Automotive Deal-breakers

Fake M badges on BMWs. Die, people. Just die in a fire. Also, ugly aftermarket shifter knobs and fake wood.

By extension, fake AMG badges and carbon fiber stickers.
 
Who cares when someone else paid for it?
Because if you are buying the car, you are paying for it. A car with leather heated seats costs more than one with cloth ones, you can not buy the expensive one but if you can't FIND the base model because everyone bought the stupid fancy one for the higher resale value (and the car will also be a boring ugly color because of resale value usually) and there was a 1/5 chance of finding a car that was the options I wanted and usually that one will be rusty.
 
You say that, and yet my dad has owned three different vehicles in which the (aftermarket) radio buzzed in synch with the tachometer.
That's a bad radio not a bad install. When I did my install I had the radio along with a wiring harness for the car and a manual on how to wire it up, it was literally put wires together (I used quick disconnects to make it nice and clean) and then plug the result into the stock harness.
And the touchscreen one's? The UI's look awful.
Most UI's look like poop, even "stock" ones. Remember that outside of the expensive models stock navi's tend to be regular aftermarket navi's with some badging and manufacturers name in the UI. At the same time my Pioneer has a much more intuitive and ergonomic UI than the Audi MMI systems, and we all know about iDrive... Like I said a very silly "deal-breaker", as it would be a case-by-case basis but at the same time stock radios are usually not expensive or hard to find (hell if the Audi one is $40...) and are an easy install. Same for the wheels, unless car is showing actual signs of abuse/neglect I don't really see what the big deal is, unless the rims are super ugly and you don't want to spend the money for a new set (that I understand).
Fake M badges on BMWs. Die, people. Just die in a fire. Also, ugly aftermarket shifter knobs and fake wood.
Fake badges of any kind actually. I saw an A4 twice already (same car) on the highway here with S4 badges and body kit, but its clearly a 1.8T..... Which I never really understood, "regular" people won't know what the difference is between M/S/RS/AMG and those who do can usually tell...
 
DIY-painted interior bits, like wood-looking centre console repainted to silver etc. I don't like wood, but it's hell of a lot better than somebody using paint to change color of the trim. Usually that leads directly to the carbage-section, even if the paint color wasn't carbage class itself, like black instead of orange for example.
 
About aftermarket radios, there are several types of them, at several quality levels. This is also true for built-in radios.

When, 9 years ago now, the original Ford radio (very low quality, to be honest) in my car decided to chew cassettes up instead of playing them, I decided to swap it with something having both cd-player and mp3 player. So i bought myself a Sony -whatever- and installed it. 2 days later I was bringing it back at the shop because it buzzed in every single mode it had, and it was complete rubbish. I managed to get to choose another one instead, so I decided to play it safe and went for an Alpine. That has been my stereo set for the following 8 years, following me in the first Golf, and I still have it in its original packing ready to be installed if and when the original stero-set in my current car should fail or start to behave strangely. BTW, the audio quality IS still a little better in the Alpine set that in the current one I have, and the only reason I haven't swapped it yet is because with this one I don't have to bring along the front portion of it every time I park the car.
 
Because if you are buying the car, you are paying for it. A car with leather heated seats costs more than one with cloth ones, you can not buy the expensive one but if you can't FIND the base model because everyone bought the stupid fancy one for the higher resale value (and the car will also be a boring ugly color because of resale value usually) and there was a 1/5 chance of finding a car that was the options I wanted and usually that one will be rusty.

I think the point he tried to make is that the first owner paid for all the crap (leather etc) and the second buyer will not face that much of a difference in the price of the used car. Or if there is, you're car-shopping in the wrong places. Spending a boatload of cash on equipment isn't a way to boost the resale value; you just pay for stuff which is barely accounted for when the car is traded in. If you want a good resale value, you buy an absolute standard model (maybe with A/C to ensure somebody will want to buy it) so the percentual resale value is better.
 
I think the point he tried to make is that the first owner paid for all the crap (leather etc) and the second buyer will not face that much of a difference in the price of the used car. Or if there is, you're car-shopping in the wrong places. Spending a boatload of cash on equipment isn't a way to boost the resale value; you just pay for stuff which is barely accounted for when the car is traded in. If you want a good resale value, you buy an absolute standard model (maybe with A/C to ensure somebody will want to buy it) so the percentual resale value is better.

Yes. Here, optional equipments are worth nothing to a car value after only four or five years. The only exceptions being 4x4 and some automatic gearbox.
 
All my cars have had:
  • 6 gears
  • Rear wheel drive
  • Factory fit Lexus rear lights (even though only the Lexus is a Lexus)
  • Remote opening boot
I'm not sure if any of these are hard and fast 'must have' features, but they're certainly an unusual collection.
 
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About aftermarket radios, there are several types of them, at several quality levels. This is also true for built-in radios.

When, 9 years ago now, the original Ford radio (very low quality, to be honest) in my car decided to chew cassettes up instead of playing them, I decided to swap it with something having both cd-player and mp3 player. So i bought myself a Sony -whatever- and installed it. 2 days later I was bringing it back at the shop because it buzzed in every single mode it had, and it was complete rubbish. I managed to get to choose another one instead, so I decided to play it safe and went for an Alpine. That has been my stereo set for the following 8 years, following me in the first Golf, and I still have it in its original packing ready to be installed if and when the original stero-set in my current car should fail or start to behave strangely. BTW, the audio quality IS still a little better in the Alpine set that in the current one I have, and the only reason I haven't swapped it yet is because with this one I don't have to bring along the front portion of it every time I park the car.
100% Agree, the Pioneer unit had NOTICEABLY better sound than stock, it also has a lot of EQ options so even though speakers are still stock I can tune it to work better with them.
 
Yes. Here, optional equipments are worth nothing to a car value after only four or five years. The only exceptions being 4x4 and some automatic gearbox.

Sometimes even autobox can have an inverse effect, since to some people it's a dealbreaker - especially in some cars. E36 coupes with relatively small engines, for example.
 
One of my biggest dealbreakers is a lack of pictures in the ad. I want to be able to see all sides of the car, interior front and rear. If there are pics missing, like no pics from the left side, the seller has something to hide there. Another one for me is short ads. I don't get people trying to sell their car with just a four-line ad basically saying model, year and that's it.

personally, i would never buy a car without having seen it in person, and having driven it.
so for an online ad, one pic is enough for me, just so you can see he didn't mess up the model name, and if it's a color you like.

* belgian second hand sites don't work the way eBay does. the popular ones are just places where you can sell stuff. if you see sth you like, you pick up your phone and call the seller, and if you can agree on the prise, you get it, and the seller takes down the ad. no such thing as bidding against eachother, but first comes, first serves...
 
personally, i would never buy a car without having seen it in person, and having driven it.
so for an online ad, one pic is enough for me, just so you can see he didn't mess up the model name, and if it's a color you like.

* belgian second hand sites don't work the way eBay does. the popular ones are just places where you can sell stuff. if you see sth you like, you pick up your phone and call the seller, and if you can agree on the prise, you get it, and the seller takes down the ad. no such thing as bidding against eachother, but first comes, first serves...
I still need a bunch of pics. All the sides and one inside at minimum, I don't want to spend an hour to go look at a car that ends up having a huge gash on the side or interior is falling apart.
 
If a guy can't be bothered to snap a few photos for a sales ad, he probably hasn't given a damn about the car.
 
Stick-on accessories.
Aftermarket head unit with a fucking light-show on the display whenever it's turned on.
Smoker's car, I don't care what people say, the stench of stale cigarettes never fully comes out of the car.
 
Smoker's car, I don't care what people say, the stench of stale cigarettes never fully comes out of the car.
That is very true, smoke takes FOREVER to get out of the car. My fiancee used to smoke and I banned her from smoking in the car even in the summmer. Despite windows open and leather interior it took a couple of weeks to fully air out....
Aftermarket head unit with a fucking light-show on the display whenever it's turned on.
I really don't understand those... Mine just said "Pioneer" when starting until I changed the logo to Audi.
 
For me it's automatics. Even when walking past a Porsche, Corvette, Miata, ect... I cringe when I look in and see an autobox.
 
For me it's automatics. Even when walking past a Porsche, Corvette, Miata, ect... I cringe when I look in and see an autobox.

With those cars I cringe a lot more than when it's in a large saloon or other luxobarge. They're perfectly fine there IMHO. There's cars for driving and there's cars for going somewhere. Those are not necessarily the same thing.
 
Smoker's car, I don't care what people say, the stench of stale cigarettes never fully comes out of the car.

Well, it is true, in a sense.

My previous Golf had been owned by a smoker for two years. It was not a bad smoker's car, because the smell was good when I bought it, and it was regularly washed because the interiors were clean, but...

but, later on, for different reasons and in different times, I took out all the air-vents and several of the interior panels, and I cleaned them before putting them on again. That was 3-5 years after I bought the car.

Every single panel and plastic piece was still dusted or stained with nicotine. It takes the form of a pervasive black-yellowish dust-like sticky substance covering the unaccessible sides of the panels, and you need water and soap to fully take it off.

Also, the ashtray cup... I ended-up swapping it after trying to clean it with serious stuff. It didn't work.

So, it's true, cigarettes never fully leave a smoker's car.
 
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