Biggest bargains of all times.

Byline: Steve Hughes

THIS is the biggest time of year for buying new cars and competition has never been so fierce with dealers desperate to shift stocks.

It is an open secret that unsold cars are stockpiled throughout the UK, as a result of which many are now being offered at cost just to keep cash-flow moving.

The downturn follows a period of the most intensive investment, with more new models having arrived in recent months than ever before.

It is the biggest buyers' market in history, with the best-ever cars loaded with the most-ever equipment at the lowest-ever prices.

The latest cars have been given the sort of safety, security and luxury features as standard that were once expensive optional extras, including air conditioning, remote central locking, electric windows and masses of air bags.

Despite this huge investment, there are remarkable deals to be done on even the most lavishly-equipped models.

Gas guzzlers may be more expensive to run but you can buy an awful lot of fuel with the thousands of pounds that are currently being knocked off them.

Even the more mainstream and economical models are being offered with generous discounts to encourage potential buyers to take the plunge.

In some cases, cars are being offered at less than cost price just to shift unsold stocks and to keep production lines moving in a bid to avoid more lay-offs and redundancies.

In other cases, prices are not only reduced but models leaving the assembly lines are being crammed with masses of equipment at no extra cost.

Most manufacturers are introducing new low-cost entry-level models and in the case of the most expensive cars, the reductions are literally thousands of pounds.

Cars that were registered by dealers to hit targets in September but remain unsold are now being offered as new but at second-hand prices.

For example, in the case of the family-oriented Peugeot 407 SW HDI, the price plummets from pounds 20,457 to just pounds 14,595, a reduction of pounds 5,862.

There are many more examples and some of the biggest savings are not even advertised or promoted because dealers do not want to appear too desperate, preferring instead to offer discounts face to face at the showroom.

The bottom line is that this is undoubtedly the greatest buyers' market ever with the biggest bargains of all time.