The Corolla is often sold by somebody who never drove it.
The person ringing us about one of these is regularly not the person who drove it. A parent, a partner, a business, a family working out what to do with a car.
So the questions here are about names, keys and who needs to be present. If it was your own car all along, they are simply quicker to answer.
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Two kinds of not knowing
What you cannot say about the car matters less than whose name is on it
One of those gaps gets filled in by somebody standing in front of the car. The other one is the only thing that genuinely holds a sale up.
A call about a Corolla tends to open with an apology. It was my daughter's and she has moved overseas. It was my mother's and she has stopped driving. It belonged to the business and the person who had it has left. Then comes a run of questions the caller cannot answer with any confidence, how it has been serviced, what the sound on a cold morning is, whether it has ever been in anything, and along with that comes a quiet assumption that not knowing all of it is about to cost them money.
It does not. Nobody here is scoring you on how well you know a car you never drove, and there is nothing wrong with saying you are not sure. The detail you cannot supply is exactly what somebody coming out to look at the car supplies instead, which is the entire reason a person comes out rather than a form doing the work. Vagueness about a car is normal. It is priced in, and it is priced in by looking.
The other kind of not knowing is different, and it is the part worth five minutes at the start. Whose name is on the registration. Whether that person can be present when the car is handed over. Which account the money is going into. Who is holding the second key. None of it is hard and none of it is a test, it is simply the part a sale cannot happen without, and every one of those is easier to sort out a week early than on the morning. Tell us who the registered owner is and we will tell you what we need.
Before the day
What we ask when the seller is not the driver
Not one of these is about the car. They are the things that decide who signs, who gets paid and what has to be in somebody's hand when we arrive.
- Whose name is on the registration?
- Everything else follows from this one, so it is worth getting straight in the first minute. If it is a company, tell us the company. If it is a person who is not you, tell us who they are to you. Nobody is asked to prove anything over the phone. We only need to know who we will be dealing with.
- Can that person be there when the car goes?
- Sometimes they can and sometimes they are interstate, unwell or simply at work, and all of that is ordinary here. Say which it is early and we will tell you what we need in place of them being there, rather than it surfacing on the morning when everything else is ready to go.
- Which account is the money going into?
- Normally the one belonging to whoever is named on the registration, which is the version that causes nobody any trouble. If it has to work some other way, that is a conversation for the beginning and not the end, because it is simple in advance and awkward at the last minute.
- Is it still insured, and who is paying for that?
- A car in the middle of being sold still needs to be covered until it is handed over, and on a car like this the person paying for the cover is quite often not the person selling it. We do not need a policy number. Just tell us if anything is about to lapse or has already been cancelled.
- Is anything of theirs still in it?
- A toll tag on the windscreen, a permit stuck to the glass, sunglasses in the visor, a phone mount, a jumper in the back. Somebody who never drove the car has no way of knowing what is in it, so it is worth a look through before we come. The toll tag in particular is far easier to deal with now than afterwards.
- Where is the second key?
- On a car that has passed between people, the spare is very often in a drawer at a house nobody has thought to ring. Both keys get counted, so it is worth tracking down before the day. If it has genuinely gone, that is fine, and far better said now than found missing at the handover.
Whoever is selling it
Three things that do not depend on you knowing the car
- Not being sure is a real answer. You are not expected to have the life story of a car you did not drive. What you cannot fill in gets filled in by the person who comes out to look at it, and that is true whether you were the driver or have never sat in it.
- The names only have to line up once. Registration, identification and the account the money lands in, sorted out in one conversation near the start. After that the paperwork is signed on a phone and nobody is driving anywhere with a folder.
- Finance somebody else took out is still ours to sort out. Where there is a loan or a novated lease behind the car, we go to whoever holds the contract for the payout and close it out there. If it comes to more than the car is worth, that gap is put in front of you in writing while there is still nothing to sign.
The practical ones
Three questions from people selling for somebody else
The car is registered to a family member who has stopped driving. Can I deal with it for them?
Tell us that at the beginning rather than on the day, and we will tell you what to have ready. Who signs and who gets paid both follow from the name on the registration, so it is the first thing worth settling. It is a common situation here and it is not a difficult one.
It belongs to the business and one of our staff had it. Does that change anything?
It changes whose details we need and who puts a signature on the paperwork, and very little else. Give us the name on the registration and the name of the person who will be signing, and we will say what we need from them. The money goes where the paperwork says it goes.
I did not drive this car. What if the inspection turns up something I knew nothing about?
Then it turns it up, and it is not held against the person who could not have known. That is what somebody coming out to the car is for, instead of a figure built from a photograph and a hopeful description. The battery is assessed properly rather than discounted on a guess, and so is everything else.
Tell us who owns it and we will tell you what the day looks like.
Or call us on 03 9000 0075 and talk it through first.