Strange car selling experience.
Discussion
Just want to check I'm not going crazy here.
Selling my 2010 Honda Civic 2.2 Type S with 2.2 diesel engine. It's on 165K miles but in good condition.
A couple lads came round earlier to look at it. All was going well until he tried to start it. It's got a start button which you have to hold down to start it.
However when it was almost turning over, he would let go, so sort of half starting the engine and letting it stall just before it was turning over properly. He did this at least 5 times before I said he needs to hold it longer. After the this engine wasn't happy and did not want to start without a bit of a struggle.
Of course they now were instantly suspicious that all manor or things were wrong with it.
He then progressed to continue doing it throughout the test drive despite me saying he needs to hold it for a second longer to let it start.
They ended up walking away after I turned down their offer. Said it needed a new alternator etc.
I'm unsure if they were trying it on, or whether they were just being stupid. The car has never done that before in my 110K of miles I've put on it, always started well. So i find it hard to believe that the car would suddenly develop a starting fault the moment I'm tying to sell it.
It all felt a bit weird.
Selling my 2010 Honda Civic 2.2 Type S with 2.2 diesel engine. It's on 165K miles but in good condition.
A couple lads came round earlier to look at it. All was going well until he tried to start it. It's got a start button which you have to hold down to start it.
However when it was almost turning over, he would let go, so sort of half starting the engine and letting it stall just before it was turning over properly. He did this at least 5 times before I said he needs to hold it longer. After the this engine wasn't happy and did not want to start without a bit of a struggle.
Of course they now were instantly suspicious that all manor or things were wrong with it.
He then progressed to continue doing it throughout the test drive despite me saying he needs to hold it for a second longer to let it start.
They ended up walking away after I turned down their offer. Said it needed a new alternator etc.
I'm unsure if they were trying it on, or whether they were just being stupid. The car has never done that before in my 110K of miles I've put on it, always started well. So i find it hard to believe that the car would suddenly develop a starting fault the moment I'm tying to sell it.
It all felt a bit weird.
Edited by Grahamr123 on Wednesday 14th October 21:42
Grahamr123 said:
I'm unsure if they were trying it on, or whether they were just being stupid.
So, they couldn't comprehend "hold the button till it starts", but could diagnose a faulty alternator? 
I'm going for trying it on, but either way consider it a bullet dodged. Take it for a decent run to make sure the battery gets a good charge after their shenanigans.
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