BHM

Bloody hell! 80/100 hours per week & working 7 days a week!?!! This is 2018, anyone who needs to work anything like that needs a career change. DCS01, as for comments about selling more expensive stock, don’t believe the hype, shit sells! However you’ll have the distinct advantage of having a forecourt, and as such can charge more for your stock. By the sounds of it you’re going to have negligible overheads (overheads can kill you in this game) but I’d be very tempted to give it a year in your job & work overtime on your own business. As for taking advice from ‘er indoors, a lifetime of experience tells me the fairer sex is always keen on volunteering men to do the graft & keep their nests feathered - anything they perceive as a threat to this is automatically shot down in flames. And yes, I’ve a few failed relationships behind me

NOACROSS - 2 posts & I think you’ve totally summed up the situation with German wonder wagons. PS give me a Zafira any day of the week over a frigging Golf. They may have their problems but they’re cheap to fix and the owners are generally pleasant. Do the phrases “occasional problem”, “cheap fix” and “pleasant punters” remind you of VW? As the old thread asked something along the lines of “Are Golf owners wired up different?”

Too right. This country’s full of Nearly Men at the moment. Tbh an email from Johnny telling you he’ll take the car usually amounts to sweet f.a. anyway - how on earth business is conducted in the various souks & bizarres around the world is beyond me.

+1

Just like his customer - a chancer wanting something for f.a.

+1.

Good luck! I sell older stock than you but I haven’t touched a DSG in about 5 years when I could ‘feel’ a couple of 100K Passats I had at the time were not quite right. Tbh I was grateful they never came back. As for the 1.2, that’s always been a piece of shit with either chain issues or valve/head problems. REPLACE with a secondhand unit, cross your fingers & avoid this engine.

Haha, how apt this is. It happens. I buried my head in the sand over a gearbox fix & now I’ve had a car at a local gearbox specialist for over 18 months. The car’s in bits so can’t be moved, about 6mths ago I formally wrote to him to advise him I intend instigating a small claim blah blah. That got him on the phone whinging, promising the earth then f. all since. It’s apt because I’m just sat at the computer now joing the govt portal to instigate proceedings. FFS, what a way to do business. Tbh it’s a case of out of sight, out of mind & I don’t like to put a man down but I either write-off a £2500 car or try him through the courts system. The moral of this tale is only ‘go cheap’ if you know who your dealing with. I didn’t know him or his company but was lured in by the cheap price & am paying the price.

I’ve suddenly flatlined. Since before the weekend I’ve only had one phone call (telling me the deal I’ll give him!) & just one email from an alleged trader hoping to rape me over a lowish mileage diesel CRV (good luck on that score). Yet a friend who’s been dead for weeks has sold 5 since yesterday (Sunday) morning. Swings & roundabouts.

Errrr...I’m trying to add something else but I think you’ve said it all.

Yep, that’s why ‘specialists’ wipe such margins across their cars. They have to sit on them & endure every sad, pathetic, know-all, dreaming twat on the planet. I recently had a near-30yr old Merc in stock. I was sick of middle aged men sending their pathetic, embarrassingly long emails. Not that I answered any but I changed my advert to something along the lines of “Serious enquiries ONLY BY PHONE, emails will not be answered and only contact WHEN YOU HAVE THE MONEY & ARE READY TO DEAL”. Funnily enough not one of the email pen-pals could stretch to a phone call.

Absolutely. Mark, you have hit the nail on the head with your last sentence. You are realistic and understand your outgoings substantially reduce profits - something I’m not sure many realise when I hear them quoting fantasy profits. In this day & age overheads should be slashed to the bone. That’s why internet companies are king & high streets are dying on their knees - overheads. Give us a few more years & at this rate we’ll all be able to afford high street units just to use as car storage! Years ago I realised, from my one-man-band viewpoint, that the highlighted sentence above was king. SIMPLE AS THAT. If you want to keep it simple, as opposed to grow the business, then you can make as much as you can but if you’re pissing away thousands every month on rent, advertising etc. it amounts to little because it’s basic mathematics - incomings, minus outgoings, equals profit. It’s not rocket science but it’s where many small businesses struggle.

What’s wrong with laughing in their face? Stuff professionalism with a cheeky bastard like that, they need to know where they stand. Let them go to Tesco, load the trolley with £50s worth of produce, offer £30 & see what response they get.

I wouldn’t want to be that dealership! As for the rest of your post I couldn’t agree more. I think every single car, bar one, that I’ve bought over the last 4 months has needed spanner’s putting on it. The 7-10yr old stock at the block is generally in a pitiful state, the trade’s so desperate that just about every vendor on DA has turned into a shyster & Sytner’s dealerships’ assessors have all been instructed to under-appraise. However, as for the prices people are paying at the block! F*** me, yesterday I thought we were already experiencing January madness.

This time of year works wonders on the appearance of my stock. Everything looks shiney & scratch-free in the compound when the rain clouds are above us.

It’s good to hear the age of romance isn’t dead!!

Isn’t that his point?

Plodding on with just one old relic this week after a couple of very busy weeks & a strong couple of months. The trouble is is the latest sale always feels like it could be the last sale because, although I’ve had a good couple of months, enquiries are thin on the ground & most of my contact is from total & utter nutters. Oddly enough just about every other small 1 or 2 man operation I’ve spoken too are claiming the last 6 weeks have been desperate except for those working for peanuts & selling unprepped cars.

There are plenty in this game pretending to be the big man & are up to their necks in it. Some of these financial nutters seem to like working for everyone else but themselves & the need to shift metal has resulted in some poor margins on the mid range stock. Tbh if hard times close a few unsustainable businesses run by Champagne Charlies, as someone who believes in living within one’s means, I for one couldn’t give a hoot.

+1

I’ll not be shopping there again. Clearly one of the bad ones who are clearly ignoring blatantly obvious faults. Perhaps Phil Northard will send them some guidance on what is expected from professionals in the motor trade.

Stamford eh? I’ve just got a misdescribed Mazda from Donald’s - they must of been deaf when appraising. Funnily enough the invoice was issued by a different garage - Sycamore Vx. Anyhow I won’t be purchasing from Stamford anytime soon.

I’ve never ever had an ECU issue in a car.

You can ask but it’s down to YOU.

I could be wrong but I don’t see that model of 1.4 Golf as an ideal auction proposition, surely it’s a classified ad job. It’s far from being desirable in terms of model, engine or specification. Just cos it’s old & low miles doesn’t mean it’s desirable - the sort of tosser who’d want it won’t have much money & those with any money won’t want an underpowered Golf.