Drivetrain the downside of mods
7th Gear Gal
Joined: Jul 2002
Posts: 36,087
Likes: 3
From: Weeblegabber West (aka WLA)
I think people list their vehicles on ebay because they know that the serious shoppers will contact them and check further into the car on offer. I have several MINI pals who have done that, and one who purchased a car after flying in to view it and then driving it back home, several states away! 
Just my .02....:smile:
Clover
Just my .02....:smile:
Clover
Thread Starter
|
6th Gear
Joined: Sep 2004
Posts: 5,149
Likes: 0
Originally Posted by chows4us
If he's local to you all, then you can see the car. I got to hand it to Spider if he can buy a car site, unseen ... I think that takes some ... courage 
I still think I can't conclude much from Ebay because I stand by my initial statement. Take a look at Ebay sales figures. I first pulled up last 100 auctions for MINI. Except for the dealer car with $31K of mods (stereo and whatever), the few cars sold were cabrio or auto. Still 90% of them or so went unsold at any price.
Then pull ALL cars, any model, sorted by price. Except for like 1 or 2 ferraris, the cars just dont sell. Forget the high end cars, scroll down to cars starting around $41K down in to high $30s. Again, its a sea of red. Except on rare occasions, the bidders who do bid are "private" which tells me nothing or have a rating of 0 - 5. And what are the odds of that transaction happening?
As for your car to watch. Why would someone buy a four year old car (being July and new cars usually come out in late Aug - Early Sep, its four years old) w/14K miles on it when for maybe a couple of thousand more, I can buy a new one built "my way" ... minus the JCW? What if I hate blue and want yellow? Isn't a major selling point of MINI to "youify" it? I might add that I understand in CA dealers might be charging over MSRP but here on the Atlantic side, I see at least 30 new MINIs just sitting in the dealer lot, gathering dust which means for every day they sit, that dealer is losing money.
I think also, the average buyer could care less about what "mods"
are done. they might just want reliability. What percentage of all MINI owners actually change the engine parts? 5 - 10%? I dunno. I just dont think the average American buyer cares about HP on this car. IMHO I may be wrong since clearly there are many zeolots, myself among them, that do care. But does the average American?
I just don't see ebay as the place to sell ... just my opinion. Your mileage may vary
I still think I can't conclude much from Ebay because I stand by my initial statement. Take a look at Ebay sales figures. I first pulled up last 100 auctions for MINI. Except for the dealer car with $31K of mods (stereo and whatever), the few cars sold were cabrio or auto. Still 90% of them or so went unsold at any price.
Then pull ALL cars, any model, sorted by price. Except for like 1 or 2 ferraris, the cars just dont sell. Forget the high end cars, scroll down to cars starting around $41K down in to high $30s. Again, its a sea of red. Except on rare occasions, the bidders who do bid are "private" which tells me nothing or have a rating of 0 - 5. And what are the odds of that transaction happening?
As for your car to watch. Why would someone buy a four year old car (being July and new cars usually come out in late Aug - Early Sep, its four years old) w/14K miles on it when for maybe a couple of thousand more, I can buy a new one built "my way" ... minus the JCW? What if I hate blue and want yellow? Isn't a major selling point of MINI to "youify" it? I might add that I understand in CA dealers might be charging over MSRP but here on the Atlantic side, I see at least 30 new MINIs just sitting in the dealer lot, gathering dust which means for every day they sit, that dealer is losing money.
I think also, the average buyer could care less about what "mods"
are done. they might just want reliability. What percentage of all MINI owners actually change the engine parts? 5 - 10%? I dunno. I just dont think the average American buyer cares about HP on this car. IMHO I may be wrong since clearly there are many zeolots, myself among them, that do care. But does the average American?
I just don't see ebay as the place to sell ... just my opinion. Your mileage may vary
I don't know that Ebay is the way to go for every one but if you know what you want and shop it hard there are deales to be had.
Resale for cars with "mods" I think is a joke. I don't ever expect to get my money out of them. The best is maybe take them off and return the car to close to stock and piece out the parts....hope to get something back.
6th Gear
Joined: May 2005
Posts: 15,478
Likes: 2
Originally Posted by MINIclo
I think people list their vehicles on ebay because they know that the serious shoppers will contact them and check further into the car on offer. I have several MINI pals who have done that, and one who purchased a car after flying in to view it and then driving it back home, several states away!
6th Gear
Joined: May 2005
Posts: 15,478
Likes: 2
Originally Posted by SRTech
I generally buy cars unmodded and unrestored. I don't trust anyone else's work and would pay more for an original car even if I was going to modify it myself.
Former Vendor
Joined: May 2005
Posts: 3,480
Likes: 0
From: Oakhurst/Fresno, CA
Originally Posted by chows4us
An excellent point. Besides, where the fun in adding stuff to your car if someone else already did it? Isn't part of the fun the road to the end rather than the end itself?
Thread Starter
|
6th Gear
Joined: Sep 2004
Posts: 5,149
Likes: 0
Originally Posted by SRTech
I generally buy cars unmodded and unrestored. I don't trust anyone else's work and would pay more for an original car even if I was going to modify it myself.
Steve
Steve
6th Gear
Joined: Jun 2003
Posts: 2,068
Likes: 1
From: the great country of california
Originally Posted by chows4us
If he's local to you all, then you can see the car. I got to hand it to Spider if he can buy a car site, unseen ... I think that takes some ... courage
I still think I can't conclude much from Ebay because I stand by my initial statement. Take a look at Ebay sales figures. I first pulled up last 100 auctions for MINI. Except for the dealer car with $31K of mods (stereo and whatever), the few cars sold were cabrio or auto. Still 90% of them or so went unsold at any price.
Then pull ALL cars, any model, sorted by price. Except for like 1 or 2 ferraris, the cars just dont sell. Forget the high end cars, scroll down to cars starting around $41K down in to high $30s. Again, its a sea of red. Except on rare occasions, the bidders who do bid are "private" which tells me nothing or have a rating of 0 - 5. And what are the odds of that transaction happening?
As for your car to watch. Why would someone buy a four year old car (being July and new cars usually come out in late Aug - Early Sep, its four years old) w/14K miles on it when for maybe a couple of thousand more, I can buy a new one built "my way" ... minus the JCW? What if I hate blue and want yellow? Isn't a major selling point of MINI to "youify" it? I might add that I understand in CA dealers might be charging over MSRP but here on the Atlantic side, I see at least 30 new MINIs just sitting in the dealer lot, gathering dust which means for every day they sit, that dealer is losing money.
I think also, the average buyer could care less about what "mods"
are done. they might just want reliability. What percentage of all MINI owners actually change the engine parts? 5 - 10%? I dunno. I just dont think the average American buyer cares about HP on this car. IMHO I may be wrong since clearly there are many zeolots, myself among them, that do care. But does the average American?
I just don't see ebay as the place to sell ... just my opinion. Your mileage may vary
I still think I can't conclude much from Ebay because I stand by my initial statement. Take a look at Ebay sales figures. I first pulled up last 100 auctions for MINI. Except for the dealer car with $31K of mods (stereo and whatever), the few cars sold were cabrio or auto. Still 90% of them or so went unsold at any price.
Then pull ALL cars, any model, sorted by price. Except for like 1 or 2 ferraris, the cars just dont sell. Forget the high end cars, scroll down to cars starting around $41K down in to high $30s. Again, its a sea of red. Except on rare occasions, the bidders who do bid are "private" which tells me nothing or have a rating of 0 - 5. And what are the odds of that transaction happening?
As for your car to watch. Why would someone buy a four year old car (being July and new cars usually come out in late Aug - Early Sep, its four years old) w/14K miles on it when for maybe a couple of thousand more, I can buy a new one built "my way" ... minus the JCW? What if I hate blue and want yellow? Isn't a major selling point of MINI to "youify" it? I might add that I understand in CA dealers might be charging over MSRP but here on the Atlantic side, I see at least 30 new MINIs just sitting in the dealer lot, gathering dust which means for every day they sit, that dealer is losing money.
I think also, the average buyer could care less about what "mods"
are done. they might just want reliability. What percentage of all MINI owners actually change the engine parts? 5 - 10%? I dunno. I just dont think the average American buyer cares about HP on this car. IMHO I may be wrong since clearly there are many zeolots, myself among them, that do care. But does the average American?
I just don't see ebay as the place to sell ... just my opinion. Your mileage may vary
But I think you are mistaken when you stated that the car in the url is four years old. You must have glanced at it because it's a 2004 and as far as I know there are no 2004 anywhere in the world that are four years old.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eB...spagename=WDVW
6th Gear
Joined: May 2005
Posts: 15,478
Likes: 2
Originally Posted by meanboy
I just reread your post and I think you just agreed with my point, and that's the JCW equipped cars do not bring much more resale value. My urls just validated my opinion.
But I think you are mistaken when you stated that the car in the url is four years old. You must have glanced at it because it's a 2004 and as far as I know there are no 2004 anywhere in the world that are four years old.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eB...spagename=WDVW
But I think you are mistaken when you stated that the car in the url is four years old. You must have glanced at it because it's a 2004 and as far as I know there are no 2004 anywhere in the world that are four years old.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eB...spagename=WDVW
I read "Mini Cooper S (2002-present)" and my old mind read 2002. You are correct, its 2004. Forget about what I said about 4 years oldAs to agreeing with you, in general, YES. If you alter you car from original state, don't expect to get your money back. However, I do not necessarily believe that to be true from a factory badged car. I would tend to believe (maybe wrong) that a DINAN BMW should have more resale value than a home-modified BMW (OK maybe DINAN isn't a good example). Maybe the new Shelby Mustang. That is probably worth more than a modded mustang just as the orignal Shelby mustangs should get far more (and do) than home modified mustangs.
However, my original comment was:
"... I'm not sure what you can conclude from the lack of Ebay sales."
I believe that to be true. Somoene mentioned its a marketing device to hunt for serious buyers. That could be true but proves my point that Ebay sales (or lack thereof) dont mean much.
5th Gear
Joined: Feb 2005
Posts: 928
Likes: 0
From: Raleigh, NC
Originally Posted by chows4us
I just don't see ebay as the place to sell ... just my opinion. Your mileage may vary
Your stats are skewed by the dealers using ebay to advertise and the people overestimating the value of their cars. In my experience, plenty of people use ebay for cars.
I've sold four cars via ebay - none to locals - and I've bought five cars including my mini.
Thread
Thread Starter
Forum
Replies
Last Post
GAT
R56 :: Hatch Talk (2007+)
6
Oct 4, 2015 07:27 PM