Max Branning

Best to self warrant if you can. Its not that difficult to do and remember even with the most expensive glitzy insurance warranty the customer can still reject the car or take you to court when they dont pay out - so best to cover it yourself in my opinion.

pushing the retail price up 200-300 pounds is not always an option though. If the cars retail money is 5k then i would say thats the best your going to get even with brand new wheels. It is just too competitive out there, buyers are driven by price and being able to "knock off" 200-300 is much easier than trying to add 200-300 to the retail figure in my opinion. Or else you could be stuck with that car for a long time to get the money you need to make it pay.

Unless they look really bad i would just leave it as is. Bung it up at your retail price and be prepared to knock a couple hundred off to get the deal done if they are fussy. It is suprising what some people will happily take if they get a few quid knocked off.

It does also depend on the kind of cars you are selling, not many people want a petrol 4x4 or a petrol estate car these types mostly go for a diesel.

S & B - You no longer need expensive roadside pitches i agree my response was to umesh asking how the motor trade will go in the future. My opinion is more and more traders will operate from home or cheap units as it is now very easy to be a trader on the internet. This will lead to retail prices dropping as roadside pitches will not be able to compete on price and lets face it most buyers are driven by price, it is easy now to do a 50 mile radius search of every car available in the trade and price compare, i know of several so called traders operating close to me who are selling cars at not much more than i would expect to pay for them!

Green giant - Why are you wishing me luck? this is not how we intend to operate, i am answering the original question with how i think motor trading will go in the future. And you have kind of backed it up with your response it is a bad situation when motor trading is done on the cheap ie from home or a cheap industrial units flogging them cheap online...it brings down the retail prices across the board leading to worthless margins.

Things will get tougher over the next few years i think, Roadside pitches will become a thing of the past as more and more traders operate from home or from cheap units on industrial estates driving down the retail prices of cars, this is especially at the £5k and under bracket. It will become a case of having to do massive volume to make it worthwhile.

Can anyone explain how it now works with offering finance to your customers and with the car loan companies that say "buy from any dealer" Do you still need to have a credit license to take finance payments from these companies. We are looking at offering finance to our customers and are wondering if it would be easier to just send the customer to a car loan company to sort out funds themselves or is this the wrong way to do things?

Can anyone recommend a good warranty provider ideally one that doesnt require up to date service history or a service prior to cover starting.