Anyone bought a runaround at auction?
 

Just need a small cheap car < £1200 and wondered about getting a "bargain" from a car auction house ;)

Any experience? Good or bad?

dl

i bought an escort rs 2000 from the auctions once nice car and all in all a bit of a buzz a pleasant experience and good price too best thing to do is get there early and have a thorough look around the car your interested in have a price in mind and stick to it shouldnt go so far wrong :thumb:

A guy I know's daughter bought a mini from auction, after 20 miles the engine had a massive failure and now needs replacing, there is no come back from the auction, make sure you have a really good look at what your buying.

there are different categories at auction now as far as im aware most of them now offer a weeks guarantee on engine and gearbox etc but as i said in my earlier reply always get there early and have a really good look dont be scared of popping the hood either as a lot of the time they are unlocked :thumb:

Silly thing, but was any of the fluid levels actually checked? Thats the thing with auction cars; Assume they ALL need a service and are low on fluids (most cars are low on oil as the average person never checks it between services), and at the very least need a set of front pads and tyres.

My mate's car had a oil filter so rusty it was actually leaking through the metal! A few more miles and it would have burst and wrecked the engine (burst filter = no oil pressure).

Depends what you want, I'm looking for a sub £500 runabout and I've had them off ebay in the past, there's also a few on autotrader...

Bad experience:

Ex-mister bought one about 16 years ago. It was a white sports MG with MG written in red on both sides of the car. Red and white sports seats. Quite cool to look at. He only did 2 miles round trip to and fro work, but it croaked it in 5 months. Gearbox went duff. :( He had to pay some scrappy to take it away.

my friend buys loads from the auctions - primarily newer/pricier cars, but makes a lot of money from them.
He tends to buy the ones with minor faults. As he is also a very good mechanic with many years experience, invariably there is little that he can't spot or fix.

he's just looking out for a V50 for me at the moment - I have every faith he'll find one, and once he's worked his OCD on it, it will be fine. My budget's around £1500.....

It's possible to get good cars. But it's also easy to get bitten if you don't know what you're doing.

i allways get my cheap winter hacks from ebay or autotrader.i think you can allways tell how a car has been treated by the owner.the last two i have had are mk3 golf gti 8v,nice little cars in my opinion.there are alot of bargains out there if you have a look about.

Most small traders and plenty of the big ones send their **** to auction as thats what they are there for, unless you have contacts to give you a heads up its a pretty big gamble to buy from one. I have watched the prep work to keep a car running long enough to get through the block and sent a few myself that I know would not last a mile. You can get good cars there but they would be 3-4 year old ex main dealer stock and you still have to know what you are doing. You would also need a trade account with some to take the edge of the shockingly high fees for non trade bidders.

Try and buy from main dealer part exchanges. Usually older or high mileage stuff.

DO NOT BUY ANYTHING WHICH HAS BEEN ENTERED PRIVATELY! There are a few genuine bargains but mostly people enter problem cars.

Cheap car here David...
https://www.scoobynet.com/other-marq...ter-650-a.html

Friend of mine buys his cars from the auctions, always get ex police cars, the ones where none of the repair work has been done.

Fills the roof and dash himself, they come with 12 months MOT, FSH and 4 new tyres, he swaps it every 12 months and always makes money.

He is doing the work himself though, so I would expect filling the gaps left by the police would be costly.