Hello all new here and I have a question for you Audi owners, I went into a small used car dealer the other day to look at this A8 they had and it looks pretty sweet. Has three little door dings on rear passenger door but I believe that was the worst of the outside (hoping if I purchase it the dentmaster can get them out if not oh well it's a used car can't be perfect. My truck I bought new and people still put their dents in it. A$$H@!&S). I did not take it for a test drive yet because it was on the floor inside and I had not brought the wife with me. I also did't believe the price was right. But it was. The price $17,000, retail on KBB is 26K and change and trade in on KBB is about 17k and change. Does this sounds to good to be true?? The A8 is a 4.2 Quattro with 47000 miles on her. I have a friend that has taken an A8 home from work and I liked the look, the ride and basically the whole package but I am wondering why such a low price. The one thing I was not too thrilled about is someone told me that when it is timing belt service time it could cost upwards of $4,000 because you should change the water pump and a few other things that are accessible at that time. Any comments are greatly appreciated. Sorry for being long winded but I'm torn between an A8 and a Caddy Deville DTS.

 

The A8 owns

 

There's always about a $8K discrepancy between the KBB of an A8 and its trade-in value, but the retail price at a used car lot tends to be in the neighborhood of the trade-in value. Keep in mind that people who will spend around $17K on a 93 octane drinking aluminum-bodied plutobarge usually aren't crazy about the fuel consumption at today's prices - hence its become harder to move these cars off the lot in the past month.

$17K seems to be a little low for a 47K mile car, what year is it? What state is it being sold in? (location) Options, etc?

Make sure to look at the Carfax thing carefuly - was it a lease vehicle, how many owners, were the services done regularly, were the services done at an Audi dealer or at Mike's Autobody and Nail Salon?

If the service costs of the A8 scare you - look at something else instead (but not the Caddy). The truth is - the A8 is a very reliable car, so not much goes wrong compared to other Audis and to other cars in the class. But when something does go wrong - its gonna be expensive.

 

Model year and location are kinda important with used A8 prices. Might wanna spend a bit and pay for a carfax, too.

 

Sorry about that guys I got so long winded and still forgot the year. It is a 99 same as you there AWDaholic and is located in Connecticut. Gonna have to check out Carfax.com too. Thanks for the input so far guys....

 

LOL, lemme see the AutoTrader page for this car! I've test driven like 5 diff A8s in that price range in CT in the past 2 months, before buying a 99 A8 4.2Q MingBlue in Massachusetts, 3 nice little 200 mile round trips to the dealer and back. I have a feeling I might have actually seen the one youre talking about.

 

Hello HansBlix, I'm new to the forum looking to get a 99 A8.
Mark Motors in New Haven has 2 99s. Have you seen them by any chance?
I'm in New Hampshire. I don't mind the drive but it would be preferable to know
Something about them ahead of time. Would you agree?

http://www.autotrader.com/dealers/dd...ler_id=3398206

Thanks in advance.

 

Hi Franasia! It just so happens I drove one of them, the blue one with 80K miles. The blue one I remember had moderate brake fade and a warning light for an O2 sensor, but the dealer assured me that it would be fixed. When backing up the steering column emitted a shudder, which shouldn't really happen with A8s. That blue one has been there for over 2 months, which is kinda weird since they tend to move them a little faster than that, but with gas these days.....Cant tell you much about the one with 99K miles, but with that mileage you'd be safer getting something else.

The dealership itself is located in the ghetto, to use a technical term. The dealer was nice enough, but did not inspire much confidence in terms of taking care of the car during its 90 day(?) warranty period. The dealer, as you can guess from the Autotrader pages, traffics in moderate-to-high mileage luxobarges which rarely exceed $16K sticker price. They scout for these cars at auctions, and typically sell them to locals. The asking prices at this dealer are generally $2K below others, but with A8s you generally get what you paid for.

A couple more things: make sure to look carefully at the CarFax report and see where the car was purchased, how many owners it has had, if the scheduled services were done on time and at an Audi dealer. Ex-lease cars are generally better taken care of. Ask the dealer about the control arms on the car, another issue with A8s. Also make sure every single electric thing in the car works, seats, sunroof, shades etc because it will be eyewateringly expensive to repair some small thing once you're off warranty. I don't know what kind of budget you're on, but try to avoid getting anything with over 75K miles or less than $13K sticker price - not much in the A8s goes wrong but once it does you'll have to resort to robbing armored trucks. Look at Boston area dealers, they should have plenty of ex-lease A8s that have been well taken care of and with dealer history.

I hope I haven't scared you off, but keep looking and eventually you'll find your A8! Keep us appraised of your progress!

 

Hey HansBlix, thanks for your reply. I have been doing my homework and read the Buyer’s Guide over at audipages and I think it’s basic to have car inspected by independent mechanic, so if not from the area, this gets kind of difficult.

Independent mechanic can be skipped if car has low miles and some kind of good warranty ... and most importantly drives and looks fantastic. It’s also important who you buy it from, I think.

I agree with you about looking in the Boston area. My budget is relatively flexible … I’m still shocked at the low prices these cars can be had for. I was thinking a car in the 50k miles range for around $15~16k would be reasonable. What do you think?

One option I’m kind of drooling over is the warm or hot pkg. It appears it was not very popular in the NE. The cold pkg. seems to be standard but not sure … looking for info about it now.

Well, will keep you posted.

Thanks!

 

Yup, mechanics are a must, even if you're far away. I live in CT and I had the dealer in MA who I bought my '99 A8 4.2Q from take it over to an Audi dealer in south Boston, they checked it out for about a hundred bucks - but it's worth doing that if you're really serious about a particular car. You can do this all over the phone.

$15-16K for a 50K mile car sounds about right, but those cars will generally not be younger than 2000. Mark Motors had a silver A8 with 53K miles for $16K asking, but it had interior condition issues....

I got my 67K mile car for $14,000, asking price was $15,995, took a month and a half of looking for A8s and a month of pestering the dealership...I think they hated me for making them finally give it up Sqeaky clean inside and out, perfect paint, almost no stone chips on the front fascia, drives great - did 127mph in it yesterday without too much sweaty palms even in choppy crosswinds, feels about the same as doing 100mph [8D]

Didn't get winter/summer packages on mine (my A8 was bought new in a DC suburb). If you do look at cars with the summer package - make sure those power shades work, cause it'll be a bitch when the electrics go. I had my heart set on having a car with those shades, but don't walk away from a great A8 if it doesn't have them, think of it as less stuff that can go wrong later on. The AC is just fine when its really hot out.