Buying a vehicle (non motorcycle) as is from private vs dealer

[mimico_polak]

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One strategy my friends swear by is buy a used vehicle and keep it max for 3 years. Sell it before major repairs and get 80/90% of original purchase money back. Buy next car that requires less maintenance. I tried it and it worked for me as well. Obviously this time I had to go a lot cheaper and older due to the economy.

80-90% of original purchase price is very difficult in typical economy. With COVID drive up in prices...it worked for some...but...it doesn't work most of the time.

My recently history...

WRX - bought for 29.5k + tax and traded in for 29.5k after 6-8 months
Volt - Bought for 19k and traded in the WRX + got a cheque for 9k with which I bought a motorcycle
Volt - Sold for 15k after 2 years to a dealership
GTI - Bought for 25.5k (with buy out fee) + tax and traded it in for 26k after 1.5 years

We'll see how the Maverick holds up.

 

[Hardwrkr13]

VIN washing is a thing and QC is known in particular for having questionable vehicle histories.

There’s been a handful of reports where cars from Ontario would be shipped to QC after flooding / hail damage in order to register and clear titles before shipping back.

@PrivatePilot has bought from QC on a few occasions so can chime in.

So having a carfax report on the QC vehicle wouldn't show history of flood/repair damage? The seller of the one car in QC I'm considering sent me the vin when I inquired about a carfax report.

 

[mimico_polak]

So having a carfax report on the QC vehicle wouldn't show history of flood/repair damage? The seller of the one car in QC I'm considering sent me the vin when I inquired about a carfax report.

It could potentially hide any issues that were found yes. It’s about due diligence with out of province cars…each province has different regulations when it comes to salvage / damaged titles.

Unfortunately it’s not a perfect system but it’s buyer beware.

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