Ebay Xm's, XM's for sale

[combwork]

Hi,

There are a fair number of XM's on Ebay just now, including a V6 with gas conversion. Could maybe be interesting............................

Jim.

[Chris Light]

Buying an XM is probably all the adventure you need, without adding bidding blind on Ebay. I'm pretty dubious about Ebay at the best of times, an Ebay XM doesn't really bear thinking about.

[noz]

Like anything else in life it's a judgment of cost versus risk. If you buy a Series 1 blind off e-bay for £100 I'd say you can't lose. If you have a mind to you could break the car up and realise about £1000 in parts even if you re-sell them on e-bay. Or if you have a Series 1 then use the parts yourself and save on new or second hand part prices. Judging by the requests for spares on this forum and others there's a ready made market for breaking them up.

It's all down to the price you pay.

For the gassed V6 there's another calculation to be considered. How much would you pay for the car inicluding all the gassing kit versus buying the kit new on it's own? If the values are comparable then it might be worth buying it just for the kit.

Happy hunting.

Cheers

noz

[combwork]

You have a point Chris, but I bought my XM Estate on Ebay. Would I have bought it if I'd found it in the local paper? Possibly not. BUT I'm glad I did buy it. My knowledge of XM's was zero before I got one, so the bits that didn't work would have scared me off. I'm not saying they are easy to work on; but there's enough knowledge on this board and elswhere to help solve at least some problems. I thought about your idea Noz; buy the gas converted V6 and fit the gear to my own car but I don't have the knowledge to do this with any confidence, besides which it looks too good to break. The pictures on Ebay show a single spoke steering wheel with radio controls set in the spoke. Does this make it a series 1? It's still there; sitting on £225 with just over three days to go. No, it's not mine. I'm not trying to generate interest. Just curious as to why it seems so cheap.

Jim.

[noz]

My theory is that it boils down to a little understood concept of 'value'. Value by definition is what someone is prepared to pay for it. If the most someone is prepared to pay for the XM is £225 then that's its value. It dosen't matter what things like Parkers guide etc says. I know the suspicion is that there's something wrong with it but it could simply be that there's not enough XM nutters out there to bid for it.

Only my view after all !!

Cheers

noz

[combwork]

Fair point Noz,

Value is hard to define. At this moment (8:47pm Saturday July 10th), having been stuck for 2 hours in central Glasgow with a starter motor which refuses to operate when the engine is hot (a `fixed' problem that crept back when my back was turned), and then found a parking ticket stuck on my disabled motor, the value of my shiny blue V6 XM Exclusive Estate (only 28 registered in UK) is not much more than my daughters Fiesta. But I know that when the starter problem is fixed, when I've got the cruise control working reliably, when I've got the air conditioning working at all, etc et bleedin cetera, I'll be a happy bunny. Truth is I'm happy now; it's a hell of a car. Ok, not everything works all of the time and some of it don't work at all, but the good bits outweigh the bad bits. So I'm telling myself. Honest, they do. No really, they do...............

Ergh.

Jim.

[gary]

I bought my xm off ebay £400 and the car is in brilliant condition,full service history,new tyres all around.
I didn't bid blindly though the car was about 25 miles away so I went and checked it out before making the deal.
The beast is a silver 1992 2.1 td absolutley solid.
The only thing wrong with it was the remote locking was stuffed and the door locks just spun when I tried to lock it.I gave up sorting the remote central locking because the xantia I had before,that had dodgy central locking aswell.(no faith)
I soaked both the door locks in WD40 and eventually one of them started working,I put that one on the drivers door now I have central locking on the key and that is good enough for me.
I see on ebay now there is a xm estate going for over £3000 wow!
But generally I think most people are scared of the big citroens and that is why most of them only make peanuts.It is quite likley that the majority of car buying dudes still think that when you lift the bonnet on one of those big french things that go up and down,you will be greeted with what amounts to a plumbers nightmare.
Now us xm nutters know that just isn't true don't we!
Keep enjoying those XM's
gary

[Peter.N.]

Buying an XM succesfully is really down to your knowledge of XMs as there are so many things that can go wrong. I am on my fourth 2.1 td estate and have problems with this one which I have never had before, although not serious.

As there are probably only 10 to 15 for sale in the whole country at any one time, you have to be prepared to travel. I bought my most recent one in Manchester, over 200 miles from here and I think I got a bargain, but not if I had to pay a garage to fix all the faults. It is a January '96 almost the very last one without electronic engine management. It had only covered 114k miles and the body is almost undamaged, it did though have a number of electrical faults, most of which I have now fixed. It also needs a water pump and rear window mechanism, the first time I have had either of these faults. But at £800:00 including the £400 he gave me for my old one with 292k, a slipping clutch and quite a few knocks and scratches, I am more than happy to spend a few pounds on it.

They are a superb car, unsurpassed for comfort, ride, space, and economy, there are very few new cars that come near it, so if thats what you want its worth buying one and spending on it. Do try and get a Mk2 (post'94) they are much more reliable.

Peter.N.

[mebedforduk]

My twopenneth

Along with Chris I have always been very wary of ebay cars, although the couple that have caught my eye in the past I have always gone and had a look at first. After all the seller is using ebay to get maximum exposure to the whole country and in most cases will pull the auction if you offer a wad of cash.

Peter.N - Yours sounds cheap- well done

Xms for sale fall into two catagories, those that are tip top A1 condition but these are normally at the XM centre etc and lots of £££. The others are those with faults, but a lot lot cheaper.


Its just a question of knowing the faults and their impact on the life / enjoyment of the car. More importantly the impact of your bank balance


Ive just had to sell one of mine as I lost a parking space. The new owner has got a hell of a bargin. Another £100 spent on it plus a few weekends.......sorry cant go on...need a lie down....its too hard to talk about it....

Mark

2.1td VSX back on the road
2.5td VSX Estate just sold :-( sniffsniff