What should i pay for this A3 people advice please

[kevlar]

Hi all went and had a look at a silver 53 plate a3 2.0 tdi sport 3 door, has 45k on the clock private sell 1 owner from new, car serviced twice a recall was completed. Warranty until january.

Had a look around and cannot find a real world price! parkers indicates around 12k, but i cannot find any at this price!!!

Any input on prices greatly appreciated soon as!

 

[AndyMac]

There's quite a selection on autotrader all between £12k and £14k

 

[kevlar]

Cheapest 2.0 tdi sport with more mileage is £12k...makes you wonder how good condition it would be!

 

[AndyMac]

Mileage has nothing to do with condition. You'll usually find low mileage cars have been completely trashed by lots of short journeys and supermarket car park dings. I would always go for a younger car with high mileage than an older one with low.
All high mileage means is that the car has been on the motorway most of its life which is a really good thing in every respect.

 

[csm7djs]

Don't know if this helps, but i paid £11250k for my 2003 2.0tdi Sport private sale. It had 56k on the clock but had just been serviced a week before.... It has parking sensors, bose sound system and a few other bits and bobs.....

The condition of the car was perfect inside and a few stone chips on the outside. There was absolutely nothing else on Autotrader at a similar price either and it was only 2 miles from my house so i snapped her hand off. Naturally now i've spent money on new RS6 wheels but and going for the chip, which puts the car up to the £12200 figure but still pleased....

 

[AndyMac]

£11250k is quite expensive for an A3!!
You could have got 11 Bugatti Veyrons for that
Sorry couldn't resist.

 

[Booster]

Hi all went and had a look at a silver 53 plate a3 2.0 tdi sport 3 door, has 45k on the clock private sell 1 owner from new, car serviced twice a recall was completed. Warranty until january.

Glass's Guide says £12,675 retail and £10675 trade (adjusted for mileage as the average car has done 34k - assuming its a 2003 53 plate not 2004).
Private sale should be £11,675.

 

[Karcsi]

There is about £2k difference between Glass's, Parkers and What Car. It's all bllx. I don't understand where they get those prices from, because they certainly haven't been taken from the real world, in which the prices asked are £2-3k more than that, and I really doubt a dealer will give you that sort of discount on their forecourt price.

The right price depends on what is on offer at the time, not what some book tells you. There are loads of A3's for sale, so it's quite simple to work out what is reasonable at this time.

 

[marriedblonde]

They are called guides

Something is only worth what someone else is willing to pay for it!

 

[Tim Stuart]

What Car prices are made up by a couple of blokes loosely connected to the motor trade and should not be trusted.

Parkers look at Glass's and CAP prices and have their own editors.

Glass's Guide is the most trusted retail price guide used by dealers to reflect what they should price the car at to sell, and is based on thousands of observed transactions in the previous month (from auctions, fleet disposals, etc.).

The difference in price between trade and retail is down to the fact that dealers need to prepare the car for sale (full valet etc.) MOT it (if necessary), tax it, put a warranty on it, pay for advertising it, forecourt overheads etc. etc. and still make a profit on the car.

Also, it should be remembered that it's a guide only and every car is unique. Specification will make a difference in price and if you've got e.g. leather and sat nav then you should expect to pay more than a basic spec car.

 

[Karcsi]

They should be guides. However, they (CAP and Glass's) are referred to as the secondhand dealer's bible, aren't they?

The problem I have with these guides is that they are not edited as guides and certainly not used as guides. They end up being used to determine what price people are prepared to pay for their cars - and seem to be marketed as such, with the advent of the sophistications such as Parker's have added to their pricing service. They have become a self-fulfilling prophesy, and undermine natural market forces.

When you go to a dealer they always take out their little book. These are people who specialise in selling secondhand cars, so why do they need a book to tell them what they should pay for it? Haven't they sold or seen sold enough cars to be able to know what they can sell it for, what costs they will occur in doing so, and what profit they would like to make to determine the price they are willing to offer you? On this basis, who needs a salesman? Sack him/her and install a computer linked to one of these guides, and it can all be done automatically, surely?

 

[kevlar]

I have just spoken to a friend of a friend who owns an ""Audi" specialist garage not a main dealer - £11,900 appears to be the "trade price" for the car im interested in with mileage.

He also said that parkers guide is rubbish! and as i said in my first post is not a reflection on the real world car prices.

I know from my own experience that parkers is cr@p! my lotus elise was valued at £8k sold for £10.5! similar experience with my focus rs i just sold to.

 

[Karcsi]

Agree. I've just put mine in Autotrader for £14,000, which according to Parkers and others is about £2k too much. My model, same age, similar mileage with leather, xenons is the cheapest on there by about £1.5k. There are some dealers asking almost 2 grand more than me.

OK, it is one thing asking a price, it's quite another what you sell it for. But why would dealers (and others) be asking prices which are apparently so over the odds, according to these guides? It's a conspiracy, that's what it is, by dealers to justify offering you peanuts when you come to trade in.

My dealer offered me £12,500. Half the mileage of this car, with all the right options (their words), and immaculate.

 

[benw123]

When you go to a dealer they always take out their little book. These are people who specialise in selling secondhand cars, so why do they need a book to tell them what they should pay for it? Haven't they sold or seen sold enough cars to be able to know what they can sell it for, what costs they will occur in doing so, and what profit they would like to make to determine the price they are willing to offer you? On this basis, who needs a salesman? Sack him/her and install a computer linked to one of these guides, and it can all be done automatically, surely?

Part exchange valuations can be a nightmare for a dealer. If they offer too much, they've lost all profit on a deal, and too little, the customer will probably walk away.

There's two good reasons they use CAP and Glasses. One, although they might trade in second-hand cars, these guides reflect prices from sales trends (CAP also use actual sales information and always include monthly commentary into how each vehicle sector is performing), so they can't always know if a PX model is sort after or not. Second, in my experience of providing IT systems in the motor trade, in bigger dealerships there's always a steady turnover of salesmen. It's a job easily open to inexperienced people and so they could hopelessly under or over-value a part exchange without a guide to rely on.

But even the trade guides aren't faultless. I recall years ago using CAP Windows at work to look up Escort Cosworth values, and at a time when they were still trading for between £15-20k, the trade-in prices were less than £9k - the trade could only dream of those prices.

Having said all that, whenever I got a poor PX valuation on my cars I would quote CAP and the dealer would go strangely quiet!

 

[Karcsi]

Hmm, so it seems a salesman could be replaced by a computer quite easily. I would have hoped you'd have to know your business in order to run one successfully, when it seems all you need is a guide to justify why they are ripping you off. Nice.

I can understand someone needing a guide if a franchised dealer is taking on non franchise manufacturer's car. But even then, they usually phone up a go-between to get a price as they won't be selling it on their forecourt. But to rely on it for cars you deal with day in day out, that's verging on scandalous.

 

[benw123]

Hmm, so it seems a salesman could be replaced by a computer quite easily. I would have hoped you'd have to know your business in order to run one successfully, when it seems all you need is a guide to justify why they are ripping you off. Nice.

Actually, in practice, getting any computer process into a dealership is mind-numbingly difficult. When sales teams are busy, they couldn't care less about any software needed to help them, including pricing guides; but when footfall was down and they were chasing their targets, we'd suddenly get calls asking how to use the software to leverage more opportunities. Remember, for most dealers, retail and PX prices are fully negotiable - those that use fixed pricing tend not to do so well, so replacing salesmen with computers would be difficult!

I can understand someone needing a guide if a franchised dealer is taking on non franchise manufacturer's car. But even then, they usually phone up a go-between to get a price as they won't be selling it on their forecourt. But to rely on it for cars you deal with day in day out, that's verging on scandalous.

I wouldn't call that practice scandalous - the prices are always fair valuations I think - and after all, we all like to believe our cars are worth more than they actually are.

But as ever, it's buyer beware. If you're offered a low value for your PX, and the dealer refuses to negotiate, walk away. This is where you can start playing one dealer off another, even if they're part of the same group. My previous two new cars were Fords, which I bought with a fixed employee discount I had access to. With so many dealers around, I visited 12 in Herts to get the best PX deal. And it worked; I drove around 80 miles that day I reckon, but my old car gained £500 in value!

 

[disco_stu01]

Depends on what extras you get as well, I paid £13k for my 2004 53 plate 2.0tdi sport, had done 38k but had a lot of extras, parking sensors, bose 6cd stereo, window tints, new stainless steel exhaust, leather alcantara interior, all body work colour coded, had just had 2 new front tyres and had just had its service. If you think you're getting a good deal you most likely are so go for it!Doubt you'd regret it!!

 

[Eeef]

Hi all went and had a look at a silver 53 plate a3 2.0 tdi sport 3 door, has 45k on the clock private sell 1 owner from new, car serviced twice a recall was completed. Warranty until january.

Had a look around and cannot find a real world price! parkers indicates around 12k, but i cannot find any at this price!!!

Any input on prices greatly appreciated soon as!

In short, nothing. You should pay £17.5k for mine see below.

 

[kevlar]

Would like nothing more than buying yours....

 

[Covenant]

Simple guide to part exchange - don't mention it until you have settled on the price for the car you want to buy.

Dealers assume that every punter will be upset at a low px value and most are. If you can avoid this you can get some much better deals.

Get the price for what you want to buy. When you have beat him down as far as possible THEN ask for a price for your px. Yes, it'll be lower than some other offers but I guarantee the guys that give you more won't match the sell price of the car you want to buy.
There's no chance of him hiding a profit in the deal by bamboozling you with writeback figures plus you get to push him hard on the px price too.

If you don't think you are going to deal, get the guy to write down his offer and pretend you want to think about it. Then you have a bargaining chip for the next dealer "look, this guy offered me £xxx for my px"