Would you buy a seized car from police auction?

[untakenname]

I've been watching online this morning the bidding at a few auctions of seized vehicles, most don't have keys and have been parked up for a while, they seem to go for a lot under market value.

Tempted to bid for a shed as there's now salt all over the roads and I want to take my car off the road till April, annoyingly some of the cheap ones (bids at £100 or less) with minor damage state 'ATF registered bidders only' which means they can only go to legit scrap yards but there's lots still available to the public.

The one thing in the back of my mind is what happens if the previous owner comes across it? The fact they have had their car seized means they may not be the type to take kindly to seeing it back on the roads (especially risky if it came with keys as the previous owner may still have a spare).

Noticed a potential buy at an auction house near to me but it looks quite distinctive so perhaps the best method would be to get a common looking car (no odd colours) from a non local auction without keys then swap the locks/immobiliser and then stick on a private plate?

Just wondered if anyone here has done this before and if so were there any issues with getting insurance afterwards or police markers still on the car?

Thanks.

[ZX10R NIN]

You won't know if it has any issue until you get the keys at which point it may have some major mechanical issues so for me they'd have to silly cheap for me to take the risk.

[CousinDupree]

If you can buy them relatively direct from source and not through a middle man that will mark them up, I would take a punt if they are cheap enough and you can at least see a recent MOT etc.

There are many outfits that buy these cars, chuck a bucket of water over them and sell unwarrantied as projects, taking any profit / saving with them. Avoid.

[Fastchas]

It didn't bode well for Homer Simpson...

[Jamescrs]

Personally if I was to do it the first thing I'd do is buy a cheap private plate from the DVLA to stick on it just on the off chance the previous owner may recognise it and decide they aren't happy about someone else having it, should cover it's original identity somewhat unless it's something very identifiable

[untakenname]

Yep, it would get a cheap age related plate from ebay to disguise it somewhat.
My interest was raised when I saw a piece in the news about criminals assets being auctioned under POCA and it included some pretty nice cars/

ZX10R NIN said:

You won't know if it has any issue until you get the keys at which point it may have some major mechanical issues so for me they'd have to silly cheap for me to take the risk.

Yeah, that is a risk, I'd take a look through the MOT history to see what advisory's/fails they have to get an understanding of what type of owner had the car.

CousinDupree said:

If you can buy them relatively direct from source and not through a middle man that will mark them up, I would take a punt if they are cheap enough and you can at least see a recent MOT etc.

There are many outfits that buy these cars, chuck a bucket of water over them and sell unwarrantied as projects, taking any profit / saving with them. Avoid.

I'm looking at auctions like this one today https://vehicles.johnpye.co.uk/auction-018/auction...

Apparently you get better bargains at auctions that sell all types of seized goods not just cars but you have to physically turn up and bid.