The “where can I find a Renner 5” thread had me in mind of putting a more general car hunting thread together... Feel free to add your own tips.
Good cars at the right money... eBay.
Find someone who had cocked up their listing. Bad listing means bad price. This means a good buy.
First of all search in the normal car listings. You can filter these by year as well and make, model, whatever. I found my latest purchase in the normal car listings this way. It got 6 bids and sold for 1/3 of what a similar model listed in Classics got for with 20+ bids. In theory I could just list the car again and more than double my money. I know “its not about the money” but its nice to buy a car you couldn't otherwise afford.
Most people will say to avoid those numpties who list their stuff with a mobile phone picture of half the car and either three lines of malformed text or 10 paragraphs of 48 point Comic Sans in block capitals alternating red and blue... If you can get to see the car or someone you know can go see it then you know what its like, what the owner is like, etc. THEN its worth a bid. Some people are real decent honest folks but they are just not literate, either with IT nor good use of written English, or both. Doesn't mean they aren't selling a good car and that its not a good deal... But the bidders will stay away allowing you to get a bargain.
“Not specified”. People list their cars with “CAR” as the title then don't fill in the details boxes which eBay uses for its search... Hmmm... wonder why they get no bids... Again, a bit of leg work here will turn up the cars people were to dumb to list properly and some of these will be goodies. Go into the “not specified” tick box and see what turns up. You may be surprised.
Google for it. You'd be surprised what turns up. I've never bought one this way but I know people who have. For example finding a classic car entered into an agricultural equipment sale...
Forums – starting with RR, RnS, NSRA, Practical Classics and then working onto the make specific sites and so forth e.g. MMA, OldSkoolFord, etc.
Listing sites – Gumtree, Admag, Pistonheads, Findit, Fish4cars, etc. Even Autotrader occasionally has some gold still.
Copart.co.uk for salvage cars. Some interesting stuff seems to go on there. There are other salvage auctions both online and in real life and some of them have specialist classic car events. Some will require you to pay to register, some may require you to be trade. Find a mate who is in this case...
Wanted ads – forums, listing sites, post office window, local paper, etc.
Don't forget banger forums and the like.
Word of mouth – hang out with folks either in person at your local meets or online on forums like this and you hear people talking about maybe selling something they have and you can snag stuff that’s not even been advertised.
Shows, meets, events, etc. - cool cars with an A4 piece of paper in the window which says “For Sale”. Also many shows and events have a for sale board where people pin details of cars they have for sale.
Autojumbles – to a lesser extent than the old days now so much stuff is traded on eBay but back a few years the Autojumbles used to always have a load of cool cars with For Sale boards up, eithe rin the car park, the For Sale pitch or on the stalls areas along with the grot stock, and many stall holders having boards showing cars they had for sale along with their stock. Still find this to a lesser extent.
Spots thread. Something you like spotted and looking abandoned? Ask the poster where they photo'd it and go door knocking. Aparently a lot of the banger racers get their cars by door knocking. People who CBA to advertise the old heap probably glad just to be given some money for it.
Scrap yards. Now everything is recycling, end of life certificates and the like this is less of an option but some friendly yards still work this way. Classic/interesting cars may get parked separately rather than stacked right away and you may be able to buy them for a decent price (usually related to weight...) A chap I used to know left his calling card with all the local yards and used to get calls when ever they got a car on his list in. He made a point of buying pretty much anything he was offered, usually breaking the rough ones and autojumbling the parts, but the decent ones he saved.
MOT stations. Not sure if they still do this or if its a conflict of interest etc. But some people will not bother with their old car if it fails the MOT. Another reason to be matey with your local MOT tester is that call “we just failed an old.... the owner doesn't want to pay for the repairs, want his number?”
Sometimes just being known as “the old car guy” works. I have been offered all manner of tat by friends, neighbours, work colleagues and even a card put through my letter box by a local scrappy who had taken a Vauxhall Viscount in and wanted to know if I wanted to buy it, delivery available. Cars offered this way included Nissan Sunny, Nissan Bluebird, Audi 80, Triumph Acclaim, etc.
ADT and other car auctions. I used to get some good buys at the car auctions but last few times I went it was all modern stuff. I believe there are still tat car auctions in small towns. There is an art to buying well at these auctions but its great fun.
Classic Car auctions. Not so many of these about at the moment as there used to be, I guess that’s eBay again for you, but reading the auction reports in the magazines it seems there are some good buys to be had at these.
Good cars at the right money... eBay.
Find someone who had cocked up their listing. Bad listing means bad price. This means a good buy.
First of all search in the normal car listings. You can filter these by year as well and make, model, whatever. I found my latest purchase in the normal car listings this way. It got 6 bids and sold for 1/3 of what a similar model listed in Classics got for with 20+ bids. In theory I could just list the car again and more than double my money. I know “its not about the money” but its nice to buy a car you couldn't otherwise afford.
Most people will say to avoid those numpties who list their stuff with a mobile phone picture of half the car and either three lines of malformed text or 10 paragraphs of 48 point Comic Sans in block capitals alternating red and blue... If you can get to see the car or someone you know can go see it then you know what its like, what the owner is like, etc. THEN its worth a bid. Some people are real decent honest folks but they are just not literate, either with IT nor good use of written English, or both. Doesn't mean they aren't selling a good car and that its not a good deal... But the bidders will stay away allowing you to get a bargain.
“Not specified”. People list their cars with “CAR” as the title then don't fill in the details boxes which eBay uses for its search... Hmmm... wonder why they get no bids... Again, a bit of leg work here will turn up the cars people were to dumb to list properly and some of these will be goodies. Go into the “not specified” tick box and see what turns up. You may be surprised.
Google for it. You'd be surprised what turns up. I've never bought one this way but I know people who have. For example finding a classic car entered into an agricultural equipment sale...
Forums – starting with RR, RnS, NSRA, Practical Classics and then working onto the make specific sites and so forth e.g. MMA, OldSkoolFord, etc.
Listing sites – Gumtree, Admag, Pistonheads, Findit, Fish4cars, etc. Even Autotrader occasionally has some gold still.
Copart.co.uk for salvage cars. Some interesting stuff seems to go on there. There are other salvage auctions both online and in real life and some of them have specialist classic car events. Some will require you to pay to register, some may require you to be trade. Find a mate who is in this case...
Wanted ads – forums, listing sites, post office window, local paper, etc.
Don't forget banger forums and the like.
Word of mouth – hang out with folks either in person at your local meets or online on forums like this and you hear people talking about maybe selling something they have and you can snag stuff that’s not even been advertised.
Shows, meets, events, etc. - cool cars with an A4 piece of paper in the window which says “For Sale”. Also many shows and events have a for sale board where people pin details of cars they have for sale.
Autojumbles – to a lesser extent than the old days now so much stuff is traded on eBay but back a few years the Autojumbles used to always have a load of cool cars with For Sale boards up, eithe rin the car park, the For Sale pitch or on the stalls areas along with the grot stock, and many stall holders having boards showing cars they had for sale along with their stock. Still find this to a lesser extent.
Spots thread. Something you like spotted and looking abandoned? Ask the poster where they photo'd it and go door knocking. Aparently a lot of the banger racers get their cars by door knocking. People who CBA to advertise the old heap probably glad just to be given some money for it.
Scrap yards. Now everything is recycling, end of life certificates and the like this is less of an option but some friendly yards still work this way. Classic/interesting cars may get parked separately rather than stacked right away and you may be able to buy them for a decent price (usually related to weight...) A chap I used to know left his calling card with all the local yards and used to get calls when ever they got a car on his list in. He made a point of buying pretty much anything he was offered, usually breaking the rough ones and autojumbling the parts, but the decent ones he saved.
MOT stations. Not sure if they still do this or if its a conflict of interest etc. But some people will not bother with their old car if it fails the MOT. Another reason to be matey with your local MOT tester is that call “we just failed an old.... the owner doesn't want to pay for the repairs, want his number?”
Sometimes just being known as “the old car guy” works. I have been offered all manner of tat by friends, neighbours, work colleagues and even a card put through my letter box by a local scrappy who had taken a Vauxhall Viscount in and wanted to know if I wanted to buy it, delivery available. Cars offered this way included Nissan Sunny, Nissan Bluebird, Audi 80, Triumph Acclaim, etc.
ADT and other car auctions. I used to get some good buys at the car auctions but last few times I went it was all modern stuff. I believe there are still tat car auctions in small towns. There is an art to buying well at these auctions but its great fun.
Classic Car auctions. Not so many of these about at the moment as there used to be, I guess that’s eBay again for you, but reading the auction reports in the magazines it seems there are some good buys to be had at these.