Who Dictates The Results Of A PPI ?

[bBunny]

Opinions please.

I found a great looking example of an 85 Targa in Gold/Burgundy, 150,000 miles . I was initially smitten as it's a color scheme that reminds me of my youth. I decided to look into it further.

The dealer ( Alan Monroe- arizonamuscle) explained his terms of any discovery in a PPI and subsequent negotiations. I have never had this experience or demand.

HIS TERMS ;

1) To get the car checked out at DonJackson's ( Phoneix, AZ. Great shop BTW ), I would first have to give him my credit card to which he would charge a $500 deposit.

2) He would dictate the terms/results of any discovery found in the PPI. Anything other than his list would constitute an acceptable result, immediately locking me in to a sale. My $500 deposit would NOT be returned under any circumstances.

3) He wanted to agree on a final sale price, dealer fees, etc BEFORE the car even went for a PPI.

I obviously have missed something going on with pCar sales ?

[JFP in PA]

Walk away. The buyer sets the rules on a PPI, chooses who does it, and sees the results first. They are telling you where to go, what you will be told, and you can't back out. Complete nonsense. On second thought, run away.............

[Cloudsurfer]

Walk away. The buyer sets the rules on a PPI, chooses who does it, and sees the results first. They are telling you where to go, what you will be told, and you can't back out. Complete nonsense. On second thought, run away.............

Absolutely. This reeks of no goodness!!!!

[moondoggy]

Appears from your list of cars that you're very familiar with buying high end cars so I think you really want this car and may be willing to put up with the dealer's nonsense notwithstanding. My familiarity with PPIs is that whoever pays for it, owns the results and which aren't required to be published by the owner. Maybe the dealer senses that you want the car too badly and is testing you. THey're unreasonable but you can test their desire to sell it by, for ex., offering a contract in writing that you'll buy it for your price IF your PPI doesn't come up with major problems. An '85 with 150k is very suspicious since, for ex., I don't know how all the maintenance docs could have been obtained from whoever they bought it from (even if they kept them). If they won't accommodate a simple PPI under your requirements, it appears that car isn't the one to renew memories. Also, you can buy another '85 and have it repainted. Good luck and if you buy it, let us know if your gut instinct was correct afterall.

[binger]

^{I would not stand for any conditions like that. I would run away as fast as you can.}

Edited October 9, 2013 by binger

[PorscheServiceThen529Plan]

Hard to believe a reputable dealer would deal like that. This would be the equivalent of letting the selling broker in a real estate transaction choose the inspector, which is a bad idea because the inspector will have every incentive to please the recurring source of business and not the one-timer (you). There will always be gray items that could go either way and you can bet that if this guy does a lot of business with the dealer there is a strong financial incentive for the gray items to not be included and anger the recurring source of business. Also if these guys already worked on it for him and missed something or made a mistake, it would be not be good for them if they found it later in the PPI.

[White987S]

That's crazy on many levels.

[bBunny]

thank you all :-)

I've sourced and bought enough high end cars as well as family cars in my lifetime, and never came across this kind if treatment.

[JasonStern]

Ignoring the dealer markup, this is a good example of why to try to buy from a private party owner. Even if everything checks out, you have no idea who the previous owner was, how they drove the car, etc. While the seller might still try to screw you over, at least you can be the judge instead of blindly guessing. Make sure to have them drive you for half of the test drive and pay attention to how they drive as well as all of the noises the car makes. Plus there isn't anything a dealership mechanic would find that a Porsche specialist wouldn't. In fact, it's more likely they would miss something. And finally, (at least the higher volume) dealers seem not to care about repair documentation, spare goodies (winter rims, hard top for cabriolets, original parts, spare parts, etc.). Some things to think about, at least. Best of luck finding another gold/burgundy 911!