Buying a car that was a rental...?
 

Genuine opinions here..tale up to now is I cover over 20k business miles a year, self employed, and had pressed my old beetle convertible into service. Unfortunately it seems I am spending a few hundred quid a month on repairs, so am now thinking I might be better served with a newer car.

Cut to the chase. We have looked at everything from smart cars to Korean crossovers, but I do love my beetle and like the new one so have found a 62 plate tdi 140 with only 22k miles on clock. It is for sale through Arnold Clark, and, from 2012-2014 was a preregistered car on their hire fleet. It then moved to its sole private owner up till now. Should i be concerned about it's two years of god knows how many inconsiderate drivers. Car will be financed so must last four relatively trouble free years, my mechanic is a vw specialist.

My dad buys ex hire cars and always argues in these days of injury lawyers for you, these cars are serviced and kept in top order on this day and age, and also points out a beetle is unlikely to have been hired and pressed into hard service, something the cars condition and meagre mileage would back up. It is colour and base spec I want, I don't like the big wheeled garish striped versions...

What say you?

I was in the same situation (albeit I do far fewer miles) as you about 8 weeks ago. The V60 I was looking to buy had been owned by Hertz for the first 11-12 months of its like. I had the same thoughts going through my mind about how it may have been treated and driven, but the test ride showed no problems, The next 3-4 years of its life it had been owned by the same person, so any problems would likely have been found and solved, or if there were any major problems the second owner would have moved it on fairly quickly?

I ended up buying it and am very happy with it, would I buy again an ex rental? Maybe, depends on the type of car, a generic fiesta as the standard offering, maybe not, but something more premium, or a convertible etc, maybe I would as they tend to cost more to rent, but I would only buy if the next owner had owned it for several years, if it had been a dog they wouldn't keep it.
I did insist that it had to have a full tracking and alignment before I purchased though, as the previous MOT stated front left tyre was worn on the inside edge, but the right wasn't. Upon viewing I could see the dealer had tried to hide this by just swapping fronts to the rear and wouldn't listen to my concerns at first, eventually he pulled out a form showing it had had two new tyres and the new ones put on the front :rolleyes:

I had never thought of it like that, I should probably be more worried how it was looked after in last four years!

A rental, no I wouldn't. It will have had all sorts of people in it leaving their germs and crap ingrained deep into the interior, people will treat it with less respect as its not something that they own and in fact, people most likely drive them worse deliberately. I'd also be wary of the quality of the upkeep in the rental companies ownership. Despite this, there will be odd reasonable one in the mix.

If its another beetle, its probably been used as a courtesy vehicle and to be honest most blokes would refuse a Beetle loan car. I personally used to insist on something like a Golf/Passat equivalent at the least. Its probable used as courtesy car by women customers who will not necessarily want to test it out at every opportunity to see how long the wheel spin marks are or its g-forces around corners. So I'd just go and treat it like any other car and assess it.

I think that it boils down to two things, 'biggbn'; one - your attitude to risk, and two - the purchase price.

If, having carried out due diligence, you are happy with the risk, and have also negotiated an acceptable discount against retail that reflects the car's history, I would say go for it - always mindful, of course, of ' caveat emptor'.

Regards. John.

Discount? Arnold Clark? Having a laugh😆. I agree with opposing statements made, contrary bugger I am. It being a beetle and such low miles gives me a bit of confidence, again, it was Arnold Clark who were first owner so may even have been a demonstrator I guess, it's declared as having been owned by a business or rental agency. They have been quite honest about this to be fair, as they have to be.

But it might have been kicked about by all and sundry without a thought...althpugh, condition negates that thought somewhat. Can't get down to see car till Saturday anyhow, a week to have a think.

Other concern I guess is low mileage diesel...potential egr etc problems? Ah, old cars are so much simpler. If I could only find a decent old s80d5....

Am I the only one on the forum who has rented a car and then not driven it at 100mph in first before smearing faeces all over it?
I and my wife and daughter have had rental cars on a few occasions, all of them have been clean and tidy, worked properly and they've been driven with due regard, on the other hand my sister's car which she bought ex demonstrator I wouldn't touch, one lady owner but totally abused.

That is my old man's attitude to, I guess you buys with your eyes and stand by your decision.

Rental cars[of the big companies]are not kept for long due to incentives from manufacturers to change.They'll have been serviced at main dealers.Yes they'll have been driven by quite a few people and possibly abused by some of those.But what says a one private owner car hasn't been used and abused by other family members?A bit of due diligence when purchasing[as with any car]and you should be fine.

My last four working cars have been ex-rental, 1.6 diesels, a brace of Focus, a Bravo and the latest a 308. I buy them with about 15k on the clock and keep them till 60K. Most days I just pound them up and down the motorways. None have broken down or failed on MOT. Only one had a fault, AC heat exchanger, which turned out to be from a previous accident that the dealer was unaware of but replaced under warranty. I did have to force the dealer to repair but that was not the cars fault.

If you buy a low mileage ex-rental that can easily do 90mph, so not a little 1.0L then it is unlikely to give you any problems even though it may have been driven like it’s been stolen. The engines are normally rev limited and the drive train can generally take a bigger, high torque engine, both protect from damage, and the discs, pads and tyres easily replaced.