Cy993

Hi everyone,

My first post . . . currently I've got a Porsche 993 and Audi S4 but have been looking to pick up an W212 E63 wagon as I now have two large dogs (which are a great excuse to get into one of these fantastic cars!). I've been reading through the forum and appreciate all the great information to be found here and I've learned a great deal.

Recently I was looking at a 2012 graphite grey E63 wagon (VIN WDDHH7EB0CA576321 with original MSRP of $128,355) that was at Schultz Ford here in NY for $79.9K. After driving the car and being pretty sure I was going to buy it, I found out it was a press/media car. (If you search 'Steve Hammes E63 Wagon', you'll find a video of the car doing donuts while bouncing off the rev limiter.)

Interestingly, I found out that Mercedes shipped the car to a company that provides cars to auto reviewers and after several months and 8K miles the car was returned to Ray Catena MB to sell. After 4 months Ray Catena leased the car to a new owner who kept the car for only 8 months and 3.5K miles before trading it in to Schultz on a new F150. Unfortunately, Schultz sold the car a couple of days after I looked at it before I could wrap my head around how this may impact it's value and reliability.

So, I'm continuing to look and hope to purchase one of these cars in the near future. Maybe I'll run into another press/media or driver education car, so here are a few questions and I'd appreciate thoughts on any or all of them.

1/ Would you purchase a car with this history?
2/ What would you think the impact to it's value would be, if any?
3/ Are these cars 'fragile' where 8K miles of hard use and abuse (and what appeared to have been 3 or 4 sets of rears!) would be a concern?
4/ Would you just buy an extended warranty and just not worry about it?

Many thanks . . .

vdubpower

doing donuts is babying the car....

Cy993

haha . . . didn't realize I was also getting a good drift car . . . these cars really are the total package!

ace10

Four out the five sedans from this thread appear to be still sitting there 2.5 months later.

https://mbworld.org/forums/w212-amg/...-2012-e63.html

Questionable history is questionable history.

dboyle

Well my first post (after lurking for quite some time) as an owner of a designated press car I got over the worry

I had the same reaction, my 2013 is the white wagon in the road/track test and it was funny finding all the GPS locations of tracks etc. Also found a luggage tag in the rear ashtray with a german racing drivers name. I rationalized it as a way to get a good deal and bought a huge extended warranty. I don't change cars too often so I am sure in 6 years when I sell it the value will be zero not due to it being a press car but due to it being an older odd wagon

I have absolutely zero 'evidence' or proof of any impact on value, just the back/forth that I had before plunking down the cash. I will say I don't regret it at all. I bought it sight unseen solely based on the deal structure and my desire for the ridiculousness that are these cars. I would never buy a car based on its ability to hold value. Since they are such white unicorn anyway I think the resale market is either very good or impossible completely external to anything you can control. I looked at 2 older wagon's and probably took a good month kicking the tires on the one I ended up buying.

-Dave

cnolke

Chris Harris, who seems to spend his life abusing pressers, has (according to a post he put on Pistonheads.com) owned 3 press cars in a row (Elise, GT3, something else) before purchasing a relative's abused S4 wagon. He indicated he's never has a single issue that could be related to abuse.

Cy993

ace10 - Thanks . . . interesting read. Yeah, this car had sat at Ray Catena for 4 months before being sold to someone that owned it for several months and then traded it to a Ford dealer. Some friends were speculating on some interesting theories behind that transaction. I'd guess all MB dealers would be aware of the history . . . it's right on the window sticker that it was shipped to the media company.

dboyle - Great story! Thanks for sharing. I'm with you . . . I tend to keep my cars a long time and only put a few thousand miles on them each year, so my hesitation certainly wasn't consideration of resale value but more compensation for purchasing a comprehensive and long warranty and the headaches that could come along with such a car (e.g., time spent negotiating with the warranty company and dealing with repairs).

I even questioned if there was a major issue and the warranty company could access the history from the ECU, they could attempt to disclaim responsibility due to abuse (e.g., race launches, no break-in period). I know Porsche reads and classifies over-revs, for example, when assessing warranty issues.

So, it's likely I would have purchased this car if I'd had the time think it through . . . it just was going to come down to price. It seems 10 to 15% off fair market would be a good starting point, but as you say these cars are a 'white unicorn' and you loose some negotiating power because of that. If it were an S63/65, I'd probably look for another and feel confident it wouldn't take long to find . . . but there's just not that many E63 wagons around.

cnolke . . . thanks, more interesting perspective. My guess is Chris Harris would be harder on cars than the average press reviewer. Overall, I was less concerned about hard driving (e.g., speed, track, etc.) than things such as no initial break-in, race launches, being unkind to the turbos, some of which probably could be read off the ECU in advance of purchasing during a PPI.