Auto Trader cars

Skip to contentSkip to footer
Advice

How to buy a car at a Franchised Dealer

If you want to buy a brand new car, the only outlet you can go to is a franchised dealer. Each one represents a manufacturer, and will also sell you used cars, as well as offering part-exchange and finance on the same site.

  • Franchises represent a manufacturer and are the only place to buy a new car
  • You can choose the exact specification of a new car, but used cars also available
  • Test drive available, as are finance and part-exchange
If you want to buy a brand new car, the only outlet you can go to is a place called a franchised dealer. These are all easy to spot, as they’ll have the name and logo of the manufacturer they represent all over the building
But, how do you go about buying a car at a dealer like this? Who do you need to speak to? What do you need to ask? And when? Naturally, the process varies a little from company to company, but we’ve come with former Top Gear and Fifth Gear presenter Vicki Butler-Henderson to Marshall JLR in Cambridge to see how they do things. This dealer is typical of franchises all over the country, with the full car-buying service available on one site – from the chance to specify exactly the new car you want to test-driving a demonstrator and sorting out finance and any part-exchange you may have. And, of course, it’s not all new cars; there’s a huge selection of used cars, too. There’s no set order in which you have to do things, and you can skip some parts of the process completely, but throughout the purchase, you’ll be dealing with just one person. And, if you ever want to go away and think things through, that’s fine. For the full details of what to expect when you visit a franchise dealer, just watch our film above.