Well,

MY05STI has been sold....6 months old and she had to go.... boo hoo....

any way just though I would let you all know to be carefull out there, It has been in Autotrader for just 2 weeks before I sold it, and I had at least 3 doddgy call's just asking info about the car and then asking for my address...

It seems people use the autotrader to shop for cars to pinch.....

I know this as one of my friends made the sorry mistake and got his type r pinched...

But for me I was ready for the call I would only meet people at a local Pub !!!! far away from my address....

 

Yep, good advice, always arrange the meeting in a public place, preferably with CCTV. If the prospective buyer wants to know why -as they suspect you may be a trader on the sly- explain that it's a high performance car popular with theives and you're not prepared to give out your address untill its necessary i.e. at the transaction stage.

NS04

 

its just struck me...when i bought mine it was a private sale from the auto trader and the guy told me his address over the phone straight away...never crossed my mind until reading this...!!!

 

problem is i wouldn't buy a car off someone who wouldn't tell me their address->

they could have just knicked it off some poor b@stard

 

Thats very good advice mate.

 

Not a problem mate, a HPI check and an examination of the car's documentation will soon revel if thats the case. It's not that you don't give you address ever, you just don't give it out over the phone straight away before you've even met the buyer to establish if the person is genuinely interested in the car. If they're genuine, they'll understand.

NS04

 

Of course the other way of looking at it would be to leave the keys on the door mat, let it be stolen and claim on your protected insurance. If the car is 6 months old you would get a good payout, maybe more so than with a private sale.........

 

a good tip for a quick hpi check is to text the word 'check' then the reg number to 88600, this will give you an instant quick reference, and is cheap.
peace of mind can't ever be too expensive!!!!!!!!!!

 

I try to sell my cars from my works address - I spend most of my time there so it makes sense (and I can crack on doing something else if they are a no show).

 

^^ good plan mate. and you get a few mins off work

 

And they'll see the staff car park, including the MD's car, which will most likely be nicer. So if they were a thief, with any luck they'll come back and take theirs instead.

NS04

 

I would never buy off anyone who wanted to meet in a pub!! I wouldn't even turn up to view!!

But, meeting at work is an excellent idea .... I will be surrounded by Police with machine guns and side arms, big dogs waiting in the pen and an electric fence to hide behind

Pete

 

All that to make sure you do your job!

 

yep yep, my boss has a 360 spider, merc SL500 & boxster. all with sick number plates worth upwards of £50k each (on the ferrari & merc anyway, he never drives the boxster)

i took him out in the scoob yesterday (i'm still running it in) i hadn't got out of first before he said "calm don't, don't kill us"

that made me laugh!

 

Are you doing a long stretch for armed robbery or something per chance?

 

And scoobynet too...

I had a call from the police the other day to confirm I was in fact the owner of the Scoob that's registered in my name. They'd just arrested a bunch of suspects for a string of local robberies, and found printouts of scoobynet cars for sale in their posession (including mine). Apparently the ******* have been known to register cars in false names before using them for raids.

Andy

 

As a minimum I would advise that you take a *land line* number off the prospective buyer and then call them back on it. Explain that you need land line number and you will call them right back with your address, if they take more than a few seconds to come up with one then I would suspect a rat.

Secondly, I would ask to see ID from the prospective buyer, photo id that is before you let them near the car.