Ex hire car for sale

I

IKZ4

Member
Hi,

Was idly browsing on e-bay as you do, and after doing a supercar driving experience a few weeks ago thought I'd check R8 prices (dream on...). Well, bu##er me, the very car I drove is for sale at £50k!

Lovely drive, my first V8 experience and my first mid engined drive, so I had a great day. But the ad says 1 demo and 1 owner... Well, one owner that has let loads of unknown drivers into the car and had them thrash it at every opportunity over nearly 50k miles!! I thought the ad was really naughty in not revealing the cars use, it's effectively been a hire car, but am I being too sensitive? Maybe the seller will reveal the info if asked about its history. If it was my £50k I'd look elsewhere for sure!
 
Yeah that is a weird one. You'd know the service history etc would be ok, and the car will have been well maintained. But the usage would be questionable, as you say 4,000 eager car thrasher drivers is not stated....!

However, if you watched the recent BBC 2 documentary of "how to build a supercar" they drove the Mclaren mp12 to destruction on a test track, almost flat out for tens of thousands of miles, if not more. The car took it well.

Could be a good buy, could be a nightmare. Tricky :?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
You'd also be in the same position with Mondeos/Passats/Insignias, as the majority of them will come from some fleet or another, whether that's someone like Lex or Inchcape running them for a small/big business or for a rental company like Hertz/Avis/Enterprise/etc.

However the 'salesman' might only claim 'one owner from new', or dealer/BMW management car.
 
Ewazix said:
As someone once said, "hire cars are like cheap whores....." well you fill in the rest :oops: .
Click to expand...

They give you the clap and nick your wallet ? :o

:tumbleweed:
 
Very naughty to not declare, but it's up to the buyer to figure things out.
A track car will be the equal of many time more wear and tear of a road car. Steering, suspension, drivetrain, etc. The only reason the track company is selling it is because the maintenance now exceeds depreciation/service/spares on a newer one.

A high mileage fleet car can be a great buy as it will have charged up and down the motorway and been well serviced. A hire car from Hertz will have been dented and dinged and most panels repaired, resprayed, couple to hundreds of couldn't care drivers, so a different story.
 
Its an interesting discussion and well worth page space for a natter .....

what would you rather have ..............

a high mileage, well used well looked after motor .....
or a low mileage, neglected machine.

Perfect example, I have an R6 motorcycle that has been on a race track since 2000 ...... I just put it back to road trim and will use it on the road next year .......
but its always been well used, never seen a normal road ..... was raced full on for the best part of 6 years ...... but had an oil chane and filter after say every 5 hours of use. was constantly being worked on so everything was A1 ... etc etc etc.
Interestingly 2 identical machines, one run in properly and one raced out of the crate. Both put on a dyno at 6 months ..... run in bike gave 118 rear wheel hp ....... raced bike gave 124 .......

Personal I look for "well looked after" ................
 
Ewazix said:
As someone once said, "hire cars are like cheap whores....." well you fill in the rest :oops: .
Click to expand...

Seem like a good deal, but sooner or later will bite you in the arse?

...what's that? Too weird? :D
 
BMWZ4MC said:
Ewazix said:
As someone once said, "hire cars are like cheap whores....." well you fill in the rest :oops: .
Click to expand...

Seem like a good deal, but sooner or later will bite you in the arse?

...what's that? Too weird? :D
Click to expand...

Each to their own, I say :D
 
Bing said:
BMWZ4MC said:
Ewazix said:
As someone once said, "hire cars are like cheap whores....." well you fill in the rest :oops: .
Click to expand...

Seem like a good deal, but sooner or later will bite you in the arse?

...what's that? Too weird? :D
Click to expand...

Each to their own, I say :D
Click to expand...


Just spent ages trying to find a clip of the weird little man (Miller) on the Armstrong and Miller show who shares just a bit too much information when in polite company, and follows it up with, "Was that a bit too weird?" whilst the others look horrified. The fact that I can find no youtube videos of him is very disappointing!
 
I've got no problem with a 'high mileage, well looked after machine', but you just know the fleet/hire car ones will have had the bare minimum servicing done (maybe at a 'trade' rate at the dealership) and nothing else.
 
BMWZ4MC said:
...and no caring owner to check up that all that should be done was done
Click to expand...

Sometimes this can be the best of buying a car 2nd hand. A face to face with the owner to gauge how much the car has been looked after.

Can go both ways, but at least you get a feeling for the care of the car buying private, as opposed to a car sat on a fourcourt with a salesman who knows nothing about the car....


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Cant believe the seller would leave off such valuable information like that. " 1 owner + thrashed by 100s of other people on a race track to within an inch of its life" Great selling point :roll:

This reminds me when browsing AUCs there was a black 3.0si roadster which for some reason the number plate seemed quite familiar. Turned out the car was the one used by various car magazines for testing, and reviewing.
 
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