And after the first week, I like it.

Full set of brand new, never used Lexus fitted mats in the boot, along with the leather owners pack, manual, Lexus assistance details etc, all sealed in seperate bags looking like they had never been opened apart from the assistance one to take out the membership card by the one owner. The card was in there seperatley.

Amateur. Mats, flaps and a tank of petrol, ffs.

and six months rent..

Elder gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying:

I pretty much have all of that for my 75, too.

Amazing what you can turn up on eBay if you look.

I managed to get a years worth on the Passat... no mats or flaps though - got the mats for my birthday. ;-)

Might be a bit obvious to any prospective buyer though, what with the 75 not being a Lexus...

Hehehe, you said "flaps".

Waves.

I bought a Daimler once just because I fell in love with it. Paid well over the odds, didn't get an independent engineer's report and was quite happy until I got it in good daylight and could see the (s**te) blown-in paint jobs. I was even more pissed off when a passing lorry bunged a brick through the windscreen, oh the repair came off my insurance. But with the window out, the rot in the firewall was obvious.

That was an object lesson about never buy in haste, never buy a wet car, and never, ever trust a single word the salesman says.

I bought my current MX-5 pretty much unseen, but I only paid a pittance for it. Even if it's a dog, I'll make a little on it when I come to sell. So far it's needed a couple of hoses and now a new rad, but that's hardly a great expense. So far, it seems ok otherwise.. I've been reasonably lucky with it. The Puma's more fun though..

And the paper work in the folder is in the name of the one owner, named on all the reciepts from new, including the intitial PDI?

I give up.

It's obviously the bestest looked after IS200 in the world.

And was a bargain, at any price. Even with a short MOT and f*ck all in the way of warranty.

You've been taking in by 'ooooh, new shiny, money in pocket' rather than be rational about this.

Yes. Comfortably. I would be using recommended indies, not main dealers most of the time, I'm not throwing £700 for the big service including belt when it is due, if a known indie with reputation will do exactley the same job with Toyota parts for £400, but it will get the proper job/parts when needed.

whats that s*it in stone? no one weighs themselves in kg mate.

i'm normally between 10.5 and 11 stone i've never gone above 11 nor matter how much i've drank/eaten

...is the correct answer.

The Passat... I reckon by the time I've finished it, it will owe me £2500 all in, as in buy back of salvage and the parts / labour thrown at it since to the point where it's back on the road with a full MOT.

I know it'll fetch more than that all day long for the foreseeable if I did want to sell it, even though it's on the HPi register now.

An equivalent, never on the register car is worth about £4k at todays prices from what I've seen.

Oh, and VOSA can f*ck off for the VIC check fee - it's still in my name and I got the tax reminder through the other day, so all the time I own it, I won't need to get it done. ;-)

Ping Richard K :-)

oops, Dunlop SP9000

How many miles do you cover in an average week / year?

In these troubled times, dealers' wives know it's part and parcel of making that sale.