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Advice on selling car privately


sipar69

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I'm seriously considering putting the Nismo up for sale when we get our move to Kent out of the way in the next month. My driving history is quite limited and after three 370s I feel like I want to try something different (maybe a Cayman).

 

I'll definitely put an ad on here as I'd love the car to go to a fellow forum member, but what else would you recommend out of Pistonheads, Ebay, Autotrader etc?

 

Be good to hear about personal experiences of using these methods - good or bad. :)

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Ebay has a massive audience, but be prepared for time wasters and low ball offers, autotrader is well regarded, along with pistonheads.

 

To be honest, if you want to sell, just put it anywhere and everywhere, if you are not in a rush, choose a couple of platforms, give them 4 weeks and if you are not getting the calls or viewings, try elsewhere.

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I've advertised mine on the forum, Ebay, Autotrader and Pistonheads. Initially not bothered with Autotrader as they are not cheap!!!, but after 2 weeks of no response, decided to pay and advertise on Autotrader as that's where I (and many more) usually start my search for car hence make sense for me to advertise there. As above, Ebay will have lots of time waster and low ball offers.

 

Facebook marketplace is good too if you're on it. It free but similar to EBay's time waster and low ball offers.

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I recently sold my 350z and used the forum and Autotrader. i had a lot of interest through Autotrader and sold it to a guy that contacted me through it so i would say its worth it yes!

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I find AT works well for standard cars, if you have something modified you need to focus on communicating that which AT does not do well at all.

 

I also would advise trying to be a bit distinctive in the ad, drop in you tube videos of the car starting up and running, walk arounds etc. Be up front about any issues and say that the price takes this into account, that stops people looking for any little issue to try knock money off. Also avoid arty photos, keep them very functional showing as much detail of the car as possible!

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Just to echo the above really, although I have not tried AT as I think it's super expensive. But then with the value of the car you are selling it is a good market.

PistonHeads - I have good luck here, especially with modified / performance cars. My 370 sold here.

eBay - Most of my car sales have been via eBay (all cars sub £10k). Just be prepared for maybe 1 serious enquiry for every 10 messages. I enjoy winding them up.

Forums - Very good if you are patient.

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I have sold my last few cars via ebay but they have been cheap cars. You will get really silly low ball offers from some muppets, but in general its a huge audience and in the end I had genuine people come out & buy them.

 

Most people I know use ebay & autotrader, so id use them.

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PH only for me, eBay too many idiots (although that can be weeded out by doing a decent advert) and AT too pricey. The fact I get free ads on PH does help though!

 

Depends on whether you decide to put a fixed sale price or want the auction approach. I usually list the car im selling for 99p start, no reserve. Gets a lot of attention and a lot of watchers. It will always fetch the market price, sometimes even more if a bidding war happens.

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Depends on the type of car imo modified and classics are more popular on eBay, small runabouts on gumtree, general and newer cars on autotrader

 

But as a general rule advertise where you would look yourself as that's where others will probably look as well

 

I used to always use pistonheads for both advertising and searching but the amount of cars and variety now is pretty poor. They have under 150k cars where autotrader have 460k. I rarely hear anyone mention pistonheads now and when I do it's usually the long term members who swear by it. As proven by Dan :lol:

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I tend to browse autotrader and eBay equally as much.

 

More often than not I see a motor on autotrader, and then spot they same advert on eBay as the seller has used both. Just goes to show that people will be browsing both. A big one for eBay is to pay for a proper 'classified ad', looks a bit more serious than a buy it now advert.

 

Personally I would try the cheaper options first and in that order...

 

Ebay

Piston heads (if modified or an enthusiasts type of car like the nismo)

Autotrader finally

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^^ I echo this, if looking for a car I will look everywhere and often see duplicate adverts, I then get a shortlist and go from there, I guess it depends what your preferences are as to where you start. I usually start with ebay just because its familiar, autotrader and then on to ph, occasionally staggering onto gumtree if my favoured channels are exhausted. I usually find ph cars to in the higher price bracket of whatever example so if you want top dollar start there.

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I sold a runabout on gumtree for about £3.5k a few years back, actually as a free tool with relatively easy way to set up adverts as long as you just insta-delete the time wasters/private traders it does get a lot of visibility in your area. Certainly I got no more time wasters than the ad on ebay.

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Pistonheads for me is the seriously modified cars or rarer cars place to search.

 

I tend to start with autotrader to get a feel for the price range the cars are in, as some on eBay are either stupidly overpriced or really cheap indicating issues.

 

Autotrader have brought in a new feature that shows if the car is at a good price based on market value which draws attention if you price the car right

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Porsche gave me a very decent trade in on mine, but remember if trading it in it's about the overall deal: So they may give you £5k for the car but then knock £5k off your purchase, which may be a better deal than walking in with cash deposit. Or may not, but worth bearing in mind rather than just getting sucked in by OMFG THEY ONLY GAVE ME £2.76 FOR MY CARZORZ!!!11

 

Apologies for the lecture on egg tasting, but not everyone looks at car buying as the cost to change, which is the important bit :)

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Ps. I tried ebay to sell mine winter time.. Was on 5 days, 1500 or so views and a long list of the most stupid questions or offers you could imagine. It ruined my life trying to get through them all so I decided to take the ad down.

 

Seriously.. Questions like is it bad on insurance! And will you take 3k cash today etc

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Ps. I tried ebay to sell mine winter time.. Was on 5 days, 1500 or so views and a long list of the most stupid questions or offers you could imagine. It ruined my life trying to get through them all so I decided to take the ad down.

 

Seriously.. Questions like is it bad on insurance! And will you take 3k cash today etc

 

I am guessing you mean ebay :lol:

 

Nowadays with ebay i pretty much ignore every question, unless its, can i have your number to arrange a viewing, when i sold my first 350z the guy who bought it had sent me a couple of messages, first was some low offer so i didnt even respond to that or answer his 2nd message, he still bid and won, turned up and paid.

 

Anything like, what mpg does it do, whats the insurance like and question already covered in the ad i just consider spam and as above, the magical CASH offers, however i do respond to those with how else do you intend to pay, magic beans or bottle tops, they dont like that :teeth: so its always good for a laugh.

 

I generally think its pretty easy to spot serious buyers or enquiries

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I hate selling cars privately. You get so many idiots and time wasters. If you can get a reasonable enough px off that's the way I would go.

 

Advertising on the forum is a good start. At least you will get serious people but the issue there is that most of us already have a zed.

 

I've used Gumtree a lot because it's free and has a large audience but as soon as you put a phone number up you tend to get spam calls.

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