Buying a vehicle long distance?

[GON]

Originally Posted By: wag123
Originally Posted By: Mr Nice
Originally Posted By: Audios
Its at a delaer, so Id pay them if anything, or take it to a local shop. Id be careful with those "we go to you to inspect" sites, if you read the fine print it doesnt go on a lift, they MAY jack it up, and theres no scanning involved, so no idea about pending faults or if the monitors are ready, if thyere not ready that means they just reset the light or the battery went dead.


Why not fly out there and test drive and inspect ?

Unless it's brand new, there's no way I will buy a car sight unseen.

+1
I would NEVER buy a 10 year old M-B sight-unseen, you are just asking for trouble!
While you are there, take the car to an independent mechanic who is experienced with M-B products and pay for an inspection.
If you can't do this, pass on the car and wait for something to turn-up closer to home.


Could not agree more.

The risk is way more than any potential reward. Even with a inspection there is huge risk with a MB, as it takes a Xentry proprietary computer to truly inspect the many complex MB systems- if there is a intermittent trans, engine, or transfer case issue- you are looking at many thousands to fix.

 

[Wolf359]

Originally Posted By: GON
The risk is way more than any potential reward. Even with a inspection there is huge risk with a MB, as it takes a Xentry proprietary computer to truly inspect the many complex MB systems- if there is a intermittent trans, engine, or transfer case issue- you are looking at many thousands to fix.


While true, those problems are somewhat more rare. There are also aftermarket systems that can do a full system scan. I have one of those that was under $100 and does a full scan of all the MB subsystems. iCarsoft seems popular now and it's a little over $100. A knock off Xentry system is in the $500-$800 range on Aliexpress.

I did buy an MB private party in another state. In that case, I drove a few hours in the evening, got there and bought the car on the spot. Brought a bank check. Asked a bunch of questions before I went there and did a carfax before going. I ended up going back home to get the insurance/plates and had to come back to get the car. That was actually trickier, but Google maps is pretty good at giving you public transportation options. It was a mix of bus, train, subway, taxi to get to the suburb to pick it up.

I was never interested in a diesel. I noticed that people would post diesel questions and never get answers. They didn't make a lot of MB's to begin with, I think for 2007/8, they only made 23-26k GL's and I'm sure an even smaller percentage of those were diesels. Plus not too many mechanics seem to know how to fix them so you may be stuck with the dealer who may also not know that much about them because there's so few out there. Oh and knowing MB, probably the 2008 model will be better than the 2007 which was the first year of a new model.

 

[Audios]

Well the repairs and scan tools are not an issue, I own a European shop and was a Mercedes master tech when I worked at the dealer, so Im willing to gamble a bit with the car. Poor bodywork is a deal breaker for me, but almost everything else would be worth it if the car is bought for the right price. Id almost prefer to find a clean one with bad motor or trans and repair it myself.