Places to find second-hand cars

[ingenieur]

Hi everybody.

I'm looking for a second hand car. I just wondered if there are any places I'm not aware of which has listings of secondhand cars.

I have looked at the following:

Autotrader
Facebook Marketplace
eBay
Gumtree
Car and Classic
Pistonheads classifieds

I've tried a couple of marquee specific websites as well. I want to be sure the perfect car isn't out there before I settle for one of the 'nearly right' cars I've already located.

[Scrump]

CarGurus
https://www.cargurus.co.uk/Cars/forsale

(Never tried them but they own Pistonheads)

[ingenieur]

Scrump said:

CarGurus
https://www.cargurus.co.uk/Cars/forsale

(Never tried them but they own Pistonheads)

Seems to be a conduit through to Autotrader as all the same adverts are shown.

[Olivergt]

You don't have to if you don't want to, but what car are you looking for? Is it something that is quite rare, or one that there are hundreds for sale and you might need to wait for just the right spec?

Have you tried any marque specialist forums? A lot of them have a for sale/wanted section.

[ingenieur]

ingenieur said:

I've tried a couple of marquee specific websites as well.

Olivergt said:

Have you tried any marque specialist forums? A lot of them have a for sale/wanted section.

I'm hesitating to name the specific car I'm looking for as there aren't many around and I'm hoping the ones which are will be on sale for a few more weeks while I'm selling my existing car.

[samoht]

Yeah, if you mention the model then you're at risk of having the thread pulled by breaking the PH rule against 'wanted' threads, also.

Personally I think you've covered the main classifieds and forums.

https://www.newsnow.co.uk/classifieds/ is quite a useful aggregator, but it's only scraping the places you've already looked I think.

AFAIK the online used car sellers like Cazoo all list their cars on at least one of the main classifieds, but maybe worth checking Cazoo site itself etc.

You could have a look on the new 'online auctions' sites such as Collecting Cars etc.

Another thing, which I think is more common with high-end cars, is if you tell a few specialist dealers in that sort of car what you're looking for, and they can keep an eye out and find you a car as it may come up for sale.

I've bought two used cars outside of the scope of the above and what you've described. First was personally imported from abroad, the second I found an ownership thread on a marque forum where the owner mentioned an intent to sell it on before it hit 100k, so I DM'd him and ended up purchasing it.

[ingenieur]

Good tips. It will be a daily driver though, so can't wait a long time after selling my current car. Will have to buy a replacement almost immediately.

[NFT]

Use google to find online & any motor trade auction biz's your willing to go to/collect from too, some have online listings/bidding and a lot let anyone go & bid.

[Pistonheader101]

ingenieur said:

Good tips. It will be a daily driver though, so can't wait a long time after selling my current car. Will have to buy a replacement almost immediately.

cazoo or cinch or similar

[griffter]

Trovit - but it covers most of what you’ve listed and doesn’t cover everything.

[griffter]

Also, exchange and mart.

[ingenieur]

yeah I was thinking about Exchange and Mart. It used to be as big as Autotrader when these publications were only in print. Somehow easy to forget about these days.

[ingenieur]

griffter said:

Also, exchange and mart.

Seems to be a proxy for Autotrader now, just had a look.

[plenty]

Marque/model specific Facebook groups as well as themed groups (e.g. JDM cars for sale, or track cars for sale) tend to have a lot of listings not found anywhere else or on Marketplace. For a rare model putting up a wanted post in these groups can be a good way of sourcing.

[SkodaIan]

If you're after something at the bottom of the market, don't forget the old fashioned card in the newsagents window / co-op, Tesco etc. community noticeboard adverts.
They can be a good source for honest, local cars which are genuine private sales.

[vikingaero]

You're missing out on all the cars with For Sale signs in their windows. I suggest driving around the whole country on a regular basis...

[ingenieur]

Some good ideas here. I think I'm running out of places to look so might have to settle for something which is good enough. But got another few weeks for the search, depending how long it takes to sell my current car.

[griffter]

ingenieur said:

Seems to be a proxy for Autotrader now, just had a look.

Really? I haven’t looked for some time. I suppose I last used it 6-12 months ago when the number of cars for sale was about 1/10 of those of Autotrader but at least they were different cars. It was quite a fun hunting ground for down at heel classics.