It had happened before.
Older sister’s Mazda got crashed into during the winter of 2020 – never to recover or be seen again.
It happened again.
Little sister’s Volkswagen Polo got shunted in the offside rear with enough force to move the rear axle and dent the nearside threequarter panel. Result : another sibling’s car written-off with a drunk driver arrested close to the scene – he’d attempted to hide.
Here we go again… I’d sourced her ex-courtesy car from a Crewe VW dealership which was £500 cheaper than in Manchester. It served her well although about five years ago had an engine rebuild as there are documented problems with the three cylinder 1.2 petrol unit.
Keen to get the best valuation, I searched on autotrader and found a near identical model advertised at a dealership for £2500. Little Sis had assumed her car was worth £500 after consulting one valuation website. Armed with that information, she was able to increase its value from the £1800 offered to £2200.
Moral of that story is to have valuation evidence and haggle hard – and also to park in a place where driver’s under some influence won’t crash into your set of wheels !
Words and photo are copyright of Sotiris Vassiliou
September 2021
