I'm learning by experience.

The car I'm looking for is a SE L petrol manual.

I had a test drive in a two year old car 14k miles that had been owned under a contract hire. It showed signs of heavy use on the seats and the service required warning was showing. Didn't care much for the dealer either - a main agent.

Decided to look for a car owned by one private owner. I drove one today three years old  at a Nissan main agent and upholstery much better with similar mileage. Sticking point was gouges in front ns wheel and new tyre just on that side. I could I suppose ask them to test alignment but I think we should probably wait for something else to come along.

SWMBO not overkeen on colour - white either.  We decided on the leather/alcantara seats as we think they are a bit more comfortable so it makes things a little harder to find what we want.

 

 

Plenty of MkIII petrol SELs on Autotrader. Guess it depends on your budget too and how far you are prepared to travel. Attitude of the dealer has lot to do with whether they get a sale or not. And interior condition is a good indicator of how well the car has been looked after. 

 

 

Interior condition as in looking like new really tells you nothing about how a company / fleet car might have been used.

Those might be lovely inside but have been ragged daily.  Maybe only the drivers seat used if not used as a family car.

The roughest of cars handed back at the end of lease and put through auction can then be refinished for the forecourt to look fantastic.

 

The shined up tyre on the scruffy alloy in the picture in the post shows a car that has not had that much of a preparation done.

 

Ex Motability cars are one previous registered keeper but you have no idea how many drivers or that automatically they are cared for.

Many will be very well looked after, and some not so, but at re-sale will be looking fandabbydozy.

3 years old & over 20,000 miles might mean there was a Service at 2 years/ 20,000 miles and another before 3 years when it got brake fluid changed and the MOT done early.

 

They are appearing ever 3 years or sooner as Motability is the biggest Group buyer in the UK and the cars then go through BCA to be bought by traders / dealers.

Edited 16 June, 20214 yr by e-Roottoot

I felt quite happy about buying the car apart from concerns about whether it had hit a kerb or other object at speed. I think the leather/alcantara seats are probably more difficult to bring back to looking like new. The car had only done 15000 miles with two services. It must have been a trade in against a Nissan. One problem is that reconditioning the wheel could take till the end of the month so probably best to wait and see if something better comes along anyway. I think my wife is right too (of course) when she tells me white cars always look less than perfectly clean. These salespeople are very keen to sell their paintwork protector at £300 a pop!

Edited 16 June, 20214 yr by MichaelTL

Because they get commission on selling what costs less than £30 in materials and under an hour's labour to do.  I used to do that as a job.    As it is the car is getting polished before you buy it and that is part of what you are paying to buy at a dealers.      If paint protection was required then that gets applied at the factory.   Actually paint / lacquer gets applied and a regular wash, polish and wax keeps the paint good. 

Edited 16 June, 20214 yr by e-Roottoot

I agree that there must be a very healthy profit in selling the paint protector.

I think this £99 'admin fee' is a joke. The young salesman was very likeable and efficient but I had to stifle a chuckle when he said showing the fee separately was more transparent.

 

What's the story on dealers who advertise a car then tell you it's 'in transit'. One I was interested in has been on Car Guru two months

but still in transit. I thought they had cleared the Suez Canal

Edited 16 June, 20214 yr by MichaelTL

New cars can obviously be In transit, and used ones that are demonstrators / ex management might be still be getting driven and will be available after 3 months / 3,000 miles or sometimes longer, and some cars are expected in at end of lease or when the new car the customer or dealership are waiting on arrives from being in transit or just on order.   There is so much BS about you never know the truth and often sales staff do not know either.  They are just there to sell and earn a living.  Some or most are sellers of finance. 

Edited 16 June, 20214 yr by e-Roottoot

Just thinking - the car yesterday had plenty of brake pad material on the rear but I think the front pads were down to about 3mm. That seems a lot of wear for 15k miles

Hi, relatively new to this forum and I'm no car expert but I do have high standards when choosing a used vehicle.

 

For me it's a combination of all of the above, the dealer must be decent, drives well, condition inside and out of very good quality (if not pristine) and the right service history in place. 

 

Never accept compromises and be prepared to walk away if you're not completely happy with something.

 

I've recently picked up an ex-motability Octavia VRS and I hope it serves me well in line with my original judgement (fingers crossed anyway!).  

 

Best of luck with everything.

 

8 hours ago, MichaelTL said:

Just thinking - the car yesterday had plenty of brake pad material on the rear but I think the front pads were down to about 3mm. That seems a lot of wear for 15k miles

Mileage is poor indication of brake pad usage.

Someone who lives in a City might be encountering traffic lights every quarter mile, but someone else in quiet part of country might drive 30 miles on easy roads / motorway and only use brakes couple of times.

 

You will get better idea accurately measuring tyre tread depth (and check the 4 digit date code, if not all same, then some tyres have been changed to mask wear).  A sensible user will not have needed to buy new tyres if offloading car at 15k miles unless they got a puncture or damaged one.

 

John I see your point about variability in driving and brake use. I was unaware of the tyre date code. I have emailed the dealer telling them I decided not to proceed - mainly because of a nagging doubt about the reason for changing the tyre. It could have been quite innocent - a puncture in the sidewall for instance but the doubt is there.

I agree with Erroll's sentiments about waiting for the right car to come along and resisting the urge to compromise. I am after all buying a car 2-3 years old and Intend 

to cover many miles abroad.

 

11 hours ago, MichaelTL said:

I felt quite happy about buying the car apart from concerns about whether it had hit a kerb or other object at speed. I think the leather/alcantara seats are probably more difficult to bring back to looking like new. The car had only done 15000 miles with two services. It must have been a trade in against a Nissan. One problem is that reconditioning the wheel could take till the end of the month so probably best to wait and see if something better comes along anyway. I think my wife is right too (of course) when she tells me white cars always look less than perfectly clean. These salespeople are very keen to sell their paintwork protector at £300 a pop!

I wouldn't say white cars struggle to stay looking clean, but they do struggle to look impressively shiny unless under sympathetic lighting.

Now black cars, they DO struggle to stay clean looking, but on the other hand, they shine beautifully.

 

Touching up stone chips on white cars is a piece of cake, they just seem to disappear when you've done them.

When I find the car I'm looking for it will have an Amundsen media unit. I see on the forum lots of threads about the firmware but could someone tell me the bare bones of it? Will I need to buy map updates officially or can I find a freebee on here.

42 minutes ago, MichaelTL said:

Will I need to buy map updates officially or can I find a freebee on here.

Provided it's a MIB2 Amundsen (2016 model year onwards) twice yearly free updates will be downloadable from both the Skoda portal and the VW Infotainment website for several years.

 

Updates for the MIB1 Amundsen appear to have ceased with the 2020/21 update.

Edited 17 June, 20214 yr by PetrolDave

We settled on a car we tested today. It was initially a demonstrator, then owned by a local private individual who went on to trade it in against a new car there.

It's three years old - or was in March. We are considering the two year warranty/mot/service/breakdown service offering from Skoda at £32 month.

One odd thing - all the rubber seals that lie outside the windows were damaged. The dealer is going to replace them foc.

 

 

18 minutes ago, MichaelTL said:

We settled on a car we tested today. It was initially a demonstrator, then owned by a local private individual who went on to trade it in against a new car there.

It's three years old - or was in March. We are considering the two year warranty/mot/service/breakdown service offering from Skoda at £32 month.

One odd thing - all the rubber seals that lie outside the windows were damaged. The dealer is going to replace them foc.

 

 

Looks like damage from when someone was over zealous with an ice scraper.

On 18/06/2021 at 20:15, MichaelTL said:

We settled on a car we tested today. It was initially a demonstrator, then owned by a local private individual who went on to trade it in against a new car there.

It's three years old - or was in March. We are considering the two year warranty/mot/service/breakdown service offering from Skoda at £32 month.

One odd thing - all the rubber seals that lie outside the windows were damaged. The dealer is going to replace them foc.

 

 

 

Hi there.

I've just been following this thread.

Just interested to know what year, model & spec of car you settled for in the end?

With the exception of the door rubbers is everything else in great shape/order?

What colour is that. Race Blue? or Pacific Blue?

Thanks.

 

16 hours ago, GordoGT said:

 

Hi there.

I've just been following this thread.

Just interested to know what year, model & spec of car you settled for in the end?

With the exception of the door rubbers is everything else in great shape/order?

What colour is that. Race Blue? or Pacific Blue?

Thanks.

 

Hi Gordo GT,

I decided early on I wanted one with the leather and alcantara seats and narrowed my search to a Mk3 facelift SE L. That model as a bonus gives me led headlights

and sat nav though I'm not sure the latter will be as good as one I can use on my iphone with the benefit of dynamic routing. 

I will collect the car next Friday so I can't comment on anything else yet. I'm not sure what the colour is apart from being a vibrant blue.

I can't put my finger on it but I preferred my test drive in the Mk3 to the Mk4. I know I prefer directly controlled functions like heating/cooling.

As a cyclist and motorcyclist I would prefer that drivers spent as much time as possible concentrating on driving and not fiddling with touchscreens.

Congratulations on your purchase.

I've also just bought a MK3 facelift SE L Estate this week and I'm really impressed with the drive and the extras on this model, including that dinky little removable torch in the boot, and umbrella,

features which only used to appear on the Superb IIRC.

 

I found the led headlights to be absolutely fantastic - really crisp lighting. Even the DRLs are really bright.. Coming from Bi-Xenons in my 2013 car this was a revelation.

The Facelift infotainment has Android Auto  and Apple Carplay which I've not yet tried, but could you not use your iphone in conjunction with this?

 

 

 

 

8 hours ago, GordoGT said:

Congratulations on your purchase.

I've also just bought a MK3 facelift SE L Estate this week and I'm really impressed with the drive and the extras on this model, including that dinky little removable torch in the boot, and umbrella,

features which only used to appear on the Superb IIRC.

 

I found the led headlights to be absolutely fantastic - really crisp lighting. Even the DRLs are really bright.. Coming from Bi-Xenons in my 2013 car this was a revelation.

The Facelift infotainment has Android Auto  and Apple Carplay which I've not yet tried, but could you not use your iphone in conjunction with this?

 

I glad you are pleased with the car.

 

Yes I will probably use the Apple Carplay if a trip involves frequently congested roads. 

 

I am putting together some music files on a SD card. Can anyone provide a link to the manual? I would like to see what file types are compatible.

 

 

 

 

Congrats.  I’ve had my 18 reg SE L for 3 months now and love it.  The 1.4 tsi is punchy enough for me, and enough bells and whistles to keep me happy.

 

I have added a reversing camera (thanks to member Weyland’s how-to), and a dash cam.

 

It was just under 3 years old, and showed 21k miles, with tbh not a mark on it.  The previous private owner had bought it from, had it serviced, and p/ex’d it through the same dealer (Marshall’s at Newbury), and had added rear bumper protector and boot liner.  Even the umbrella was present!

 

I did foolishly buy the coating, but before the winter, I’ll be claying the car to take it off, and protecting it with my usual regime of polish and wax, which has stood me in good stead for years on previous cars.

 

So decent ones are about...

I managed to find a link to the Amundsen manual for my Octavia 3. Looks like I will need to alter some of my music files as max sample rate 48khz and I've saved some as 96kHz.

The car will need new tyres before long. Any recommendations for quiet running tyres that have plenty of wet weather grip?

I must find the tyre test website.

The Mk4 I tested seemed to have very noisy tyres - forgot to note what they were.

Edited 27 June, 20214 yr by MichaelTL

Re: Tyres. Is your car fiited with the 17" (225/45/17) or 18" (225/40/18) wheels?

I found this discussion was quite good...

 

Failing that the Tyres forum on this site has plenty to feast your eyes on.

 

 

Mine has the 17” wheels - so the higher profile tyres, but still noisy.  I didn’t think to insist on a particular brand when the dealer agreed to replace tyres noted as advisories on the MoT test.  Potentially expensive omission...

Edited 27 June, 20214 yr by Baxlin

Just to add, I work in the fleet industry and most company cars aren't ragged. Reason is as a driver you get it out of your system quickly and most people are also paying for their own fuel. It's a business tool, not a weekend sports car.

 

Not all fit that mold but most do. They generally have a bit more cosmetic damage (used more, parked in different places more) but most of that is rectified before auction