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Good afternoon hive mind,
Looking for a new family car, secondhand.
Large estate, petrol, max budget around £15.5K.
Looking to keep it & look after it long term.
I've seen a BMW 2.0 528i M Sport Touring 5dr. Looks lovely. 2013, 65 000 miles. Only thing is, its a Cat S write off. As I understand it (from the AutoTrader website) : This vehicle has sustained damage to part of its structural frame or chassis in the past, and the insurer decided that repairing it would have cost more than replacing it.
The dealer replied to my queries quickly and sent images over; his words "it sustained damage to the rear passenger side area, we replaced the rear bumper, tailgate and lights using genuine parts".
Worth a look or should I keep looking?
If I go for a look and need an independent inspection to assess the repair, whats the best way to do that?
Thanks, Paul
Worth a look if local…
What the dealer describes in his reply doesn’t cover any of the structural stuff that would have resulted in the write-off though, which seems odd.
Seems like they have just decribed replacing the parts, which doesn’t ncessarily address the structural stuff underneath, so I’d be wary.
AA and RAC could offer an inspection if yuo don’t know anyone in the trade (and by that I mean repair trade as opposed to sales).
It’s a lot of money to be committing so worth checking out. Also, probably best if you intend to keep it for a while as selling a Cat S can be challenging…
Worth a look. Could have been perhaps a subframe.
But more importantly will your insurer consider it (or an insurer) favourably when you tell them.
I'd not be put off by a CAT S if I had photos of the damage before, during and after repair. But there's no way I'd pay £13k for a 2013 528i touring as a CAT S. Waay too much. A non damaged 2012 535i sold recently on Autotrader for £17k.
I've always viewed a CAT S as something I'd be happy to sink money into and then run it into the ground.
No chance, unless you are really familiar with cars (ie, in the trade): it's too easy to hide nightmares. Some insurance companies won't quote and you will find it hard to sell on.
Have they got the independent engineers report to say its road worthy ?
DVLA / IVA test centre would of had to approve it (?)
Personally I wouldn’t, nor would a lot of people which is why there price is cheaper.
My brother in law has had a couple of bmw 3 series like this over the years and both have suffered long term problems with the paintwork and corrosion where the repairs have been made. If you buy cheap and intend to run it into the ground maybe worth it.
Ballache to sell on later. Oh and cream leather looks dirty after cleaning and sitting on it for 5 mins !!
Cat S also includes wrapping a chain through the distorted bit and a steel gatepost and driving it till it yanks it straight....or it did with my mate Stan the bodyshop man.
Absolutely no chance.
Hello all.
Thanks for the advice, which broadly seems to be walk away & keep looking!
Which is what I think I'll do.
Plenty more fish in the sea etc etc!
Cheers
You could always pay for a vcheck report online, they search salvage auctions so may be able to show the images of the damage and confirm of it was minor structural damage.
Both my cars are cat s, some right bargains to be had - I got a 5 year old, low milage zafira for £4500 (had a fairly poor quality repair, but mint ones are £11k), and a very well repaired gt86 for £7k (similar non cat would be £13kish).
I'm comfortable assessing the damage and the repair, I wouldn't trust an independent report provided by the seller, as the zafira had one of those and it's innacurate. I've never had any troubles getting them insured, obviously if they are written off again the payout will be lower (max of 25% less than a normal car).
I recon you should be looking for 30% off the normal price, pics of the damage and be comfortable inspecting the repair. I believe any damage to the monocoque is technically cat s (rather than cat u), which is why so many of them are being repaired compared to the old cat c. It's hard to have a medium sized accident in a car and not **** a panel that's part of the shell
Edit : just had a look at the ad. All that dealers stock are write-offs, so he's clearly doing a trade buying them up off copart, doing them up and selling them on. That doesn't mean they are bad, at least he's practiced in it, but chances of it being repaired by an official BMW place is remote
Thanks for the post @5lab. I'm away with work until next week so sometime to think.
Something I forgot to put in the origional post is that I asked if the dealer would mind if I had it independently inspected and he has no issues whatsoever with me arranging that.
My infernal umming and ahhhing continue...
Depends how much time you have. I need a car to work and don't have much time to get repair work done, so wouldn't touch a car that's been in an accident.
If you have lots of free time. Then it could be a bargain.
No reason not to buy it if the price is right and repair good. Should be no more than2/3 of the price of an equivalent car without write off history.
so wouldn’t touch a car that’s been in an accident
Thing is, a clear insurance cat is no sign of no accident. It just means the cost of repairs were lower than the value of the car. My mate had his car punted down a motorway by a foreign lorry, repair bill was £20k on a car costing £30k new and it was repaired by insurance, with no insurance marker. On something like a 5 series you could feasibly do £40k of accident damage with zero paper trail. All it means is the insurers body shop did the work, and if you've seen some of the horror stories coming out of those places (not surprising, they get work by keeping their quotes as low as possible, cutting all corners where possible), you'd understand that a cat car and a non cat car are not necessarily all that different.
Don't know if this is of any use to you. eBay
I'm also browsing for large family estate, but probably diesel.