Selling car privately - what to do about insurance for test drives?

Raider · 12 Jun 2011 at 12:43

Will be selling my Boxster S over the next couple of weeks and obviously need to arrange for buyer test drives. However I'm a bit concerned about insurance.

Quite often their insurance will cover driving another car with the buyer's permission but only 3rd party cover. My nightmare scenario is letting the potential buyer take the car out for a spin (with me obviously) and have him/her ding it on a curb, or scrape a wall, or something much worse.

Is it just a risk I have to take? Any advice? Thanks!

Raider · 12 Jun 2011 at 12:52

Just tried Day insure, they say "The vehicle has been identified as 'PORSCHE BOXSTER S Cabriolet 3387cc, 2dr Petrol Manual (06-09)' and unfortunately we are unable to offer insurance for this vehicle"

Will look for an alternative..

Raider · 12 Jun 2011 at 13:02

Ok looks like nobody will touch it for short term insurance.. I guess buyers will either have to sit in the passenger seat then! That or I take a gamble..

Raider · 13 Jun 2011 at 09:07

Thing is, if I was buying my car, I'd want to have a thorough test drive, on country roads, motorway and town driving. So a quick spin around the industrial estate would be totally unacceptable.

I think I'll have to go with Peerzy's suggestion, passenger seat ride only, unless they sort out their insurance. I will ring my insurance company today though and see what they can do..
EDIT: My insurance company won't add a new driver temporarily to my insurance. So that one is out of the question now! Man this is tricky...

Raider · 13 Jun 2011 at 13:46

Sin_Chase said:
You don't test drives peoples private sales like you would a dealer car. It's to see if the car is mechanically sound and fit for sale, not to see how you like it wherever you want to drive it.

They should find a dealer example if they want to abuse that model of car for a day. A passenger ride should be sufficient to placate them if they are unwilling to arrange their own insurance.

That's a very good point. Hopefully a serious buyer would have checked some other ones out at Porsche first.