade can market them immediately.
Take someone who has an idea what they are looking at. It's an interesting day even if you don't buy.
Take someone who has an idea what they are looking at. It's an interesting day even if you don't buy.
Watch out for the fees. On a £5k motor from BCA they'll charge you £529, £10k rises to £661 buyers premium. If the car has a BCA Assured inspection on it, they'll want an additional £63. They will also charge you £26 to post the V5 for you.
Traders get a substantial discount on these figures - Gold card customers, which only requires 12 cars a year, will pay about half the above buyers premium and inspection fee. For this reason, it can work out cheaper to get trader to buy the car for you and you pay them for it. There are people around who offer this as a service.
Traders get a substantial discount on these figures - Gold card customers, which only requires 12 cars a year, will pay about half the above buyers premium and inspection fee. For this reason, it can work out cheaper to get trader to buy the car for you and you pay them for it. There are people around who offer this as a service.
You really need your wits about you at an auction, my general experience is that there are few bargains these days v risk, I'm quite surprised what some prices get driven up to. Even with good mechanical knowledge I've still had several vehicles that had need high cost repairs inc gearbox and head-gasket / engine issues which are fairly easily masked for purposes of getting the car through an auction. Back in the day when bodywork was work expensive to have done you could pick up bargains with minor damage that were clean cars and punt them on, this rarely happens now.
My advice would be to avoid private entry vehicles like the plague unless you can find out the background, the reasons for a private individual(s) selling a car at auction is generally never good IMO. Where as dealerships regularly move on anything that is sitting a long time / trade ins that aren't suitable for sale.
Conversely I've had my bargains over the years, the best I've done was on a couple of well spec'd 3 series (320d mspec) that were about 5 years old at the time, but with 80/90k on the clock, they had come in marked as a private entry with no service history and poor cosmetics / light damage. After a lot of digging I found they had been owned by a small company that had gone under and were being auctioned off, after even more phone calls I dug up extremely fastidious service history with a BMW dealer in a different city and once cleaned they were great!
My advice would be to avoid private entry vehicles like the plague unless you can find out the background, the reasons for a private individual(s) selling a car at auction is generally never good IMO. Where as dealerships regularly move on anything that is sitting a long time / trade ins that aren't suitable for sale.
Conversely I've had my bargains over the years, the best I've done was on a couple of well spec'd 3 series (320d mspec) that were about 5 years old at the time, but with 80/90k on the clock, they had come in marked as a private entry with no service history and poor cosmetics / light damage. After a lot of digging I found they had been owned by a small company that had gone under and were being auctioned off, after even more phone calls I dug up extremely fastidious service history with a BMW dealer in a different city and once cleaned they were great!
CubanPete said:
The auction houses do prep cars, and give comprehensive appraisals so the trade can market them immediately.
ROFL. Avoid private entries. Read descriptions carefully. Understand how much you'll be paying in total (it'll be a lot). Don't assume a clean auction report means a clean car that won't need major £££ surgery five miles down the road.
Privates buying from auction always seems mad to me but best of luck.
I would echo a lot of the comments above. I used to work for a car trader in the early 1990's; we moved around 20 part exchanges a week from main dealers straight to auctions (and smaller dealers) so I spent a lot of time there. Up until a few years ago I bought all my cars from auction but with the private buyers premium it has become uneconomical. You also need to factor in your time (spending a day at an auction only to be outbid is soul destroying after a while).
In terms of your question regarding third party warranties, you can buy a car from auction and then purchase a warranty. One of the last cars I bought from auction was a 118d, which I then covered with a BMW (Mondial) warranty. I made sure the car had a full service history, which was a requirement of the Mondial warranty. I'm glad I purchased the warranty as I made a number of claims, including a dual mass flywheel and clutch at 80k miles!
In terms of your question regarding third party warranties, you can buy a car from auction and then purchase a warranty. One of the last cars I bought from auction was a 118d, which I then covered with a BMW (Mondial) warranty. I made sure the car had a full service history, which was a requirement of the Mondial warranty. I'm glad I purchased the warranty as I made a number of claims, including a dual mass flywheel and clutch at 80k miles!
I bought my wife a 2001 Toyota Yaris (JDM one) from auction for £1,100 and in what must have been seven years I changed the battery, the exhaust manifold (rust) and the oil sump (rust). I can't remember doing much else, maybe I got lucky but I did do as thorough an inspection as possible before it went through.
I think it depends on the car and what could go wrong /cost which would determine whether or not I'd go to an auction again, but you do see some pretty good deals going through.
I think it depends on the car and what could go wrong /cost which would determine whether or not I'd go to an auction again, but you do see some pretty good deals going through.
Saved from a previous thread (sorry can't remember who wrote it!)
"Hi, I'm afraid a lot of you are behind the times with BCA's fee's etc but first things first. One of you guys hit the nail on the head when they said BCA do not want "private buyers" at their auctions and the card scheme IS designed to deter them. Without any sort of card, blue, silver, gold, platinum or black, the fees are astronomical. The most common trade card is the gold card, obtained by buying 12 plus cars a year, and the fees on that on average are £190-£200 per car under £2000, the fee does vary depending on the value of the car bought, so for a couple of hundred quid banger you would pay less, around £100-£120. By law BCA cannot ban private buyers so they deter them with high fees for the private one off buys, which I have to say I totally agree with, private buyers are a pain in the bum for various reasons and should really stick to the small "local auctions". I will justify that comment if anyone is interested or offended by it.
The other thing you should all know is that BCA own the notorious "We Buy Any Car .com" and their auctions are full of those vehicles branded as UK Car Group and grade the cars from Premium to Select to Trade and to No Reserve, UKCG Premium being late, low mileage expensive cars down to UKCG No Reserve which is the real bargain basement and involve some right animals. To use an example BCA Blackbushe near Camberley, which I think is the largest auction site in the country, has for sale on average 1000-1200 cars 3 days a week plus a huge commercial sale and a specialist sale, on the Monday, Weds and Friday which are the general sales nearly half the cars sold are We Buy Any Car.com cars, a great little business, rip of desperate members of the public by buying cars for a fraction of their true value then a quick polish and rebrand them UKCG and then flood their own auction houses up and down the country and resell at top dollar with a hefty commission on top, brilliant eh.... good old BCA !
One last thing and its a word of warning to any private punters thinking of venturing into one of BCA's many outlets, be very very careful, you will be swimming with sharks, every trick in the book is employed to hide, mask, disguise and cover up the many defects these cars carry. Not of all of course and in an attempt to balance my comments a lot of decent cars do go through those halls and bargains can be had, so if you like playing Russian Roulette I wish you all the best."
"Hi, I'm afraid a lot of you are behind the times with BCA's fee's etc but first things first. One of you guys hit the nail on the head when they said BCA do not want "private buyers" at their auctions and the card scheme IS designed to deter them. Without any sort of card, blue, silver, gold, platinum or black, the fees are astronomical. The most common trade card is the gold card, obtained by buying 12 plus cars a year, and the fees on that on average are £190-£200 per car under £2000, the fee does vary depending on the value of the car bought, so for a couple of hundred quid banger you would pay less, around £100-£120. By law BCA cannot ban private buyers so they deter them with high fees for the private one off buys, which I have to say I totally agree with, private buyers are a pain in the bum for various reasons and should really stick to the small "local auctions". I will justify that comment if anyone is interested or offended by it.
The other thing you should all know is that BCA own the notorious "We Buy Any Car .com" and their auctions are full of those vehicles branded as UK Car Group and grade the cars from Premium to Select to Trade and to No Reserve, UKCG Premium being late, low mileage expensive cars down to UKCG No Reserve which is the real bargain basement and involve some right animals. To use an example BCA Blackbushe near Camberley, which I think is the largest auction site in the country, has for sale on average 1000-1200 cars 3 days a week plus a huge commercial sale and a specialist sale, on the Monday, Weds and Friday which are the general sales nearly half the cars sold are We Buy Any Car.com cars, a great little business, rip of desperate members of the public by buying cars for a fraction of their true value then a quick polish and rebrand them UKCG and then flood their own auction houses up and down the country and resell at top dollar with a hefty commission on top, brilliant eh.... good old BCA !
One last thing and its a word of warning to any private punters thinking of venturing into one of BCA's many outlets, be very very careful, you will be swimming with sharks, every trick in the book is employed to hide, mask, disguise and cover up the many defects these cars carry. Not of all of course and in an attempt to balance my comments a lot of decent cars do go through those halls and bargains can be had, so if you like playing Russian Roulette I wish you all the best."
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