Buying - 2nd Hand - Possibly clocked
Discussion
Was in the market recently for a small car for a family member. Found a nice little 17 plate Fiesta. Sub 50K.
Went to view. Dad was selling it but it transpired he was insurance fronting the car for his Son. Son was now 21 and wanted something with a bit more vroom. Son was working "abroad".
They bought it 6 months back from a dealer, at time of purchase it had a service and a clutch. Oh, that was a red flag, but not huge.. Clutch at sub 50K? Not a huge problem, as one it's possible and two, it has a new clutch so that's a win.
Car has the odd mark, but it's 7 years old so expected. Steering wheel all good. Seat has wear. Fairly happy on the whole. Vcheck is good. 3 different tyres.... not good. Service book is good. No invoices. Initial stamp from Motorpoint. 2 stamps from a major Ford dealer. 1 stamp from unknown but it says Approved Service and a Ford logo. 1 stamp from selling dealer.
First red flag on the servicing was that the selling dealer and previous unrelated service stated "OIL + AIR SERVICE". Both in caps, but different hand writing. One of them wrote the month, but in lowercase. Unusual term I thought, more so as used by two different places. I'm thinking did any of these services ever happen.
Simples. Call the Ford Main dealer and ask them about the car. No previous plate changes. What followed was a check, on the reg plate, and VIN. Nope, they had never seen this car. I relayed this onto the seller.
I took pics of the drivers seat, brake and clutch pedal, these were for comparison to another family members Fiesta. When compared with a known higher mileage similar car I estimated the Fiesta had done 100-120K miles.
The moral? If buying private go by condition and check those service stamps are genuine.
I relayed my opinion to the seller. The car sold to someone else three days later.
Went to view. Dad was selling it but it transpired he was insurance fronting the car for his Son. Son was now 21 and wanted something with a bit more vroom. Son was working "abroad".
They bought it 6 months back from a dealer, at time of purchase it had a service and a clutch. Oh, that was a red flag, but not huge.. Clutch at sub 50K? Not a huge problem, as one it's possible and two, it has a new clutch so that's a win.
Car has the odd mark, but it's 7 years old so expected. Steering wheel all good. Seat has wear. Fairly happy on the whole. Vcheck is good. 3 different tyres.... not good. Service book is good. No invoices. Initial stamp from Motorpoint. 2 stamps from a major Ford dealer. 1 stamp from unknown but it says Approved Service and a Ford logo. 1 stamp from selling dealer.
First red flag on the servicing was that the selling dealer and previous unrelated service stated "OIL + AIR SERVICE". Both in caps, but different hand writing. One of them wrote the month, but in lowercase. Unusual term I thought, more so as used by two different places. I'm thinking did any of these services ever happen.
Simples. Call the Ford Main dealer and ask them about the car. No previous plate changes. What followed was a check, on the reg plate, and VIN. Nope, they had never seen this car. I relayed this onto the seller.
I took pics of the drivers seat, brake and clutch pedal, these were for comparison to another family members Fiesta. When compared with a known higher mileage similar car I estimated the Fiesta had done 100-120K miles.
The moral? If buying private go by condition and check those service stamps are genuine.
I relayed my opinion to the seller. The car sold to someone else three days later.
Forkhandles2 said:
You sound a nightmare to sell a car to tbh.
As the next poster says, they are known in the trade as an EcoBoom. It's not a case of if but when the engine grenades itself.I would say I am the perfect person to sell a car to, I won't haggle on price before I see the car and I do my research. If the car you are listing is as described I will 100% be buying it when I come to view.
I will not give you a sob story and a take the p
s offer and once I drive away you will never hear from me again. I know the risk of buying a car privately and won't be threatening you or asking for money back later on due to "my mechanic says the car has an issue"But I would never buy an Ecoboost engined car.
ThingsBehindTheSun said:
As the next poster says, they are known in the trade as an EcoBoom. It's not a case of if but when the engine grenades itself.
I would say I am the perfect person to sell a car to, I won't haggle on price before I see the car and I do my research. If the car you are listing is as described I will 100% be buying it when I come to view.
I will not give you a sob story and a take the ps offer and once I drive away you will never hear from me again. I know the risk of buying a car privately and won't be threatening you or asking for money back later on due to "my mechanic says the car has an issue"
But I would never buy an Ecoboost engined car.
‘It’s a matter of when it blows up’… given they’ve been making them for about 10-12 years that’s quite a statement. Presumably experience gained from watching YouTube. If people ran them on the correct oil and changed the belt in plenty of time it’ll be as reliable as anything else. I cannot think of a single engine where it doesn’t have some sort of weakness somewhere along the line. Maintain it and be aware of weak points and it will be fine. I would say I am the perfect person to sell a car to, I won't haggle on price before I see the car and I do my research. If the car you are listing is as described I will 100% be buying it when I come to view.
I will not give you a sob story and a take the p
s offer and once I drive away you will never hear from me again. I know the risk of buying a car privately and won't be threatening you or asking for money back later on due to "my mechanic says the car has an issue"But I would never buy an Ecoboost engined car.
Forkhandles2 said:
‘It’s a matter of when it blows up’… given they’ve been making them for about 10-12 years that’s quite a statement. Presumably experience gained from watching YouTube. If people ran them on the correct oil and changed the belt in plenty of time it’ll be as reliable as anything else. I cannot think of a single engine where it doesn’t have some sort of weakness somewhere along the line. Maintain it and be aware of weak points and it will be
fine.
Ford engine failures are probably more common than you think. There are often patterns with each model but the problem is real. Don’t get me wrong, other manufacturers have problems but Ford are not the best at handling them.fine.
You know something, in a post GDPR/Covid world, it is very difficult to get corroborating information out of a dealer especially when it comes to servicing. Some don’t have the info even though the book is stamped by them and some refuse to release the info.
If one does a vin check, most check for mileage discrepancies, and it checks out and the book is stamped by the dealer - and the car works - and the price is right - and the seller doesn’t make you feel nervous, get it bought. Or not.
If one does a vin check, most check for mileage discrepancies, and it checks out and the book is stamped by the dealer - and the car works - and the price is right - and the seller doesn’t make you feel nervous, get it bought. Or not.
Forkhandles2 said:
ThingsBehindTheSun said:
As the next poster says, they are known in the trade as an EcoBoom. It's not a case of if but when the engine grenades itself.
I would say I am the perfect person to sell a car to, I won't haggle on price before I see the car and I do my research. If the car you are listing is as described I will 100% be buying it when I come to view.
I will not give you a sob story and a take the ps offer and once I drive away you will never hear from me again. I know the risk of buying a car privately and won't be threatening you or asking for money back later on due to "my mechanic says the car has an issue"
But I would never buy an Ecoboost engined car.
‘It’s a matter of when it blows up’… given they’ve been making them for about 10-12 years that’s quite a statement. Presumably experience gained from watching YouTube. If people ran them on the correct oil and changed the belt in plenty of time it’ll be as reliable as anything else. I cannot think of a single engine where it doesn’t have some sort of weakness somewhere along the line. Maintain it and be aware of weak points and it will be fine. I would say I am the perfect person to sell a car to, I won't haggle on price before I see the car and I do my research. If the car you are listing is as described I will 100% be buying it when I come to view.
I will not give you a sob story and a take the p
s offer and once I drive away you will never hear from me again. I know the risk of buying a car privately and won't be threatening you or asking for money back later on due to "my mechanic says the car has an issue"But I would never buy an Ecoboost engined car.
Sir Bagalot said:
paddy1970 said:
Can also happen when buying from a dealer...
100% agree, but when you buy from a dealer you have a bit more protectionI bought a car with no service history once and 5 previous owners. Come sell time I visited a local scrapyard and found a car with the service book in it which was complete.
Sold the car I owned with that book and got a couple of grand more. That was a few years back but the moral of the story is “if the service book is not present then just get one made up”
Perhaps this is what that guy has done
Sold the car I owned with that book and got a couple of grand more. That was a few years back but the moral of the story is “if the service book is not present then just get one made up”
Perhaps this is what that guy has done
paddy1970 said:
Sir Bagalot said:
paddy1970 said:
Can also happen when buying from a dealer...
100% agree, but when you buy from a dealer you have a bit more protectionSir Bagalot said:
Was in the market recently for a small car for a family member. Found a nice little 17 plate Fiesta. Sub 50K.
Went to view. Dad was selling it but it transpired he was insurance fronting the car for his Son. Son was now 21 and wanted something with a bit more vroom. Son was working "abroad".
They bought it 6 months back ....
When I and my brother first started driving and looking at cars of similar age it seemed every car we went to look at some kind of implausible story - selling for son / another family member was common, often with different address on docs, had it a month and wife doesn't like it (wife didn't drive) etc. Don't recall any of them having service history / receipts.Went to view. Dad was selling it but it transpired he was insurance fronting the car for his Son. Son was now 21 and wanted something with a bit more vroom. Son was working "abroad".
They bought it 6 months back ....
I just couldn't do it now. I was able to hep both my kids buy new when they left uni - a SEAT Ibiza and a Mitshubishi Colt, both cost around £7K. I know prices have moved up a lot for various reasons, but we changed those cars at 7yrs old and both were only worth £1K at that point (traded them in as both had issues that weren't obvious but I wouldn't have sold them privately for the sake of a few hundred quid) so the cost to own might not be so different today.
Forkhandles2 said:
ThingsBehindTheSun said:
If this was an Eco boost I would not buy it unless it had impeccable service history from someone who had used the correct oil.
Even then I wouldn't buy it.
You sound a nightmare to sell a car to tbh. Even then I wouldn't buy it.
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