Quattroporte auction values

[village idiot]

Can anyone give any guidance on what a new-generation Quattroporte (with the newer auto gearbox) might go through auction at... in comparison with the prices asked at the dealers.

I have an aquaintance who wants to upgrade their F1-box Quattroporte for the newer car and is looking at the best way to do it...

Chopping the old one in for a lightly used newer example at the local Maser emporium will undoubtedly be easier, but buying through auction and then trying to sell on the old car would surely leave more than enough in the pot for a spanking of an altogether more pleasant kind and a fish & chip supper thrown in to boot?

Thanks in advance for any pearls of wisdom.

[sjn2004]

My "new generation" do you mean the face lift released late last year or just the earlier model with an automatic gearbox? To be honest seems an awful lot of money to lose on trading up just to have a slightly different gearbox(who drives it in automatic mode anyway).

[village idiot]

sjn2004 said:

My "new generation" do you mean the face lift released late last year or just the earlier model with an automatic gearbox? To be honest seems an awful lot of money to lose on trading up just to have a slightly different gearbox(who drives it in automatic mode anyway).

sorry... i meant the new gearbox (i think that was launched about 2yrs ago?).

just out of interest, has anyone investigated the mileage in buying a new maserati (rhd) from a European dealer... can that work out cheaper?

cheers

[Pork]

village idiot said:

just out of interest, has anyone investigated the mileage in buying a new maserati (rhd) from a European dealer... can that work out cheaper?

cheers

I would say with the exchange rate at what it is at the mo, I would say it wouldnt be viable.

[village idiot]

Pork said:

village idiot said:

just out of interest, has anyone investigated the mileage in buying a new maserati (rhd) from a European dealer... can that work out cheaper?

cheers

I would say with the exchange rate at what it is at the mo, I would say it wouldnt be viable.

but surely with the falling value of the sterling, the uk dealers who will need to be offering a fixed sterling price must build in margin to compensate... if you happened to hold accounts in both sterling and euros, wouldn't you get a cleaner deal buying the car in the currency it is built in?...

[MogulBoy]

village idiot said:

but surely with the falling value of the sterling, the uk dealers who will need to be offering a fixed sterling price must build in margin to compensate... if you happened to hold accounts in both sterling and euros, wouldn't you get a cleaner deal buying the car in the currency it is built in?...

If you have cash in both currencies, you should still think about how much cash you have in total in one currency or the other.

ie. At £1=€1.10 and you have say £10 and €11 in cash. You have in effect the equivalent of £20 in (sterling) or €22 (in euros) in aggregate.

If you then decide you want to buy something in the UK for £4. That would be the equivalent of 20% of your net worth expressed in sterling, and therfore, if the same item is available in Europe for €4.4 then that is also 20% of your net worth expressed in euros.

Ignoring currency dealing costs, it is irrelevant whether you fund this from your Euro account or your sterling account, you have still spent 20% of your net worth at that point in time... (i.e 4/20 = 4.4/22). But if the same item is actually available for €4.0 then it's cheaper in Euroland.

In terms of whether it would be cheaper to buy a brand new Quattroporte in Europe, well, if you think about list prices, manufacturers try to set list prices at a base level in Euro but clearly currency swings in the short term can upset this balance.

I would expect the Euro to fall from current levels in the not too distant future, so if you ignoring any special discounts to clear new stock that might exist, list prices in Euroland will certainly fall in relative terms from where they are today but it may not swing back sufficiently for them to actually become 'cheaper' than the UK list price as sterling is really quite low as we all know.

If you are looking at a personal import into the UK, start by looking at dealers in the Netherlands. Local taxes for Dutch people are so high that the manufacturers have to do their best to keep their net prices as low as possible in that market. You don't have to pay these taxes when you export to the UK so there is a possibility for 'arbitrage' here, although there is no law to stop them charging you a variable premium for the all important "Right Hand Drive" option! I know, I bought a Scooby over there in 2000 and the netto price for the RHD model was circa 10% higher than the netto price ofr LHD! Go figure!

Anyway, back on topic.. I am warming to the Quattorporte! particularly as I believe that they all have 5 seats and are therefore more family friendly than say a Merc CLS. I would also like to know what the residuals are looking like for the proper auto version.. Anyone know?

[Edited 'cause I got my own numbers wrong!]

Edited by MogulBoy on Tuesday 27th January 08:06

[baguaman]

will agree with you on them being more family friendly than the cls..

i had a loan cls 500 and YES only two seats instead of my three.

saying that am happy to have the qp back.. but still loved the supsension of the cls.