I need to sell my car – 53 plate Rover 75 Estate.

Does anyone have any suggestions as to the best options for getting it sold, should I use e-bay, auto trader, local paper or something else.

Last time I used auto trader was years ago and all I got was people phoning me trying to get me to advertise with them.

Thanks

Auto Trader shifted cars for me on more than one occasion when Ebay failed.

Recently sold a car very easily on Ebay Motors classifieds. I chose Ebay over Autotrader as Autotrader wanted 35quid to be on the website only (not in the mag) for 2 weeks whereas Ebay wanted 15quid for a month.

Had Ebay not generated much interest I’d’ve bitten the bullet and listed on Autotrader too.

As a buyer I’d always look at Autotrader and ebay (and probably Pistonheads). Maybe that’s not true for everyone, but it must be increasingly likely that people are aware of both.

I quite like the fact that it’s easier to make an arms-length first contact via ebay (i.e. via email) to ask some basic questions and apply a first-level filter, whereas with AutoTrader you’re always straight in to a telephone call. It seems to be this same mechanism that protects you from canvassers on ebay – they haven’t yet resorted to emailing eBay sellers to get their phone numbers.

On the flipside AutoTrader has (in my opinion) better fitering facilities to find the car you’re looking for in the first place.

Local papers hereabouts are generally only full of tat.

As a seller I’ve sold 2 cars and a motorbike via eBay and never had any trouble with timewasters.

So, on balance, I’d also be in the ebay-first-then-Autotrader-if -necessary camp. Wherever you advertise the most important thing is to provide plenty of information up-front and be realistic about your pricing.

NJA- which engine is it?

local paper is always full over priced – folks wanting dealer money for private sales

scotads , autotrader , gumtree and even driving round smaller forecourts always works for me , usually end up with a decent vehicle at a price im happy to pay. i tend to avoid ebay …..

my last purchase was via driving by and seeing a golf sat at the side of the road with what looked like a forsale sign in the window … stopped had a look – test drove it , bought it …. how ever i had been scouring gumtree and autotrader looking for something to replace our imminant mot failure of a mazda 323.

I need to sell my car – 53 plate Rover 75 Estate.

Does anyone have any suggestions as to the best options for getting it sold,

It being a rover, probably better to sell it for scrap, you might get 50 quid for it. 😉

Damn, El-bent beat me to it!

Seriously though, I’d stick with AT. If you don’t sell by the end of the advertised period then they’ll offer you a discount on a similar or better package.

Also try Pistonheads (tis free).

IME AT will give you the more seriously minded buyer, and IME the ‘no canvassers etc’ has actually meant I’ve not had any canvassers.

Do keep an eye on prices though. I sold our Focus on there a fortnight ago and prices went up and down literally 20% over a single month. Was a bit weird, but got a good price in the end.

Hora

It is the BMW 2 litre diesel.

Personally I find the more places you put it the more coverage it gets (derr) – so a 28 day listing on ebay with an absolutely ridiculous amount of pics- with all imperfections shot. I did this with my old Forester. People feel more secure/trusting in the prospect if you’ve shown everything- feels like you are more ‘honest’ rather than ‘usual scuffs and off supermarket scratches’ – as this is highly subjective. To me it means the car has dings and corner parking scratches, to others it means nowt worrying about so define yours with pics. Pay that little extra and anyone who comes to see the car in person really will be almost there.

Don’t put full history- define it in detail.

Don’t put ‘no offers’ or ‘no timewasters’ regardless of how many idiots view the car. It says to me that you have an attitude problem. Selling privately is all about people having the right to see the car and decide it isn’t right for them 🙂

As ‘verses’ says there is a big difference in price between Ebay £15 & Autotrader £35. I used Autotrader recently and just got idiots offering silly money but that may be the state of the market currently. I would try Ebay first next time and I actually think the filtering is better on Ebay.

I gave it to the garage who I bought it off to sell. They sold it freshly serviced, 12 month MOT, 6 months road tax and I still got more than my base price. They sold it as there own and took a part exchange which as a private buyer I couldn’t do.

You’ll ALWAYS get chancers. Think about it- some people are selling their car as they really need the money and out of 10 chance calls how many people cave in to a cheeky offer?

Make sure you state BMW diesel engine in your ad though (preferably in the title or sub title if an ebay advert)….then list as per Hora post 3 up.

Take you time to write a well worded and laid out advert.

It is the BMW 2 litre diesel.

One of my guilty secrets is that i always wanted one of them. If I didn’t have a company car id be on this like a fat kid on a smarty.

Thanks for the advice – today I will be mainly writing an e-bay ad, although I might hold off the pictures til it stops raining – July FFS!!