Thread: Advice needed after buying unsafe car.

Morning all. im new to the forum and looking for advice.

Last week i bought a stunning alfa romeo 147. I seen it listed on ebay and went to view it. The seller told me he was a trader from home and done it for a living on the side of his valeting company.

After falling in love with the car i left a deposit the next day and got a recipt then paid in full a few days later (£1600).

After a few blissful days motoring i decided to take it down to see my family for the day 70 miles away. After i got off the motorway i noticed a slight knocking coming from the front of the especially when cornering.

I thought It would be a cv joint or something similar. Then after stopping for 10 mins i was following my dad into town, when turning a right hand bend there was a huge crunch as the front near side wheel was ripped from the car which then ground to a halt on the disk.

After inspection it seems that the previous owner had fitted plastic brake calipers to make it look better but they were attached with blu tac. To make them fit behind the wheels the guy fitted 5mm spacers but only used standard length bolts so only 2 - 3 threads on each bolts were attached.

The garage have provided me with a statement saying they removed all brake covers and spacers as they were unsafe and that the damage to the wing was caused by the wheel coming off.

I contacted the seller of the car who only offered to mot the car for me if i paid for all the repairs. I read on here that as it was a trade sale i could refuse the car as it was unsafe. I told him this but his reply was sold as seen with no warranty and was a private sale. Thr invoive however was in his business name and at the bottom says
"the car is sold as a trade sale and no warranty is implied or given. Standard trade sale terms and conditions apply which are available on request"
When i said this his reply was simply. Im not a trader... Unlucly.
Can anybody help?

Small claims court, HMRC & Trading Standards look the best routes, in addition to ebay copying his ebay feedback to see how many cars he has sold.