Cars & Motorbikes Buy a used Audi Q5 from dealer

I bought an Audi Q5 2009 from a Dealer on last Friday with low kilometres of 96,000km for $16,000. Because of the pressure from the dealer's tactic sales approach, I signed the contract at the first sigh of the car and without subjecting to mechanic pre-purchase inspection. He told me this car is the lowest price and o-meter just in the market in 3 days. Yesterday, I booked mechanic inspection and inspection report says Rear Differential Vibration/Shudder during the drive, breather pipe damage and wishbone cracking. I have not contacted the inspector to find out estimated repairing cost (weekend today).

I can exercise cool off within 3 business days because I am in Victoria.

What should I do?

1. Exercise the cool off. Pull out the contract and run away

2. Negotiate with the dealer to modify the contract to address the issues/fix the problems and subject to the mechanic inspection again, and a deduction $300 from price for mechanic inspection cost. Otherwise, I exercise the cool off condition immediately.

3. Negotiate with the dealer to reduce the price to cover the cost to fix the problems unless I exercise the cool off condition immediately

What do you think about the options above?

In your opinion, should I cancel the contract to avoid costly repairs in the long term?

 

FYI, the price $16,000 include the 5-year warranty from the dealer and the third party, Presidian Group.
The warranty covers the Differential repairing cost up to $2,000.
However, I doubt that the third party will cover the existing problems before purchasing the warranty.

 

Run away.

 

did you pay a deposit?

no personal experience, but from 110% of people ive spoken to, those second hand car dealer warranties are not worth the paper they are written on

 

Yes, I paid a deposit of $1000.
If I exercise the cool off right, the worst case is lost by 1% of the purchase price.
If not, it may cost me a lot if the car is not reliable during ownership time.

 

Run away quickly. The problems would be covered under statutory warranty but unlikely they would be fixed.

16k for and 11 yo Q5 with 100km is not a good deal.

 

Thanks for your advice.
Try to search the differential vibration repairing cost on the Internet but not find much information. Anyone has an idea?

 

Whao, you have been sold a car that is not roadworthy....got a cracked wishbone.

Take it back and buy yourself a commodore.

 

And flying over speed humps.


Guilty. lol

 

Or an ex Falcon Taxi.......
Either would be better than the Audi

 

Take your money n look somewhere else. Cracked wishbone should’ve been picked up by their mechanics before selling it. Vibration in the diff would be expensive and could also be caused by something else. Relying on dealer warranty wouldn’t be a good idea. Dealing with them with warranty repairs will be a massive headache.

 

A while back I read reviews on one of those dealer warranty extension thingy. LOL every reviewer was peeved.

The warranty was BS. They had to you jumping through hoops of fire and still wouldn't fix anything. Paperwork would be lost, emails lost. If an engine blew they'd blame a $10 bolt and just give you $10 and not fix the engine. It was a joke.

I think the company was eventually sold. But it had some political links and was owned by very wealthy people.

 

No doubt it was

 

Bad enough getting a repair under stat warranty. Had a car with a few issues, window motor and central locking fixed then I a gearbox issue that they refused to acknowledge. Took it to an independent and then requested repairs based on independent report only for it to be refused.

Took the issue to fair trading and the reply I got was actually quite threatening, fair trading told me the things the dealer fixed were not covered by warranty and if I continue to pursue the gearbox issue it will likely be ruled that I owe money for other repairs.

Those extended warranty would be a nightmare, read the fine print and it is a very limited cost covered per repair and lots of restrictions for n what is covered under what circumstances.

 

Check out on youtube 'Auto Expert John Cadogan'. He gives no nonsense, independent car reviews and isn't afraid to say it how it is..

I know this sounds very rude, but I think the main purpose of buying a 2009 Audi Q5 is to give the impression one has money (when they don't)..
euro cars (bmw/audi/merc) are notorious for very expensive maintenance items when they approach 100k. I think your money would be better spent on different make and model (newer with less k's).

 

I'm be pretty sure the "Cracked wishbone" is actually referring to the bush, which isn't a hugely expensive repair. Breather pipe damage is going to be next to nothing as well.

The differential could be very expensive. I can't remember if the Q5 runs proper Quattro or Haldex- the Haldex of those years could have some problems, but Quattro has always been a very reliable system.

You're not covered by statutory warranty on the car- it's too old.

What did you end up doing?
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Whilst I don't disagree that a disproportionate amount of European cars are expensive to maintain or otherwise problematic with a bit of age on them, Non-Euro cars are not immune to problems. Toyota's Hiluxes have had issues with DPF's for years now, Mazda's MPS series cars were a mess, Honda's auto's through the 2000's were made of glass, Nissan's CVT's are a disaster and Subaru can't seem to make an engine that keeps all the fluids and gases where they're supposed to stay. Hyundai are notoriously awful with warranty claims and lets not even get started on Holden product from the last ten years.
On the other hand; W205 Merc C-Classes are bulletproof, Mk5/6/7 Golf and Passats are very good cars (with the wet DSG), most recent Renaults are very reliable and... okay I'm running out of examples.

We personally own a VE2 Commodore, Mazda 3 and Renault Meg. The Renault is MUCH MUCH better to drive than the Mazda at a similar price point, but it has admittedly had a lot more dealer visits than the Mazda- ha! The Commodore is also reasonably nice to drive, but the interior is plain cheap and nasty, and I'll be damned if I can get comfortable in it....

The point I'm making is that a lot of people do spend more on a nicer car because they enjoy a nicer car. Sure, there's plenty of people who bought BMW 318i's because they wanted the badge.... but just because someone wants to spend a bit of money on a car they like, don't immediately assume they're a posing prat. God only knows, I didn't think I'd be caught dead in a Renault.... I went out to buy a Corolla (oops), but my mind was made up the moment I drove it!

 

I wouldn't judge someone for spending a large sum on a brand new euro car, provided they're spending within their means..
Buying one second hand with an unknown history, in my opinion, is a large repair bill waiting to happen..

 

assuming we are talking family sedans, I dont know much about hilux

but from my personal experience, japanese all the way for daily drives, minus nissan

eg your civics, corollas, mazda 3/6
ive had these all my life for 10years plus and so has my family and not one has broken down ever, or had a expensive breakdown,

I currently have a japanese daily and a euro/american toy

I think euros are stupidly over rated , and anyone who has one has enough money to cover it or brand/image is important to them,

purely from a financial I would never get a euro for a daily unless I won lotto,
those entry level bmw 3series, merc c/e class, vw, audi etc. I would not touch
price vs reliability vs repair costs vs service costs, not in a million years,

but that being said, the current shape entry level mercs look fantastic inside and out, and I would nt mind

/preparing to get flamed

 

You guys are probably both right as a general rule- but there are plenty of exceptions, especially if there's a great mechanic around.

e.g. My 2007 Land Rover Freelander 2 was rock solid- I bought it because it's all Ford underneath haha! They're mucmore reliable than the similar year Forester, X-Trail, Grand Vitara, etc alternatives.

Most higher end European cars are nicer places to be, and drive nicer, than similarly sized (obviously not similarly priced) Japanese/Korean/American/Australian cars. Unfortunately the extra money you spend often doesn't seem to translate into better quality engineering and materials under the hood.... which does tend to result in some bigger out-of-warranty servicing/repair bills.

Another big factor- We get SCREWED in Australia on Euro car pricing- both to purchase and to service. You wont find another country in the world where a base model 318i is more than double the price of a Golf, and you sure as hell wont find a BMW Dealership anywhere else charging $250hr for servicing!!! They claim all sorts of reasons like tax and how expensive our market is to service, but the reality is that stupid Australians will pay more.