Nick M.K.

Two key words here: quality and buyers. I'm with these two and I also have eBay Motors Pro, Motors.co.uk and the free Car Gurus package. The odd lead comes from those.

No. He pressed the button mark as sold. But the advert was left live.

I agree, consider starting a youtube channel at least. Once you deal in cars you will have lots of content topics. What to look, how to buy, how to sell, how to prepare an advert, how to negotiate (or NOT) with a dealer, what to ask, what not to ask etc etc etc :-)

For me anyway :-)

I expressed frustration once because I’ll never set foot at Walsall again. Not knocking Northerners, just the ones working in Walsall BCA and the facility in general.

It is as if I hear myself speak. But not just the owners. If a car passes through several dealers like us that like to prep it's revitalized each time.

White spirit if you don't have a Stanley glass scraper Danny

Considering how often my buyers NEVER ask me for the number of previous owners I have to respectfully agree to disagree. I don't display number plates in my ads and don't give registrations over the phone so it's not easy for them to secretly check. A lot of people just don't care. Which means that you can not get a lot more money for the 1 owner stuff. It will just sit there longer, slightly dearer than the 4 owner cars until you find the one buyer willing to pay more. And another point: Our house is 1 owner. Is it worth more than other similar houses on the street ?

Define minting? Wet vac valet, machine polish, full alloy refurb on almost every set, PDR, bodyshop for even minor scratches at the bottom of the bumpers, interior leather repairs and conolising, non matching tyres on 1 axle get replaced with as new used or new. Then 2 days later we get to the mechanical nitty gritty and I can write for ages. But I am obsessive and half of my job satisfaction comes from the result after. I could easily sell a car with only half the prep I do. I know professional dealers that have never paid for a full wheel refurb. Still do OK.

I personally don't think low owners should make the Retail price of a car higher. And neither should the gender of the last owner. I've sold with 1 owner and I've sold with 6 owners. While one may be more desirable than the other and may sell faster (or easier) I would price them on condition first, then history, then spec. One of the worst cars I ever sold (it wasn't very bad but it should've been nicer for that age / miles) was a white Mini Cooper S with one lady doctor owner from new. It was absolutely filthy when I got it and required 3 times the usual amount of prep...

They buy the information from the dealership / manufacturer's order systems which are completed at the time of ordering the new car. If the car is not built to order (many Korean or Jap cars for example) the dealerships complete that information when they first receive the car. The check is very accurate on German and UK built cars, less so on Korean and Japanese for that reason.

£2.90 per car. I uploaded one here as an example which increased the value of the 6 year old Merc ML by approx £5000.

Diesel because they are now MUCH cheaper to buy, more reliable when used on long trips and will give you 50% more fuel economy. Oh, and their road tax is a fraction of the price compared to petrol (BMW 320D £20, Jaguar 2.0 petrol £240)

Do you know any "photography stars" that achieve the same result only with a mid-range camera and some talent :-) I know people that ABSOLUTELY go to town on the prep, spend 4 days to a week just valeting and detailing a car only to then go and take a blurry dark photo of it with their old phone, advertise it on Gumtree and trade it out unsold in 90 days. Learning what you need to do to a car to make it sell takes a long time and so does learning what you DON'T have to do. Will you believe me if I tell you that I've never cleaned or had an engine cleaned properly in 14 years of dealing?

I hate CarGurus but like AT. I especially like the fact that they don't display Above Market like CarGurus does. I actively use HPI Spec Check to increase the "marker" value of my stock (something I wasn't doing before) and as a result my sales prices and my margins have increased slightly!

Any prep you do over the minimum required to sell it quickly for the going retail price is effectively too much. Knowing where to stop takes years of trial.

But the Audi A3 as a product (irrespective of age) is all about style over substance and I think this video format makes this ad stand out compared to the typical walkaround used car video (including my own). Remember that the person that will buy it will not see it as end of life and it’s good that the video steers them away from that thought.

Enfield is my closest BCA site but I’ve never ever bought there. Not even once. Give me Bedford or even Blackbushe any day.

No. Because it only has 100 miles over what you stated no punter in their right mind will object to that but at 90000 you get in more searches. IF someone says something about you putting slightly lower miles you can say one of two things: When it arrived and we advertised it had just under 90K miles and after we've test driven it the figure is slightly higher. OR Due to customer feedback we have rounded the mileage very slightly so you have a chance to find the car if you limit your search to 90000 miles. We wouldn't want you to miss out on a car for the sake of 100-200 miles.

13) Remove photos of dashboard showing date and time. If it sticks in stock they can see it and can be put off

I had a look at the Audi A3 mostly. The location is OK, not great but not the worst I've seen. Similar to one of mine I sometimes use when the light is really low (https://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201811072224788). You can zoom in thye car a bit more to get rid of some of the background. 1) The £4050 price should be £3990 or £4000 or over £4190. Otherwise you don't appear in a lot of searches for the sake of £50 that EVERYONE will want to chip down. 2) The mileage of 90100 miles should absolutely be 90000 in your ad, again to be visible in searches 3) I like your text but remove half of the superlatives. Have a couple, sure but "fantastically smooth" as an example for the DSG gearbox is a bit over the top. 4) Remove the bit about NOT offering finance. You can do a finance deal with ZUTO for example and even if you don't want to work with them you can always get a customer to come, see the Audi, love it, then find the money somewhere else in a few days. 5) Remove the number of owners. It could put people off. If it's really important for someone they will ask over the phone. 6) Remove the payment by BACS or CASH bit. 7) With a service and MOT date like that put New MOT, New service or recent service. 8) Change the order of your images slightly so customers see the nice leather interior very early after clicking on your ad. Mix them up a bit :-) 9) Pick ONE photo of the alloy with the least amount of damage and use that. Don't give buyers a reason not to come and see the car. If you are worried about letting their expectations down put in your advert text "Some kerbing marks on alloys" 10) Use the world Petrol and the word Auto somewhere in your ad so if someone is specifically searching Google for a Petrol Audi Auto you have a chance of them finding it. 11) Pay attention to every little detail in your ads and if it bugs you - get rid of it. 12) If you have a landline number give it to Autotrader to display along with your mobile. Divert the calls to your mobile so you will always answer it. Use call whisperer.

Hi Tim, Pamporovo is where I go. Will be there from 1 to 4 Feb so will just miss you. The best night club (and it’s not dear nor fancy) is Plan B in The Perelik Hotel. You might as well try it if you don’t need to be out at 8:45 to catch the first lift up.

They wish they could afford me :-)

I only have another couple of weekends left with decent conditions, the first weekend of Feb I am taking 7 Brits from our village. Depending on how that goes I can organise a car-dealer only ski trip next year for those that 1) ski or 2) enjoy £1 pints of beer in winter conditions :-)

For the benefit of anyone curious about the economics of this* (*pre-Brexit): return Ryanair fare to Plovdiv, Bulgaria (my home town), £80-£90 including two cabin bags transport to resort: Free (I have my own car there) accomodation: Free (A friend has an apartment) 3 day ski-lift pass £76 meals out £30-£40 for the three days Knowing I didn't drop any of my prices during the slowdown: Priceless. Knowing that after 14 years of working like mad, 12 hour days, 7 days in most weeks I can do this: Even more priceless.