E86 value - have they got it wrong?

[pvr]

On the distrust side - if I look at the cost quoted for a gear linkage bush (plastic sleeve basically) on my Golf, they quoted £290 whilst the part I bought for 30 pence and fitting is literally 1 bolt to remove, slide the sleeve in, and tighten. Yes - in that case you would always think from that dealer that if they quote that for something so simple, what else are they doing to customers.

 

[Beerman]

I could write a book about dodgy cars and dodgy practices at car dealers. The problem is rife throughout the industry.

I don't think the margins on your average family car are great, but more dealers are getting involved in slightly older sporty cars or potential future classic and can make bigger profits on them.

Also look how many buyers end up taking out high interest rate finance, hugely inflated insurance policies for GAP, alloy wheels and tyres, smart repairs, paint protection and fabric coatings that aren't applied, and warranties that cover nothing.

Salespeople force all these policies and extras far too hard.

Recently dealers had to stop offering GAP insurance due to the massively inflated costs and commission payments they were receiving. Dealers were getting about 70% of the policy cost as commission.

 

[STC_Zed]

On the distrust side - if I look at the cost quoted for a gear linkage bush (plastic sleeve basically) on my Golf, they quoted £290 whilst the part I bought for 30 pence and fitting is literally 1 bolt to remove, slide the sleeve in, and tighten. Yes - in that case you would always think from that dealer that if they quote that for something so simple, what else are they doing to customers.

Repairs are different to sales, but for main dealers that is where the money is. I don’t think they make a huge amount in sales typically (I’m taking the likes of Sytner etc) but they make a killing on servicing and cutting corners on it. A friend had an F10 M5 with fuller dealer history that started running like a bag of spanners. He took it to an indy who could look at it quicker and he basically said it’ll be plugs 4 and 8; they won’t have been changed because it’s a crap job to do. He pulled them and they’d never been changed. My friend hand been charged for them on past services though….

Look at what a dealer charges for an oil change; my M140i was £299 for oil and a filter. Which is nuts really.

 

[STC_Zed]

I could write a book about dodgy cars and dodgy practices at car dealers. The problem is rife throughout the industry.

I don't think the margins on your average family car are great, but more dealers are getting involved in slightly older sporty cars or potential future classic and can make bigger profits on them.

Also look how many buyers end up taking out high interest rate finance, hugely inflated insurance policies for GAP, alloy wheels and tyres, smart repairs, paint protection and fabric coatings that aren't applied, and warranties that cover nothing.

Salespeople force all these policies and extras far too hard.

Recently dealers had to stop offering GAP insurance due to the massively inflated costs and commission payments they were receiving. Dealers were getting about 70% of the policy cost as commission.

Yeah there are some real sharks out there but there are some good eggs too.

The main dealers are particularly bad in my experience; they’re selling finance not cars in reality. I got so cheesed off with my local Sytner trying to buy my M140i. I ended up using TRL who cut through all the BS.

 

[Beerman]

I could write a book about dodgy cars and dodgy practices at car dealers. The problem is rife throughout the industry.

I don't think the margins on your average family car are great, but more dealers are getting involved in slightly older sporty cars or potential future classic and can make bigger profits on them.

Also look how many buyers end up taking out high interest rate finance, hugely inflated insurance policies for GAP, alloy wheels and tyres, smart repairs, paint protection and fabric coatings that aren't applied, and warranties that cover nothing.

Salespeople force all these policies and extras far too hard.

Recently dealers had to stop offering GAP insurance due to the massively inflated costs and commission payments they were receiving. Dealers were getting about 70% of the policy cost as commission.

Yeah there are some real sharks out there but there are some good eggs too.

The main dealers are particularly bad in my experience; they’re selling finance not cars in reality. I got so cheesed off with my local Sytner trying to buy my M140i. I ended up using TRL who cut through all the BS.

I've not heard of TRL for a while. He did offer good deals on cars and I liked the way he was open with the deals.

What I didn't like is when he worked in tandem with Motech selling modified cars. Doing the modifications invalidated the warranty and he shouldn't have been involved in deals like he was doing. When challenged about the warranty situation he was evasive about it. He became the evasive salesman pocketing extra money.

I remember some of the cars ended up poorly modified. They didn't check the tracking after changing springs and adding spacers.

 

[STC_Zed]

I could write a book about dodgy cars and dodgy practices at car dealers. The problem is rife throughout the industry.

I don't think the margins on your average family car are great, but more dealers are getting involved in slightly older sporty cars or potential future classic and can make bigger profits on them.

Also look how many buyers end up taking out high interest rate finance, hugely inflated insurance policies for GAP, alloy wheels and tyres, smart repairs, paint protection and fabric coatings that aren't applied, and warranties that cover nothing.

Salespeople force all these policies and extras far too hard.

Recently dealers had to stop offering GAP insurance due to the massively inflated costs and commission payments they were receiving. Dealers were getting about 70% of the policy cost as commission.

Yeah there are some real sharks out there but there are some good eggs too.

The main dealers are particularly bad in my experience; they’re selling finance not cars in reality. I got so cheesed off with my local Sytner trying to buy my M140i. I ended up using TRL who cut through all the BS.

I've not heard of TRL for a while. He did offer good deals on cars and I liked the way he was open with the deals.

What I didn't like is when he worked in tandem with Motech selling modified cars. Doing the modifications invalidated the warranty and he shouldn't have been involved in deals like he was doing. When challenged about the warranty situation he was evasive about it. He became the evasive salesman pocketing extra money.

I remember some of the cars ended up poorly modified. They didn't check the tracking after changing springs and adding spacers.

I guess his business model has been hammered by limited supply and the lack of deals post Covid. I think he did pretty well selling cars via BabyBMW.

The Motech tie up was sketchy and I’m surprised he was able to use BMW Finance given how funny they can be about modding PCP’d cars (for obvious reasons).

I did like the totally clear prices though; this option is likely to add £x per month etc. There were no silly handovers either which I appreciated. I’d definitely buy from him again. Much easier to deal with than the sakes team at my local Sytner.

 

[Z450]

From my experience at a main dealer there is not much money in the cars. However as mentioned above add on products, and servicing can generate a lot more!

Horrible when you hear stories of expensive service charges and the work has not been done!

 

[DaveP]

Let me show you something. An example of a z4 3.0si manual going through auction this week. Look at the book price £1650. And I expect it to finish around that from what I’ve been watching for the last few months.
I’ve also been seeing coupes with 100k going through at less than £4K.

Not only these cars but 95% of cars have tanked. People are asking some crazy prices privately and they have been sitting on them for months. Just check out the sale section on here.
The market dictates the price and not the sellers.
IMG_0534.png

Not being funny, but if I were a dealer then I'd look at an end price for a 100k roadster in good nick and work backwards.

Say, £4,000, less £1,000 profit, less £1000 for the extra 36k on the clock, less £1000 to £1,500 for repairs, cleaning, detailing, providing a warranty, fees. £500 to £1,000 is what I'd want to pay... dealers work on insanely low margins.

It's not really surprising, is it?

There's a reason why dealers aren't tripping over themselves to buy 20yo Boxsters either. Older, complicated cars are a massive liability if you're a small dealer. Taking a hit on a couple of cars with undisclosed faults would put a decent dent in the wallet for them. This is why you see most used car dealers trying to focus on run-of-the-mill stuff, or reselling trade-ins that bigger dealers didn't want.