Buying a <£500 car at auction?

[Rave]

Right, long story short: I need to insure another car by June this year or else I lose 6 years of NCB. I don't actually need a car as I commute by motorbike and I can usually borrow my mum's when necessary, but it would be handy to have one occasionally for lugging stuff about or going on booze cruises. Since it'll get used very infrequently fuel economy etc. isn't much of an issue, and because of the aforementioned 6 years NCB I can insure pretty much anything with <250bhp for reasonable money.

A little article in this week's Autocar reckoned that you could get an early Vauxhall Omega estate for £500 at auction, which would suit me perfectly- something a class smaller like a Mondeo, Xantia or 406 would also be fine. So, my question is, where can I find an auction full of quasi-bangers like these? (Live in London, can travel within reason). When's a good time to buy? I don't actually need it until June, but it occurs to me that traders might have a glut of trade-ins in March, and that could tip the supply/demand equation in my favour.

All advice gratefully accepted.

[IainB]

Rave,
Ive stopped going to the auctions (MK) these days as all the 'bangers' <£500 are going for well over book price, seems to be a lot of immigrants buying atm. Case in question, bubble shaped rover 200? series, no tax/mot, looked OK from outside, but was totally (and I mean totally) rotten underneath went for £485!! Hate to think how they intend to make to road legal……
As much as I hate to say it E-Bay seems to be a decent place to get a bargain sometimes, and, you get the time to actually have a good look around the car, test drive etc, that or the local paper

[Supercharged]

Auctions are a big risk for buying a single car - especially the the cars for sale at that price...

You'd be better looking on AT, eBay, local paper, free adds or even just looking at cars advertised for sale by the side of the road...

[Rave]

Aye, I could use ebay, but I like the idea of turning up with a wodge of cash and getting to check out a bunch of different cars on the day, rather than making a journey to see just one car that may or may not turn out to be any good. If it turns out that it all goes for silly money, so be it- I'll just keep my money in my pocket- no auction fever for me, I got nearly all of it out of my system years ago at a police auction I used to frequent.

[Moby-Dick]

You could try the ones in tooting ?

http://www.google.co.uk/maps?hl=en&s...local&ct=title

[Agent]

Dont Direct Line allow named drivers to keep / gain NCB's ?
If so, got any mates / family that you could use ?

[davidstone28]

BCA or Manheim will have &#163;500ish cars. The BCA auction in North London is one of the big ones. Think they seperate them out into &#163;4000+ or &#163;4000 and under.

In the later category, probably about 10% of cars going through will be in the sub &#163;1,000 category. Not a huge number admittedly, but go every Tuesday or Thursdays and see what's about.

Personally, I think you're better off looking in the classifieds. At least that way you'll have a chance to drive the car before you buy it.

[Rave]

Dont Direct Line allow named drivers to keep / gain NCB's ?
If so, got any mates / family that you could use ?

I'm not sure that would work? And more importantly, I'm not sure that any other insurer would recognise it, so I'd be stuick with Direct Line forever then (and they've never been cheap for me). It's a bit like 'bonus accelerator' policies- I had a couple with Admiral but they weren't counted as a full year by any other insurers. Happily I then switched to Elephant who are part of the same group of companies. I actually have 6 years and 8 months of NCB, but it only really counts as 6.

The other possible option is that my mum makes me the registered keeper of her car and I have her and the rest of the family as named drivers (currently all three of us sons are named on her policy). I daresay I have far more no claims than her (her last car was nicked a couple of years ago) so it may even work out cheaper. It's only an old Clio 1.9D though and although it's a nice little car, it's a bit small for a four-up booze cruise.

Cheers for the pointers David.

[Rave]

You could try the ones in tooting ?

http://www.google.co.uk/maps?hl=en&s...local&ct=title

Hmm- your map points to Wimbledon? Could definitely do that on the tram though, for free as well- bonus. I'll google Mannheim now then.

I could check out that place in Deptford too, I've driven past it many times but they don't seem to have a web presence at all.

[Rave]

Edit: actually yes they do:

http://www.auctions2000.co.uk/2.html

Might pop down next Thursday night if I'm not working and have a bit of a nose about.

Edit: can't edit properly for some reason, what a twonk

[badass]

I bought one of my old cars at a Manheim auctions. That was shortly before the immigrants swamped them and drive the prices up

Another good way is if you know your neighbourhood well, any cars you have seen standing for ages, knock on the door and put an offer in if it works. Its a great way of getting a £20 car and I know someone who made a fair bit of money that way.

[davidstone28]

I bought one of my old cars at a Manheim auctions. That was shortly before the immigrants swamped them and drive the prices up

As opposed to the non-immigrants? You get all sorts of people at car auctions these days. At BCA near Leeds, you get born and bred Yorkshire folk bringing their whole families along thinking its some sort of day out. Fact is, there been a huge increase in private buyers over the last few years, and its no longer the preserve of motor trade. That's whats driven prices up. Rave isn't in the motor trade, nor am I, and you may not be either.

[SilentDeath]

I dont see how you can BUY <&#163;500 banger without atleast driving it once to find out if its really about to explode as the price would suggest.


You could however try to buy a &#163;1 volvo top gear style from a dealer.. that would work.

[piggeh]

If you can make it to Wimbledon area, in Mitcham there's an auction called Dingwall Car Auctions. It's a right dive (and that's an understatement!) but a lot of the cars going through are cheap bangers. They only have about 30 cars a week though, although it's on a Friday evening so no need to take time off work, etc.

http://www.dingwallauctions.co.uk/

When I was there, there were cars going for &#163;20!

However, BCA also have cheaper cars. Depends which one you go to though. Blackbushe is quite large (3 auction halls at once) but practically every car will be over &#163;500. Paddock Wood is a more mixed affair and more likely to have some cheaper models (it's about an hours drive from London).

[Rave]

I'm a bus driver, so I'm often working on Friday nights unfortunately. I can fairly easily get to Wimbledon on the tram though so may well give it a go- cheers.

[ChristopherW]

Maybe you could do a Clarkson and buy a really old part-exchanged banger from a dealership for &#163;1 - just so they don't have to do the paperwork and pay for it to get scrapped (which would cost them a lot more)?