Selling second hand car, ONO vs OVNO vs NO OFFERS

[sixty]

evenings guys, so i'm putting my second hand car on Autotrader tomorrow and wondering what you seasoned car veterans would recommend on the ad.

Part of me wants to put a reasonable price with NO OFFERS, just to cut out the tyre kickers/extreme hagglers. Part of me wants to increase the price and use ONO expecting to be knocked down, but I can imagine this will get more ridiculous offers, hence OVNO?

The last car I sold private was my vauxhall nova over 12 years ago, so i've no recent experience on the best "etiquette" as such!

[otherman]

I put an asking price with a bit of haggle room, but don't add ono or onvo. If people are gonna haggle they'll do it whatever you put.

[Liquid Tuna]

In my experience it doesn't make a sh*t of difference what you put. You'll still get timewasters, tyre kickers, imbeciles and then the odd genuine buyer.

[rallycross]

if its too cheap you will get the asking price right away.

if its a fair price everyone will still expect to get something off your listed price.

it wont make any differnce what you put in the ad!

[All that jazz]

Don't put "no offers" as it's the quickest way to make people dismiss your ad and move on to the next one. I generally allow £200 of wiggle room on anything I'm flogging above £2k and £100 for anything less than that.

[Sir Bagalot]

If it's an honest car then advertise it at an honest price. If anyone calls and enquires about price then simply answer them with it's realistically priced already. I could have advertised it at £500 more and then give you £500. A friend of mine who changes every six months does this.

He also doesn't let anyone test drive it unless a price (subject to test drive) is agreed.

[All that jazz]

Sir Bagalot said:

If it's an honest car then advertise it at an honest price. If anyone calls and enquires about price then simply answer them with it's realistically priced already. I could have advertised it at £500 more and then give you £500. A friend of mine who changes every six months does this.

He also doesn't let anyone test drive it unless a price (subject to test drive) is agreed.

Strange bloke. I wouldn't be making any offers until I'd test driven it. I can't see what difference 'his way' would make anyway. Agreeing on a price doesn't mean that you're going to buy it so why not just let the guy drive it and let him make an offer afterwards like normal sellers would do?

[Raize]

Increase price to just below price of next identical car, use ONO. Undercut him if he changes it. Buy his car if he undercuts too low and resell it.

[Nedzilla]

I dont tend to put any of them.As already said if you put no offers you will get no intrest as no one wants to pay the asking price.You would be best overpricing the car but be willing to haggle as some people still expect to get it for £000s off the asking price.

If you dont put anything people will just expect there to be some negotiation as thats just the way it is when selling a second hand car.I dont know of anyone whos ever got the price shown on the advert for a second hand car in a private sale.

The main thing to do is to get them down to view it and if the car is good it will sell itself but always be prepared to drop the price slightly.

[Spanna]

Firstly, I wouldn't use Autotrader.

Secondly, I wouldn't put any of those abbreviations. The price is at the top, 99% of people will offer less than that. Encourage to come and have a look, then sell it to them. Sounds easy doesn't it.

[carreauchompeur]

Raize said:

Increase price to just below price of next identical car, use ONO. Undercut him if he changes it. Buy his car if he undercuts too low and resell it.

:Rofl: Viz top tip, right there. Cunning!

[AlexRS2782]

Liquid Tuna said:

In my experience it doesn't make a sh*t of difference what you put. You'll still get timewasters, tyre kickers, imbeciles and then the odd genuine buyer.

^^ This ^^ +1 or whatever else the internets need you to post nowadays

When i had my RS Turbo up for sale a few years ago i priced it realistically based on the market, etc, and said No Offers, based on the price it was for sale at. Within the first day it was up for sale i was already receiving the usual calls asking "best price for cash", "what's the lowest you're after", etc. After much annoyance over the next 7 days, i was finally contacted by the genuine buyer who wanted it, turned up, and paid the asking price with no offers

From then on i've always priced my cars a bit above what i wanted for it, knowing i'll take less, and then still be prepared to get the usual timewaster phone calls, emails, etc, as expected when selling a used car

[Nedzilla]

I think ive been pretty luck when it comes to selling cars.Ive always sold them to the first viewer and only had to drop a few hundred quid each time which I was fully expecting.
I have however,ALWAYS had the usual 'whats your best price for cash' brigade on the phone.Seriously,what do they expect you to take for the car,milk bottle tops??

The last car I sold was a E46 M3 convertible a few months ago.I put the car up for £10.5k which was very reasonable considering it was a mint example.I put the ad up on a sunday afternoon and within an hour I had a chap on the phone with a funny accent asking if I would take £8k for it!! I laughed at him and he told me I would never sell it for that as there are other cars the same age for sale at £8k.

It sold two days later to the first viewer for £10,200.

[renmure]

Depends on the type of can and asking price to some extent but I agree with the folk who say it doesn't really matter. If nothing else, saying that the price is firm allows you to manage the buyers expectation of haggling for a bargain. Doesn't mean they won't try tho.

[Sir Bagalot]

All that jazz said:

Sir Bagalot said:

If it's an honest car then advertise it at an honest price. If anyone calls and enquires about price then simply answer them with it's realistically priced already. I could have advertised it at £500 more and then give you £500. A friend of mine who changes every six months does this.

He also doesn't let anyone test drive it unless a price (subject to test drive) is agreed.

Strange bloke. I wouldn't be making any offers until I'd test driven it. I can't see what difference 'his way' would make anyway. Agreeing on a price doesn't mean that you're going to buy it so why not just let the guy drive it and let him make an offer afterwards like normal sellers would do?

He got fed up with people out for a sunday test drive. The offer is subject to an acceptable test drive. Let's say he's asking £10K, he certainly won't entertain any offers under £9,800, so if you offer him £9K subject to test drive then he will tell you that offer isn't acceptable and no test drive.

It works for him.

[All that jazz]

Sir Bagalot said:

He got fed up with people out for a sunday test drive. The offer is subject to an acceptable test drive. Let's say he's asking £10K, he certainly won't entertain any offers under £9,800, so if you offer him £9K subject to test drive then he will tell you that offer isn't acceptable and no test drive.

It works for him.

Why doesn't he got the whole hog and get them to agree to a price on the phone "subject to inspection, test drive and whatever else I can dream up" ?

Some strange folk about.

[AndyT77]

Nedzilla said:

I think ive been pretty luck when it comes to selling cars.Ive always sold them to the first viewer and only had to drop a few hundred quid each time which I was fully expecting.
I have however,ALWAYS had the usual 'whats your best price for cash' brigade on the phone.Seriously,what do they expect you to take for the car,milk bottle tops??

The last car I sold was a E46 M3 convertible a few months ago.I put the car up for £10.5k which was very reasonable considering it was a mint example.I put the ad up on a sunday afternoon and within an hour I had a chap on the phone with a funny accent asking if I would take £8k for it!! I laughed at him and he told me I would never sell it for that as there are other cars the same age for sale at £8k.

It sold two days later to the first viewer for £10,200.

So strange accent chap was right then?

[Ozzie Osmond]

Assuming you're not at the "dirt cheap" end of the spectrum your advertised price should be no more than £1,000 more then you expect to get for the car.

When the prospective buyer makes an offer,

• if it's too low just tell him to get lost
• if it's at least in the ball-park offer him a modest reduction
• after a couple of rounds of banter accept a price between £500 and £1,000 less than advertised.

ONO = if you want to
OVNO = what's the point? Same as ONO
NO OFFERS = please don't buy my car. you'll be keeping it!!

[jdwoodbury]

AlexRS2782 said:

"best price for cash"

I love this.....what other form of currency do you think I would take...bananas?

[C8LNJ]

That really annoys me when selling a car.

Advertise at say £3k when its worth that all day long & you'll always get some idiot (or not if it works for him on occasion!?) texting you 'Hi mate, can give you £2k cash tonight!'

I got a lot of this and it made me wonder what they possibly pondered I wanted instead of cash, fking coconuts!!?

I never reply to texts now when selling, its the signature of a time waster!!