Hi all, 

New to the forums, just put a deposit down for a fiesta st2, mp215 already on it. Just wanting to clarify a few things, ive bought a lemon before and want to make sure i dont feck up again given ill be spending 13,000 of my hard earned cash.

 

I went to look at the car, from a ford garage (a small one with a small selection of used cars but you can order new fords from there and it has its own service centre). Turns out the car was actually the salesmans, he proved it on the ford system with the finance record and showed me the extended warranty aswell. 

When i viewed the car it had a thin layer of dust all on it so wasent 100% easy to see the paint, but it looked even, panel gaps matched on both sides of the car (the front doors had a wider gap at top and slightly less towards the bottom, is this normal?, it was the same both sides), didnt notice any obvious 'orange peel' effect on the paint.

The alloys were absolutely immaculate, not a scuff on them, the car had done 15,000 miles and front tyres were only just needing replacing. Oil was clean, only been serviced at that garage 2000 miles ago. The hpi check came up with a plate change, which tallied with the v5, the vin on the car tallied with the v5 and reg, and outstanding finance which i was shown on the ford system as being in the salesmans name.

Test drive was great, was allowed to give the car some throttle, pulled well, cornered well, no unusual noises and so forth.

 

Is there anything else i should check before i pay the full amount, i didnt actually ask if it had been resprayed/in an accident but a hpi check shows its at least not had a bad accident. 

 

I only got good vibes from it, i think im just being overly cautious.

On 07/02/2017 at 5:27 PM, St65mp215 said:

Hi all, 

New to the forums, just put a deposit down for a fiesta st2, mp215 already on it. Just wanting to clarify a few things, ive bought a lemon before and want to make sure i dont feck up again given ill be spending 13,000 of my hard earned cash.

 

I went to look at the car, from a ford garage (a small one with a small selection of used cars but you can order new fords from there and it has its own service centre). Turns out the car was actually the salesmans, he proved it on the ford system with the finance record and showed me the extended warranty aswell. 

When i viewed the car it had a thin layer of dust all on it so wasent 100% easy to see the paint, but it looked even, panel gaps matched on both sides of the car (the front doors had a wider gap at top and slightly less towards the bottom, is this normal?, it was the same both sides), didnt notice any obvious 'orange peel' effect on the paint.

The alloys were absolutely immaculate, not a scuff on them, the car had done 15,000 miles and front tyres were only just needing replacing. Oil was clean, only been serviced at that garage 2000 miles ago. The hpi check came up with a plate change, which tallied with the v5, the vin on the car tallied with the v5 and reg, and outstanding finance which i was shown on the ford system as being in the salesmans name.

Test drive was great, was allowed to give the car some throttle, pulled well, cornered well, no unusual noises and so forth.

 

Is there anything else i should check before i pay the full amount, i didnt actually ask if it had been resprayed/in an accident but a hpi check shows its at least not had a bad accident. 

 

I only got good vibes from it, i think im just being overly cautious.

You are right to be cautious bud - its alot of money. But, from what you've said - it sounds great. The panel gaps sound fine and they're symmetrical on both sides so that's a good thing, too. The car will have been used as a demonstrator as well by the salesman during his time owning it so its in his interest to keep it tidy - including when he came to move it on - the company wont do him many favours, if any - so again, in best interests to keep it nice and tidy.

Congrats, and enjoy!

Is it bad being an ex demo for 15000 miles? Would it have been loaned out to customers and ragged a lot? Or just used for when someone wants to test drive a fiesta st, so maybe 5 test drives a week? Even that, revving from cold could it be a bad thing? 

Can't say as I've ever been gentle on demonstrators... If you've got an extended warranty, that's better though.

Also HPI only flags up declared accidents, if it was never declared it will be clear anyway.

10 minutes ago, alexp999 said:

Can't say as I've ever been gentle on demonstrators... If you've got an extended warranty, that's better though.

Also HPI only flags up declared accidents, if it was never declared it will be clear anyway.

You have never been careful on demonstrators? As a customer? 

 

Surely it should be advertised as ex demo if it has been used for that purpose.

I always push demos earlier/harder than I would my own car as you have a finite amount of time to try and get a feel for what it can and can't do.

They don't have to advertise it as ex demo no.

The place I test drove a Focus ST before buying mine was the dealer principals car.

To be honest though, when buying a used car, you never know how it has really been treated.

The car you are looking at could well have been treated better than the way some private owners treat their cars, lol.

1 hour ago, alexp999 said:

To be honest though, when buying a used car, you never know how it has really been treated.

The car you are looking at could well have been treated better than the way some private owners treat their cars, lol.

This is true, all i know if this car wasent curbed at all on the alloys, generally looked immaculate and the mpg average was 38mpg, the finance was in the sales managers name, but there was no other fiesta st on the forecourt so it could well have been used for a lot of test drives :/