Not Getting Ripped Off In Private Sale

That's exactly how it works though, each imperfection has a deductable value - a value you can tell well in advance by putting any areas of damage etc into the valuation tool.

People only end up surprised by what they offer if they don't accurately enter the details to start with
 
You will rarely get the stated offer from WBC no matter what you class the cars condition as being in they will go over it with a fine toothcomb so the stated value will drop quite quickly
I would suggest you be realistic if you are planning on selling to WBC- the only advantage is you get the cash transferred to your account within 4 days so you don't have to indulge people who want to offer you a ridiculous price and waste your time
However, they are a business they take a cut before selling to auction who then take another cut before selling on to trader to take his cut -its business
 
I bought my car privately and viewed it with a mechanic so I knew I wasn't getting a dud. The buyer let us tinker with it for about an hour before we haggled a final price based on what we discovered compared to what the description said. Did a bank transfer after inspecting all the documents and sorted the V5 out. Pretty painless process to be fair! My advice would be make sure your description is absolutely spot on if you go private or you give people some serious haggling ability if you fail to declare issues, regardless of how minor.
 
WBAC have to sell the car on. That costs money too. So what they give you, they usually can make at least £500+ to make it worth their while. The more expensive the vehicle the more this will be.

I would always try and sell for significantly more than what they offer.
 
While I'm sure that no-one is especially interested in my personal sales journey, I will share my conclusions after attempting a private sale.

I stuck the car on autotrader at their recommended price of £3550.

The first caller was a man from a nearby town interested in making a purchase, he informed me. Yeah, bruv, what it is like yeah bruv innit I want to buy your car yeah innit bruv. He said he would call later in the week to arrange a visit.

The second caller was similar: yeah mate what it is right bruv, that I want to offer YOU £1200 for your car, bruv. After I informed him that WBAC had offered me £3000, so I in no uncertain terms rejected his generous offer, he grudgingly raised it to £1400, amongst a further plethora of yeahs, bruvs, innits and 'what's your best prices'. The next day he phoned once more to offer £1550, at which point I blocked his number to save myself from further nonsense.

The first man called later and I had a discussion with him. He claimed to have recently passed his test, but betrayed a disturbingly high level of knowledge about car dealers and WBAC. Nontheless I agreed that he could come and look at the car.

In the interim, I visited WBAC, who went over the bodywork with a fine toothcomb, knocking £60 off here and there, along with two lots of £127 for a couple of scratches beneath the front and back bumpers. I suggested that their price of £2600 was not sufficient, at which point the salesman unsuccessfully attempted to haggle me into selling it with a slightly increased offer (I later discovered they are on some sort of commission for knocking down the price).

By now I had sufficient concerns regarding the first gentleman that I sent him a text to let him know that the car was sold, even though it certainly wasn't. This seemed to upset him for some reason and he sent me various texts in reply asking how much I'd got for it, which I ignored. He followed up with a phone call at 10:30pm when me and my wife were asleep, followed by further text messages asking why it was still on autotrader. I then blocked his number.

With the insurance on the car due to expire the following day, I took the car to Evans Halshaw. As I'd hoped, they looked at it as a smart, high-spec Nissan Note that would buff up nicely and shift off their forecourt in less than a week. I sold them the car for £2949, which I was content with all told.

CONCLUSION: This is why you don't see many private adverts in autotrader any more. The time wasters, griefers and tyre kickers still exist, but they have fewer private individuals to badger, so you stand a higher chance of encountering one.
 
So you put it on AT, had one interested buyer looking to make his first car purchase, then gave him the run around and blocked his number...

In the end selling it for less than trade value after wasting hours of your time at WBAC.
 
I don't know how some of you have major problems selling a car. I've only ever sold one to a trader and about 12 privately to the first person to view.

Surely you can work someone out on the phone, if they sound nice enough and ask the right questions then I will deem them welcome to come to my home and view. If they don't, then I will make my excuse to kill the call. It only takes a few words to know who you want to deal with.

Works both ways of course, I went to view a car last week, the car was decent but the seller was a complete.. well I can't say. I just walked away as I was completely unwilling to give him my money despite the car being decent and actually bought one in worse condition (but better history/mechanically) out of principle as the seller was genuine, honest and accommodating :)
 
Quite, when I sold my first car genuinely I had forgot to MOT it, we had 3 cars and a VAN, they all were due MOT's + services within a week or 2 of each other and mine just got forgotten.

First person came around and we were both perplexed as to why we couldn't find the MOT cert.

Looked it up, saw it was a month out, I apologized profusely, and got it booked in over the phone while they were there. Drove it with them to the test center, got it tested, passed with flying colors and the car was sold.
 
WBAC offered £2100 for the Wife's 2010 Peugeot, so went with that thinking it would be hassle free. The car only came with one key and had a scratch on two panels, so I described that. Somehow they managed to come back with a valuation of £1250 on the day! I talked them back up to £1550, but it was a Pyrrhic victory in all honesty. Realistically it wasn't worth my time to leave at that point and then to advertise and so on.
 
Psycho Sonny said:
WBAC have to sell the car on. That costs money too. So what they give you, they usually can make at least £500+ to make it worth their while. The more expensive the vehicle the more this will be.

I would always try and sell for significantly more than what they offer.
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Negative.

Source: used to work there.

If they give you a low quote, it's just a polite way of saying 'not interested' - because the route most vehicles go generally generates low returns for those kinds of cars. If it's clean and in demand, however, they'll usually deliver a decent price because they can knock it through the local auction with no trouble for a predictable return.
 
paradigm said:
So you are saying that WBAC don't have to make a profit on their stock?
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Losses weren't uncommon, but as long as the net trend was positive then that was fine. I should have clarified; what I was getting at was they don't look to make anywhere near £500+ on each car. It's a fraction of that.

Obviously the more the merrier, but volume was really the key :)
 
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