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Early this year we had a White Qashqai that was popular, and a good number of phone calls came in. First to get to us to see it loved it, and asked for a p/x price for their 55 plate X3. The X3 looked tidy enough, up on miles, and a quick drive showed that it pulled well, and apart from the handbrake warning light on,poor tyres, and associated road noise, nothing too bad. The owner advised that the handbrake light, stays on intermittently, most likely the switch he said. Sure enough, we had the handbrake on and off a few times whilst we were parked, and every time it went off. We made a fair offer, and deal done. Handover came, and we then took the X3 to the workshop we use for inspection. The report came back with dual mass slight knocking, and all tyres need replacing plus attention to the handbrake light. Apparently the handbrake light goes off, but then comes on again after moving forward. We thought it'd make a good car, so approved the work...Dual mass done, tyres done, handbrake light is not so easy. There are no other lights on the dash, however a full scan showed that the car had 4x4 faults...after a lot of head scratching we took the speedo cluster out and took it apart to find that the light tunnels for the 4x4, abs, and traction control warning lights, had been filled with black silicon sealant!!! I'm sure if we asked them, they'd have no idea how it happened, it wasn't them, it's always been like that... It's had hours spent on it, the transfer case motor has been changed but we can't get it to calibrate...all the light are still on,it's out of MOT and it's now dumped round the back where I can't see it... We are now better at looking that the lights on the dash come on before we start any potential p/x.

The only way to find out is too just do it, this way you will understand what everybody on this forum are trying to explain to you. It might take a month or a couple of years for you to figure it out but to be honest been doing this job for over 10 years now and can honestly say you will learn something new all the time. You might think it's a bit harsh but to be fair the advice you have been given is the best free advice you will ever get. Let us know how you get on with your first sale

You don't actually deserve to sell a car to anyone with that attitude pal , Taking money for a potential death is worth a good slap in my opinion . Every car we have bought needs something doing , and it gets done as well . People like you give us all a bad name . So i think you might be better looking for a shelf stacking job at Asda .

Often wish I did more mechanical training body repair training etc can do the basics but wish i had gained more qualifications , keep saying i might do some but too old now I often tell myself I should have 20 years ago and other days I tell myself i cant do everything myself anyway ..and lucky i have good contacts ..

I refer back to my original post that many main dealers do not fresh mot all stock yes there are many dealers who will sell without fresh mots and also various dealers who will sell without checks etc ask yourself this would you buy from one or put your family in it untested or no checks carried out I know I wouldn't some traders just want to make a quick buck also as above every dealer is different with regards to mot many will mot on arrival many will wait till sold many will do a bit of both many large main dealers have a large customer network a small home trader or local independent car dealer doesn't always have this luxury when customers return 3 or 4 times for replacement cars recommend family etc you know your doing something the right way . as I said small dealers are opening themselves up to problems if a major fault develops later down the line .or end up in court with an untested car sold with present mot Main dealers probably have funds and insurances etc available for this also large workshops staff etc to turn around warranty claims Also bearing in mind though there is 3 main dealers who freshly mot and warranty everything near me there is also 3 that don't anymore than 6 months mot it goes with that and 3 months warranty theres also a small dealership near me for sale which sells car unchecked but has a lot of bad google reviews . I could also tell you stories of guys that buy from auction and then sell them on pretending to be private sellers who bought the car for there niece but she didn't like it was the wrong colour etc it goes on has done for years and probably always will new pay and go sim and they have another car on next week doesn't mean its right though and as you said above there is dodgy people in every trade as to advisories there at the testers discretion so effectively the same car could go to one garage and get 10 advisories and be moted at a different car the next day with none or maybe more 10 more or 10 different ones extreme example but just to make the point and paint the picture . it may even just pass or fail at others as really the mot is at the testers discretion seen lots of cars with stuff advised to pass at a different garage the following year with no advisories but the advisory not having been done for example a tyre place may advise a tyre and a place that doesn't do tyres may not one piece of advice i would offer about any car ask yourself if you would be be happy to use it as your own personal car before you sell it thats normally a good indication again welcome to the forum and I do wish you luck . And hope your business works out for you keeps us all posted all the best .. good luck and finally give it a try or you will never know and ask yourself what if ..here to help

I think we have all had a few but the most memorable ones for me were 2 irish gents who rocked up in 2 lovely mercs to px. The cars were absolute stars, absolutely mint!! They were tough to deal but got there in the end. I was a young lad(A JUNIOR) at the time so had a load of help off the sales manager. Delivery day came and went with no collection, I wasn't overly concerned as we had good dippers off them. They rang about 3 days later and said they would be with us in the next week or so....did we need any more money etc etc. To cut a long story short they came one evening when it was blowing a fuckin hooley….torrential rain and all. Said they would be there at 6 and was still waiting at 7.30... they kept calling saying they were on their way. To cut a long story they dropped the cars and collected their new ones, they even said they were sorry for the state of their cars but they had been busy working and weren't as clean as when they brought them to px. We looked at the cars the next day when the valeters came to us and asked about the prep needed on the Mercs Fuck me..... the cars were not the same cars as we had seen a month or so. We had been absolutely stitched to the hilt, they had had paint all over, needed some more....holes in seats and a dog had eaten part of a headlining in one of them. Thank fuck I was a junior, my SM nearly got the sack as he had gone early and left me alone.... we blew 8k on the 2 cars trading them, funnily enough to an Irishman. I have never fallen for that one again but I chuckle about it now.

Hi Arash, What you've done probably isn't the best way of understanding what other people are doing, and you have to decide what you want to do. Some dealers might not MOT a car until it's sold and some might as you say just not bother and sell it with the MOT that is has, obviously this can be a dangerous game to play and you could be selling something that had a moody MOT three months ago and be a complete death trap. You need to either have a mechanic inspect your cars or have a new MOT, ideally both but as a minimum a new MOT. You must be sure what you're selling is safe, don't be one of these 'dealers' that thinks a PDI is removing the auction stickers! Your question regarding the £700 car and the £1600 car should be self explanatory, firstly no two cars are the same. The more expensive car has no advisories so is priced accordingly, the cheaper car with the advisories might need hundreds of pounds to correct and bring to the same standard as the more expensive car. Good luck with your venture.

First lesson is no two cars are the same. Second, the £700 will sell first. Third, the £700 might, ironically, be a better car than the £1600 one. Fourth, the £700 might be a damaged repaired car. Fifth, it might not be, but the £1600 might be. Sixth, the MOT testers discretion will dictate the advisories. Confused yet? Its the nature of the trade, nothing is simple or straightforward. There's no rules to pricing. With regards to whether they are a mechanic or not, how on earth are we to know? Perhaps phone them and ask?

Again, on the banger money PX - I just don't bother driving them. If I have cleared a couple out of the retail and allowed £500 on the swapper, I just scrap them for about £150 or whatever I can get and still make a nice drink out the overall deal. This often happens when a dealer down the road gets all fussy about their PX and bids scrap money, customer gets all pissed off and dealer ends up making nothing whereas; I have still made a fair chunk and just have to make one call to get the junk lifted. Short sighted customers - all hooked on how much I allowed on the PX.

Not long after we opened, we took an old 1.3diesel Hyundai Getz in for sale. Customer was "devastated to part with it", decent MOT, looked fine offered him £500 to get the deal done (didn't bother driving it out of the yard). Happy customer leaves with his new i20, Ryan takes the Getz to the local shop, starts a 3 point turn and cuts out in the middle of the road. Managed to get it going again but there was no reverse! Ended up spares or repairs on eBay with fuel and gearbox problems. Had another customer a week or two later, PX and old focus. Lives 2 streets away so had walked up to test drive the Volvo he wanted. Mileage on PX please, 103k he said. No problem, we'll give you £700 for it. Deal done, he returns that evening for handover, our mechanic test drives the PX which is fine and new car goes out. About to ring the guy who has our cheap stuff, looking through the MOT history - last MOT 180K miles, check the car 198k miles!! A few lessons quickly learnt, thankfully they weren't too expensive! -Kelly-

I had one guy say his new girlfriend was vegan and was slowly making him change his diet, that she had put three bins in the kitchen for recycling, all natural shampoo, oat milk in the fridge and, of course, HATED the fact he had a diesel car. It was a constant bug bear apparently. I test drove his part ex and it drove very well. Listened for all the normal noises and it seemed okay. Anyway, after explaining that diesels were hideously unpopular I offered him a lowish amount for it... hoping to retail it at a nice profit. Hand over day comes, he's been in the car all day and because it's the end of the day and it's got a load of fuel in it I decide to drive the car home. Get back home and the flywheel's rattling it's tits off. The only way I didn't hear that on the day is the car wasn't warm enough. I remembered he called me the day he was viewing to say he'd been delayed half and hour when originally the journey was 20 minutes. He also turned up with a Costa. It's clear to me he sat and had a coffee while the car cooled so the noise wasn't as obvious. Made a wedge out of the one I sold him and a little on the part ex so I don't resent it and if he'd have rang with a whinge I'd have had a whinge back.

Drug dealers... Scammers and con men They can afford to pay it. As long as they get a bit of paper saying where they bought a motor... Then sell it at a loss... And top it up with some drug money they not bothered mate. Cars are always the easy way to wash dirty money Then you got your dreamer dealers who dont check prices and bid because they think they can flog it for even more...

What do you mean? All customers are honest upstanding citizens and would never do such a thing. It's those secondhand car dealers!!

Ha, you're not alone! I had a mint 93 K Reg 205 GTi 1.9 in white, 58k miles, perfect history, sold it for £2500, which was strong money for it back then......!!

I would have kept my 1990 Miami Blue 205 1.9 Gti with 70k on the clock and countless MK2 Golf GTIs. I’d probably be retired by now if I had!

The only thing I would do differently is to have started doing what I do much sooner. I have been fortunate to have seen rapid growth in the last 18 months (since starting again). Imagine where I would have been if I had restarted 10 years ago.

I suppose it all depends what he did before David, if he was lifting 300 quid a week in a crap job he might feel he is ringing the bell now. You can see he is getting in deeper, he can't see it. This next year will sort the wheat from the chaff!

Aston Barclay last night was absolutely eye watering, some cars were going £1000 over cap clean..... I went to the cafe and ate shepherds pie and beans. It was the highlight of my night

It's always good to have your fingers in a couple of pies Hamski. I use two brokers, one for prime customers and one for customers that might not look so good on paper. They have different advantages and disadvantages, my prime broker pays more commission but the paperwork involved is a ball breaker and is probably responsible for the lack of wood in the Amazon with all the printing of documents and getting the customer to come back in to sign. Then I have to create a special invoice for them and rescan everything and send it all back to them. My other finance company is more efficient and call the customers themselves and sort out all the documentation with them directly so I literally just just reply with their V5 doc ref and sign an email and return it and it's all done, though they pay much less in commission. It's nice to deal with a smaller broker as you get to speak with the main man which can be helpful when things get a bit tricky. Good luck anyway.

We sell cars up to 15k, if we take a car in part ex and we think it is worth resseling even a 500/600/1000 etc car we still do a full workshop check and often a new m.o.t just like we do with every other car we sell to make sure everything is safe and sound, ok cosmetics may not get that much attention but I would not sell any car that I hadn't checked over.

If I had a car on stocking or outright and it was at 90 days I would just end up cutting my losses, taking a hit and shifting it on.Buy something else, take some finance comm, take in a nice PX. There is a lot of silly old men in the trade who think anyone who pays over cap clean for a car is 'money laundering drug dealer innit'. Many, many businesses make funding work for them. Some don't. That being said some people with a big pot of money owning all their stock still take losses and still mess up when buying. Keep up that kind of activity and your out of a job funded or not. Cars are worth what anyone wants to pay for them. Set your limits and worry about yourself and what you can do.

Watched BCA BMW Sale this morning and xdrive 330d and 335d 64/66 plates were average £1,500/£2,000 over CAP Clean and same price as Autotrader Retail cars on sale , Madness pure madness . Watched one two months ago , needed two front tyres , MOT and wheel refurb . Nice thing was at £13,500 really max and that was well over CAP , I know this model are rare and make more than book but you still need a profit margin in that sort of stuff . The bloody thing sold at £16,000 on the hammer , Gold card fees and assured report + plus online fee would be £16,500 out the door , local place to us bought it . Put £18,495 on it , it didn't sell surprise surprise and today its on sale at less than they paid for it still wants refurb wheels and two tyres , So the dopes who do this are not helping prices are they , probably forgot what they bought it for . watched a 3.0 litre petrol BMW last month fetch £12,500 on the hammer + fees " I had a strong £11,000 for it max ", found it online for sale at £13,295 , who can work on £300 on 13k . Even if its finance its not worth doing it for . Daft times for sure , oh well onwards and upwards ,