Filling Paint Chips?

[lupinsea]

I'll be doing a thorough deep clean and prep on the ZHP this weekend to get it ready for sale. It has a few paint chips and I was wondering what is a good way to go about filling these?

My understanding is that it'll take a number of coats of touch-up paint to fill the chip hole itself, then I'll need to cut it down with a polish of some kind?

But that's all I know at this point.

What do you guys recommend?

Also, I'm seeing the a lot of 330i's listed for $10-11k private sale and $12-14k dealer. Is it worth putting a lot of effort and cost into getting the ZHP super sparkly or, given it's 124k mileage, will that not really matter and should I just do a very good cleaning? In other words, given the milage is it worth spending a heroic amount of time and money to really get the car prepped for sale?

It has a cracked fog light that I don't want to replace. And the bumper cover is scuffed bad from curb cuts and coming / going from driveways. Basically, given the milage I'm not thinking it's worth dumping more money that I probably won't get out into this car to fix a few cosmetic things. Mechanically it runs well and is in excellent shape.

Thoughts?

[ZBB]

I'd love some good tips on paint chips...

But my take on your car is that you should give it a good clean, do minor touch-ups on the paint chips, but leave it as is. Doing much more than that won't result in significant more $ when you sell it...

[John V]

Make sure it's clean inside and out but don't bother with the paint chips. It won't be worth your time and effort.

In the past I've had very good luck with the following method:

1) Wash car thoroughly
2) Dry with lint-free cloth
3) Use alcohol to clean out the chips
4) Get a bubble of paint on the end of a blunted toothpick
5) Fill the chip with the bubble and let it dry completely
6) If necessary, repeat 4-5 to get the fill just above the level of the rest of the paint
7) Cut the chip down with a credit card and some Langka

Do not attempt with metallic paint - it won't work.

[Nick M3]

Dr. Colorchip. Messing with regular touchup paint mostly gives you lots of opportunity to make things worse.

[FC]

Admitedly I've gotten lazy re: cars, but I would drop a tiny spec of paint, just enough to not have exposed metal, and the give the car a good polish/wax job. That will be good enough to look good in photos and from 10' away and ultimately get you lots of bang/buck. On a car that is not mint, I would not go beyond that.

[bren]

You might want to use some ~1500 grit sandpaper wrapped around a small rubber eraser or flat piece of wood to knock down the paint, and then compound/polish.

But yeah, that dr. colorchip looks quick and good enough.

[equ]

That's a round 200k kilometers... I wouldn't worry about the chips. On my cars, I do the minimal FC solution, just a bit of touch up on the worst ones so bare metal is not exposed. I don't worry about it being perfect or bringing it up to level, etc.

[FC]

My wife's MCS had the equivalent of a mild keying on the driver's door. Deep enough to feel with a fingernail, but not past the primer.

I simply put a small amount of paint along the scratch, wiped the excess with my finger, and procedeed to go 3-2-1 with the Griots machine polish. It's amazing how little you can see.

[Nick M3]

You might want to use some ~1500 grit sandpaper wrapped around a small rubber eraser or flat piece of wood to knock down the paint, and then compound/polish.

But yeah, that dr. colorchip looks quick and good enough.
It works reasonably well - it doesn't disappear the chips, but it fills them with color. And it's easy.

[John V]

Dr. Colorchip. Messing with regular touchup paint mostly gives you lots of opportunity to make things worse.

It's almost impossible to fuck up the method I posted.

Also: Please come up and get your shocks out of my garage :P

[lupinsea]

Thanks guys.

And thanks, John, but given I have the metalic silver paint it sounds like your technique wouldn't be advised in this case.

I think I'll go with FC's solution of just filling the chips enough so the black base coat / primer isn't exposed. Probably won't take much since it's surprising how thin a body-shop paint job is.*

Spent about 7 hours this weekend washing and cleaning the car. That got me to a clean exterior including clay bar, clean wheels, a clean engine compartment, clean trunk gutters and front hood gutters, cleaned door sills and door jambs, and a cleaned rear passenger compartment.

I still have the front to do plus some vacuuming of the carpeting.

Oh, I did managed to fix a badly worn drivers seat bolster by applying to black shoe polish. Man, huge difference. Took the gray and white cracked and work leather back to black and it blends in incredibly well with the rest of the seat.





* 2 months after we got the car it was side-swiped by a delivery truck. Fortunately it was all cosmetic and the driver's side quarter panel and hood were replaced. Nearly all the paint chips are on the hood. I do have some gouges on the rear deck lid where someone stole our rear lip spoiler and you can see just how much thicker the paint is on an OEM painted part vs. a body shop painted part.

[Nick M3]

Body shop paint is almost always many times thicker than OEM...

[John V]

Body shop paint is almost always many times thicker than OEM...

Yep. Unless they took the time to cut down the orange peel after the work, which they generally won't do unless you request (and pay extra for) it.

[kognito]

Hey Lup,

You did get the A/C working? right?

Fixing chips and cleaning up the car is good and all, but if the A/C isn't working I think a lot of buyers will look elsewhere.

[lupinsea]

Well, the paint on the hood and fender looks good and matches VERY well with the original paint. . . but it looks tissue paper thin where the chips are.

No idea how the shop painted the car or what they did. I basically called up the local BMW dealer and asked which shop they used. Then went there and had the work done (paid for by the delivery truck owner).


A/C is still out. I don't know if it simply needs a recharge or if there are other problems with it. At this point I don't want to sink a ton of money into the car, including the $100 or so it would take for a diagnostic. Especially since in my past experience nobody gives you credit for spending money to fix a car. As in, you don't get out what you put into the repair.

So, I'm figuring on selling the car "as-is". Especially with where depreciation has taken the value of the car.

[clyde]

I'd kind of count on the a/c needing either a compressor or evaporator (maybe both). Neither is cheap or simple, although there are plenty of Chinese imitation parts that make it cheaper. And noisier. A lot noisier. Not a lot cheaper. Had a long, drawn out pitched three way battle with Warranty Direct and a BMW dealer over this.

[Pinecone]

While you don't get credit for fixing things, you DO get dinged for having things not working. ESPECIALLY big things like AC.

[equ]

I agree.. Even with 124k, a not working AC will make a buyer suspect what other things the seller has ignored.

(Personally, I use AC very little in NJ. I'd probably never use it in Seattle.)

[kognito]

I agree.. Even with 124k, a not working AC will make a buyer suspect what other things the seller has ignored.

(Personally, I use AC very little in NJ. I'd probably never use it in Seattle.)

not necessarily, defrost and defog work off the AC, fog is an issue here (certainly is this morning!)

[lupinsea]

Hm...

I think I'll list the car as is and see how it goes. If buyers are really turned off on it then I'll reconsider.

The question for me is. . . will I get dinged more than it costs to fix it? If I get dinged and they want to negotiate the price down to the cost of fixing the A/C then I figure . . . might as well drop the price and let the new buyer take care of it. If they want to drop the price signficitanly lower than the cost of fixing it then I'll fix it.

And it's just the A/C. . . haven't really needed it in Seattle so I haven't bothered with it. The rest of the car is in good mechanical shape.

[John V]

I think you'll have a very hard time selling the car without A/C unless the price is really sweet. But I'm not familiar with the WA-state used car market.

[ZBB]

I'll share this experience:

When we sold my wife's '02 MINI, it was in overall great shape. Only problem was that she had hit a 2x4 on the freeway once, and it had hit right in one of the fog lights, breaking the plastic clips that held it in and putting a ~1 inch crack in the bumper. We disclosed that in the ad for it, and nobody even mentioned anything about it.

Then we had a person agree to buy it -- but needed one day to get the cash together. So we thought we'd be nice and take it in to get detailed. The car wash ended up breaking the driver's seat recline mechanism (common issue on the early MINIs). Since we were selling the car, I stopped by the MINI dealer to get a quick estimate of repair (it was close to $800 -- and at that point I was ticked).

We informed the buyer, and he said "well, I'll just fix it -- my wife really wants that car" -- but we felt bad and told them to pay $300 less.

On a side note: We attempted to make a claim with the car wash management -- but they never returned my calls nor responded to the letter we sent them. In retrospect, I should never have left the location with the issue not resolved. But we vowed to never use that company again (a local chain of car washes and gas stations) -- and no one in our family has visited them since. I guess we're not the only ones -- the company is now in Chapter 11...

[clyde]

On a side note: We attempted to make a claim with the car wash management -- but they never returned my calls nor responded to the letter we sent them. In retrospect, I should never have left the location with the issue not resolved. But we vowed to never use that company again (a local chain of car washes and gas stations) -- and no one in our family has visited them since. I guess we're not the only ones -- the company is now in Chapter 11...

I wish you lived in Albuquerque instead of Phoenix so I could make a Breaking Bad joke about Skyler buying the Car Wash.

[lupinsea]

I think you'll have a very hard time selling the car without A/C unless the price is really sweet. But I'm not familiar with the WA-state used car market.

I don't do a lot of private party buys and sell. Last time I went through this was when I sold the Miata private sale. The time before that was buying my Jeep and selling the Cherokee. So I'm not sure what the market is for BMWs other than what I see asking prices for on Autotrader, craigslist and a few other places. And nobody mentions in the ads what condition the vehicles are in. So who knows. . . I can't imagine they are all in pristine condition.

The last two cars we bought were used from a dealership, the CPO BMW and my wife's Volvo, also a CPO.

We'll just see how it goes.

I talked to our mechanic and they said if it's just low on refrigerant it's about $200 to charge it up. I know i could do it for less if I tried charging it up myself, though I've not done that before. But the mechanic said they'd also give the system a look over to see if there is anything else wrong with it during the recharge. Like I said, I'll list it and see what response I get. If the A/C is a big sticking I'll re-evaluate what to do.

[bren]

I think you'll have a very hard time selling the car without A/C unless the price is really sweet. But I'm not familiar with the WA-state used car market.
+1

[Nick M3]

Not having working a/c rules out 50% of buyers off the bat. At least. If you don't even know what's wrong, then someone is going to have to make a worst case scenario deduct and then add in hassle factor. Something like 30%+ of the value of the car.

[lupinsea]

Ok.

Well, it costs me nothing but time at this point just to list it. If it's an impediment I'll take it in and have the mechanic do a diagnostic on it and check the refrigerant levels.

FWIW, these are the images I posted.



http://img199.imageshack.us/img199/9784/clp11209852.jpg



http://img10.imageshack.us/img10/9790/p11209712.jpg



http://img21.imageshack.us/img21/3402/p11209702.jpg



http://img62.imageshack.us/img62/7803/clp11209812.jpg



http://img683.imageshack.us/img683/5345/p11209762.jpg



http://img829.imageshack.us/img829/5921/clp11209752.jpg



http://img7.imageshack.us/img7/9044/p11209772.jpg



http://img718.imageshack.us/img718/8005/p11209962.jpg



http://img88.imageshack.us/img88/2756/p11209932.jpg



http://img51.imageshack.us/img51/8147/clp11209902.jpg

[bren]

No floormats?

It looks a lot cleaner than any ~100k mile e46 I looked at with my BIL over the winter. After a few weeks of searching he gave up and got a c-class.

[lupinsea]

Yeah, I have the floor mats... took them out to vacuum and forgot to put them back in when I did the photos.

[Nick M3]

Yeesh, you were worrying about filling paint chips on a silver car? For some reason, I thought it was Orientblau.

[FC]

Pretty car. I still like Imola better, but nice. Not bad for 100K+ miles. Certainly looks plenty good in those photos. Best of luck, lup!

[Plaz]

Looks fantastic!

But yeah, I'd never buy a car that didn't have working A/C.

[John V]

That's a great looking car. Screw the paint chips on a silver car. Get the A/C fixed (or at least checked out so you know what the bill is going to be) and list it. I bet it'll sell quickly with working A/C or with a quote to get it fixed.

[SARAFIL]

That's a great looking car. Screw the paint chips on a silver car. Get the A/C fixed (or at least checked out so you know what the bill is going to be) and list it. I bet it'll sell quickly with working A/C or with a quote to get it fixed.

+1

Get it diag'ed. No buyer will pay a fair price for this car not knowing how big of a problem the AC is. If you find a buyer as-is, it'll be a low-ball price.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Josh (PA)]

I too think an A/C diag would be worth it, especially considering the stupid price clean ZHPs are selling for.

[bren]

I too think an A/C diag would be worth it, especially considering the stupid price clean ZHPs are selling for.
Like this $25k example....

http://russelbmw.com/used/bmw-3_series-330i-2005-6793P.html

[clyde]

To be a little bit of an asshole to the potential buyer... It's a 9 year old car with 100k on the clock begin sold as/is. I probably wouldn't say anything about the A/C at all. It's getting to be that time of year up there that non-thorough people may not think to check it...especially when the car looks as nice as it does and everything else works.

As Lup said, his only expense here for now is some time.

[JST]

To be a little bit of an asshole to the potential buyer... It's a 9 year old car with 100k on the clock begin sold as/is. I probably wouldn't say anything about the A/C at all. It's getting to be that time of year up there that non-thorough people may not think to check it...especially when the car looks as nice as it does and everything else works.

As Lup said, his only expense here for now is some time.

Remind me not to buy a car from clyde.

Seriously, I wouldn't be able to do that. Even if its not technically fraud, it's dishonest and sleazy...and whoever buys the car from you knows who you are and is likely to come back and stir up some shit when they realize you sold them a car with a huge issue that you almost certainly knew about. Assuming they didn't have a valid claim, would you really want to have to defend yourself in court/in a dark alley (depending on the buyer's disposition)?

[clyde]

Remind me not to buy a car from clyde.

Seriously, I wouldn't be able to do that. Even if its not technically fraud, it's dishonest and sleazy...and whoever buys the car from you knows who you are and is likely to come back and stir up some shit when they realize you sold them a car with a huge issue that you almost certainly knew about. Assuming they didn't have a valid claim, would you really want to have to defend yourself in court/in a dark alley (depending on the buyer's disposition)?

Like I said, it's a 9 year old car with over 100k and I'm selling it as-is... <shrug>

Maybe it's because I've been lied to too many times by too many sellers (private and dealer alike) or maybe it's because I've been screwed too many times by trying to do the right thing, I don't know. and I don't much care. I'll respond honestly to any questions. I won't object to them looking/checking anything themselves (unless I believe they're likely to damage the vehicle). I may or may not sugegst they have the car inspected by a mechanic of their choosing, too. But, I'm not offering up anything in a regular listing.

But I probably wouldn't sell privately anyway. I'd at least get an offer from one dealer before trying. The delta between the offer and what I'd expect/hope for privately would have to be pretty steep (to put a dollar figure on it, three times my regular hourly pay multiplied by the hours I'd expect to put into cleaning, marketing, showing, waiting, and stressing about the car) to go the private route.

And if this was my car and I was going to sell it privately, I'd get it fixed before trying to sell. My expectation is that anyone serious about buying would check it. My time is worth something to me and I don't have enough of it to waste it on marketing and showing a car to people when I don't expect them to actually buy it.

[lupinsea]

Well, so far I've gotten three inquiries on the car.


One from a guy in Minnesota.
Another via e-mail last night.
And a third this morning who sent an e-mail, then called voice about 10 min later.


The third fellow is from Yakima, about 300 miles (round trip) away and he wants to drive over this weekend to check out the car.

All have asked about the condition of the car and I've been very up front with everyone about the A/C and the other issues. The guy in Minnesota loved the car and said it's exactly what he's looking for (ZHP w/ cold weather package) but he'd need something in the $10k range to fly out and buy it. I didn't quite want to go there quite yet since it had only been listed for barely 6 hrs by the time he called last night.

I'm not trying to screw anyone over here and eventually the car will sell at fair market value for what it is. I don't really know where that point is. I'll probably give it a few weeks and then look at pulling the trigger on a recharge / diagnostic at the mechanics depending on what interested parties are saying. If people are wanting to heavily discount the car by several thousand dollars because of the A/C issue then I'll probably look into getting it fixed. If it's maybe $1k or so . . . I'd probably drop the price down there with out much concern so the buyer can get it fixed themselves and sell it as-is.


I too think an A/C diag would be worth it, especially considering the stupid price clean ZHPs are selling for.
I'd agree on a clean ZHP.

The clean ZHPs are asking $20-ish for ~30k miles, $15.5k+ for ~65k miles, and $13.5k for 120k miles in great condition.

That's simply not my car.

Mine is 8-9 years old and 124k on the clock. There are some paint chips, curb rash on a couple wheels, a minor ding here or there, and the soft touch plastics on the center console are showing some where. It'll probably go for $10-11k somewhere in there. It looks great in pictures and looks pretty good from ~ 15 ft away (i.e. none of the cosmetic stuff catches your eye). But it's obvious when going over the car that there are some blemishes. The diagnostic/recharge might be worth it at some point but I'm not sure a big A/C repair would be. Probably leave it up to the new owner if they want to fix it or save a bit the sale price and not fix it. It's Seattle, I haven't found the A/C to be a big selling point to me around here. Nice, sure, but it's never been a must-have feature on any car I've bought.

We'll just see where this goes.

I might be posting back after some time saying "See, you told me so...."

[lupinsea]

Ok, 6 people interested in the car. . . 4 want to look at it this weekend. One of whom is a co-worker of my SIL's former boyfriend.

[bren]

Like I said, it's really hard to find a clean e46 on the cheap. Maybe you should have priced it higher. :p

[equ]

Sounds like you left some money on the table.. But then again, sometimes you try to extract an extra $1k and it takes a month. Probably priced right.

[John V]

It also hasn't sold yet.

[lupinsea]

It also hasn't sold yet.

Wrong. :D

Sold the car at 10:45am Saturday morning.... $11,000 "cash".

Less than 48 hrs after posting it for sale.



I must say, this was the easiest and fastest I've ever sold a car. Bar none.



For those wondering about the market for a car like mine, a 124,000 mile BMW w/ A/C issues and numerous minor cosmetic issues, read on, it's another long-winded Lupinsea special that was basically summed up in the above sentences:


The Ad Posting
Late Thursday morning I posted the ad on craigslist and Microsoft's and Amazon's internal employee bulletin boards. By Friday I had 7 people interested in the car and 4 people lined up to look at it this weekend. A 5th guy was flying down from Alaska next week to do some car shopping and wanted to look at it, too.

Of those 7, one called from Minnesota, one from Alaska, two from Yakima (a 300 mile round-trip drive from Seattle), and the rest were local.


The First Potential Buyer
When the first guy showed up this morning we went over all the issues with the car as we did a 360 walk-around. We covered the paint chips, the messed up front bumper, the body work from the side-swipe, the door ding, the roughed up wheels, the worn center console soft-touch plastics, and the A/C. At the same time I was also pointing out different features of the car as we'd get to them.

By the time we got back to the front of the car he said he wanted it and offered $11k. I thought about it a moment then accepted.

Then I suggested we take the ZHP out for a test drive.

The buyer was a nice gentleman in his 60's. He was looking for a car for his wife and arrived in a Lincoln Mark VIII w/ 260k on the clock. On the test drive I piloted the ZHP for the first few minutes. Once clear of the neighborhood I buried the throttle and we shot down the road running up to redline in 2nd. I heard him mumble a "holy Jesus!" under his breath and then we took a couple tight turns. . . then a "wow!". After that I settled down until I found a spot to pull over where we changed seats and he drove the rest of the time.

He liked the acceleration and cornering . . a lot . . . and kept mentioning how quick the car got up to speed the rest of the test drive. That and just commenting on it's handling, sharp steering, etc. etc. etc. The rest of the 30 minute+ test drive was spent talking cars and answering questions about the ZHP and relating the ownership experience and the car's inherent care and feeding.

So... ZHP > Lincoln Mark VIII w/ 260k on the odo


The Arrangement for Payment
On the drive back to my house we worked out how we would arrange the payment.

Since we both used Bank of America we headed down to a local branch where we met my wife (so she could sign the title release and sales agreement, too). It took maybe 2 minutes for us to do an electronic transfer of the $11k from his account to mine with the help of the teller inside.

By the time that was done and verified my wife had finished signing the papers.

Boom, done.


Money on the Table? Thoughts:
The car was listed on craigslist for $11,750. But for the MS and Amazon postings I offered $500 off the craigslist price, or $11,250. The buyer was a co-worker of my SIL's exboyfriend . . . who my SIL alerted to the Amazon-posted ad w/ the $500 off offer and he passed it on.

Given that the car got 6 hits at the $11,750 price on craigslist I'd say it was priced aggressively. All the other interested parties I spoke with were very much aware what the ZHP package was and were hungry for it. The the 3 other guys I called to inform the of the sale were genuinely disappointed ats missing the car.

I suppose I could have declilned the $11k offer and took my chances bargaining with the other guys but $11k seemed fair and that's where I figured the car would end up. The buyer seemed like a good fellow who knew someone I knew and was willing to pay in cash.

So. . . :dunno:

At the end of the day I feel good about the sale. Seems right in my gut and I'm not beating my head against the wall with sellers remorse for not listing the car higher. I also feel at ease that it was a good deal for the buyer, too, and that he had full disclosure on all the issues the car had and knew what he was buying.

I think if I had priced it higher it probably would have sat longer or I'd have had more hassle haggling with other buyers, especially picky BMW enthusiasts that would have nitpicked over every little thing, like the A/C. :eeps:

So, yeah, there may have been money left on the table but I'm ok with that. The ease and speed of the sale was probably worth what little extra I could have gotten.


Thoughts On the Marketability of the Car
Over several pages there was a lot of back and forth on here about how badly the A/C and other defects would have affected the sale. My thoughts on this are that I think there are just different markets (regionally as well as sub markets locally), especially for many who are commenting from the east coast market . . . and especially from a BMW Enthusiast mindset.

For the BMW purist they are looking for a (largely) mint condition Bimmer with low miles and are willing to pay a higher mark up for that. That is their automotive world. Vehicles with blemishes, accidents of any kind, high milage, etc. usually just don't register on their radar.

What's left is the rest of the market.

I figured there was a market for people who were interested in a more well used BMW and would accept some cosmetic or minor mechanical issues or higher miles for a lower cost of entry. And frankly, this is where my mind set is for my next car. If I can shave a chunk off the car if it has some dings or other small things I think I'd go that route.

And apparently others will too.

Plus, I think there is also a niche market for those really looking for the ZHP. Even on a used car the ZHP package is a pretty good bargain. Even if commands an extra $2-3k buyers are still LOTS of money ahead if they were to try and replicate all the ZHP package goodies via the aftermarket.



Post Script
First, I have a sneaky suspicion that the buyer and his wife are probably going to be arguing over who gets the keys. The husband seemed to REALLY like driving the car. :)

Second, I had a good time owning the ZHP these last 5.5 years and my wife was a little sad to see it go which surprised me given how much stress such a nice car has caused when ever it needed repairs or new tires. But as my wife and I drove home we gave our selves two high fives. . . first: "Yay, it was awesome owning a BMW!" She was really excited to say that and liked the "idea" of being a BMW owner. Then I pipped in with "Yay, it was awesome selling the BMW!" which she immediately repeated and gave me a high five in return. I understand it's the same with owning a boat and the two happiest days of boat ownership.

As much joy as it was with the car and as good of a fit as it was for a time in our lives, we have different goals now. And despite the fact that we could continue to afford the maintenance and up keep on the BMW, well, we just don't want to anymore. As much as I still love a good on-road performance machine I want something that cost less, will be less stressful to own, and ultimately more reliable. I'm willing to give up the Germanengineeringness to get these other qualities.

So...

I'm on to my next hobby. . .

Miata hunting.

Stay tuned.

:devcool:


.

[FC]

Well done. Congrats!

Good luck with your new miata.

[John V]

Good effort, but you need a preface titled:

Preparing To Put the Car Up For Sale

or something.

Congrats

[clyde]

I'm on to my next hobby. . .

Miata hunting.

Stay tuned.

:devcool:

So, if you're into cars with minor issues and you want a low miles Miata...

[equ]

Congrats on a well-priced, painless sale!

[bren]

Glad it worked out well for you. There is certainly something to be said for pricing right and getting a fast easy sale.

Too bad you didn't fix the A/C though...could have gotten $15k for it. ;)

[clyde]

probably gonna need $4k of parts and labor to fix the a/c right, so, you know.. ;)

[lupinsea]

Glad it worked out well for you. There is certainly something to be said for pricing right and getting a fast easy sale.

Too bad you didn't fix the A/C though...could have gotten $15k for it. ;)

Ha! No.....

There were other ZHPs on the market that were same miles but in better condition with asking prices in the $13,500 range.

Even w/ functioning A/C there's no way I could have gotten all that much more.

Anyways, it's done and I'm comfortable with the sale.

And driving my Jeep on the daily basis for now until I get another car.

Speaking of which. . . talk to you guys later, I'm going to go comb through craigslist for a bit.