Nobody wants to go first: mandates, NCNDAs and the hunt for a high-value car

Picture a heated garage on a cold November evening. Under a fitted cover sits a car that has, for several weeks, been very quietly for sale. Elsewhere, in an office with a long to-do list, sits someone who has been hunting for exactly this car for years.

Both of them want the deal. Neither will make the first move.

This is the standoff at the heart of high-value car sourcing, and it is stranger and more stubborn than it looks.

The standoff

To the seller, silence is a strategy. The moment word gets out that a significant car is for sale, things begin to change. Its value can shift. Its whereabouts become sensitive. And the phone starts to ring with people who were never going to buy.

The buyer has a mirror-image problem. Say who you are, what you can spend and what you are after, and you may find the price quietly rising to meet you, or your name turning up in conversations you never agreed to join.

So the dance begins. The seller asks for proof that the buyer is genuine and can pay. The buyer asks for proof that the car exists, is truly available, and that the person offering it can really sell it. Two perfectly reasonable requests. Between them, a locked door.

Enter the middleman

Into the gap steps the broker, offering to carry messages between the two so that neither has to reveal too much too soon. Done well, it is a real service, and many brokers do careful, professional work.

The trouble is that it rarely stops at one. A buyer's broker speaks to a contact, who knows another contact, who has a friend close to the owner. Each link takes a fee, adds a day, and sands a little more detail off the original message. By the time a question reaches the owner, it may bear little resemblance to the one that was asked, if it arrives at all.

Often, the person at the front of the chain has never met the owner. They are repeating what they were told.

Every extra hand is another person who knows your name, your budget and what you are looking for.

The word “mandate”

Listen long enough and you will hear it: I have a mandate. It sounds weighty, and it can be. A mandate is written authority from the owner to act on their behalf, usually to find a buyer. It may be exclusive, meaning only one party may sell the car, or open, meaning several may. It normally runs for a set period, on agreed terms.

But a mandate is not ownership, and it does not transfer title. It can also travel. Someone holding a mandate may share it with a colleague, who shares it again, and with every step it drifts further from the person who signed it. Fewer and fewer people along the line can say with confidence that the original authority still stands.

Saying you hold a mandate costs nothing. Proving it is the hard part. A meaningful check means seeing the document itself, confirming it was signed by the owner or by someone entitled to sign for them, and making sure it is still current. Plenty of intermediaries cannot, or will not, show it.

The NCNDA

Then comes the paperwork. The non-circumvention and non-disclosure agreement, or NCNDA, does two jobs. It keeps what you learn confidential. And it promises you will not go around the person who made the introduction, by calling the owner directly, say, to avoid paying the broker.

It exists for sound reasons. Brokers expect to be paid for an introduction, and principals want their identities protected. The difficulty arises in a long chain, where you may be asked to sign several of them, often before you know who is truly at the other end.

An NCNDA protects fees and relationships. What it cannot do is tell you whether the car exists, or whether the person offering it is able to sell it. How enforceable one is also depends on its wording and where it applies, so take legal advice before you sign.

Proof of life

Of all the phrases in the trade, this is the most dramatic, and the most telling. Proof of life is evidence that a car genuinely exists, sits where it is said to sit, and is truly available. It sounds as though it should be the simple part. It almost never is.

The usual request is a dated photograph or a short video, sometimes with the date and the buyer's name handwritten on a note beside the car, plus ownership documents. Every item has a weakness. Photographs can be old, or lifted from an earlier listing. Documents can be edited, or belong to another car entirely. The chassis number would settle the question, but it also identifies the car and, through the car, the owner, which is precisely what a careful seller does not want to hand over until the buyer is proven.

Now add a chain. The person you are speaking to may have no access to the car at all, only a photograph that has already passed through three other inboxes. Each request takes a day to relay, and by the time the answer comes back, the car may have found a new owner.

Reading the warning signs

You do not need to be an expert to sense when something is off. A few signals worth noting:

• Nobody will name the owner, or put you in touch with someone who can speak for them
• A mandate is claimed but cannot be shown
• You are pushed to sign an NCNDA or pay a fee before you have seen any proof
• The photographs look generic, old or too polished to be real
• The price looks better than the market allows
• There are more than one or two people between you and the owner

None of these proves anything alone. Together, they are a reason to pause.

A simpler way

Strip it back and the problem is plain: too many hands, and too little verification. The answer is fewer steps, a clear line to whoever actually holds the car, and permission at every stage. It is less theatrical than the usual way of doing things, and rather more sensible.

That is how we approach it at Tailyr. We list cars from our partners, and if you want something that is not on the network yet, we can source it for you. For discreet cars, we work only with owners, principals and holders of an authorised mandate, and we do not work with brokers or intermediaries who claim access to a car they cannot deliver. Introductions are always made with your permission, and once your details have been passed to a specialist, we delete your identifying information from our network.

If you are looking for something specific, you can speak to Tailyr, or read more about Discreet Assets. We have also written about what “discreet” should really mean when you are sourcing a car. This article is general information, not legal advice.