7 Hints on How to Buy the First Car - Tips and Tricks For Buying Used Cars

Buying the First Car: How to Start?

To make your 1st car choice easy-going, first define the model you are interested in.

Forget for a second about that black hammer you saw last week and be realistic, start from thinking over the following:

1. What is the car lifespan? For how many years roughly you are buying it?
2. Are you planning mostly city driving? Or mostly in suburbs?
3. What about care and maintenance? Think over costs for each option.
4. Where is the service station? Is it easily reachable? Where the car parts can be found if necessary?
5. Decide of whether you need the big or the small car.
6. Is the price affordable for you?

If not too much aware of all that overwhelming technical information provided from dealers, please review the list of technical parameters you probably need to think of first before buying your first car (if you have no idea what to start from), besides the price and safety: production (year), luggage boot, engine size, fuel consumption and engine power. Most of the technical information can be taken from auto-catalogues or on-line resources. Start rather from the look and price not from technical parameters.

1. Do not go for the cheapest and the most expensive options. There are a lot of European, American, Japanese or Korean that cars posted on dashboards.
2. Think over the type of fuel you are comfortable with. (Gas powered cars will have higher costs for gasoline but obviously less for service maintenance).
3. Restyled car vs standard model: think a second which one is the best one for you.
4. When buying used car, try to check it on the service station (on the stand): very rarely it happens that dealers trying to sell cars that were damaged from the flood waters. Try to find out where is the car originally from (if not American), why it was sold, and how much is the mileage.
5. Check the look (external interior) for the rust.
6. For used cars: we would suggest you to open the capote and check the state of electric wires (look for the signs of leaks and rust).
7. After that ask dealer to start up the ignition and if the sound is soft, that means that it's 90% everything is OK with your car. Check if every button is working at dashboard, if there is any strange sound when driving.

Ford Focus vs Chevy Aveo 3D vs. Honda Civic 5D

Imagine that you are planning to choose between 3 hatchback models: Ford Focus, Chevy Aveo 3D and Honda Civic 5D. All of them available at local dealership but you still thinking what option to choose. To tell you the truth I am not trying to sell you any of that models, this is just some steps to go through I would like to suggest you. While having almost the same dimensions (Ford Focus: the 4337 mm long, 1839 mm tall, 1497 mm high, Chevy Aveo 3D: the 3920 mm long, 1680 mm tall, 1505 mm high, and Honda Civic 5D: the 4256 mm long, 1765 mm tall, 1460 mm high) the biggest luggage capacity you have with Honda Civic 5D.

Honda Civic has the biggest engine volume (1799 cc), and Chevy Aveo 3D has the smallest one (1498 cc). You find the following for the engine power parameters: 86 php for Chevy, 100 php for Ford Focus and 140 php for Honda. Honda Civic 5D is the best choice in terms of engine power.

Why I am speaking about the engine power? It's the main factor for the top speed available for your car.

According to the open data, Ford Focus has the lowest fuel consumption for all regimens.

Comparing Honda Civic and Ford Focus, the last one is more competitive in terms of saving costs for gas.

Tips and Tricks for Buying Used Cars

Avoid showing your interest or praising particular model ahead, I would better suggest you to talk with the dealer concerning minor defects you have noticed. Always let the dealer know that you may change your mind any time. Try to ask for lower price based on the drawbacks found. And the main rule: if you have not caught the sight of some car from the first glance, I would suggest to pass by and not to buy car under pressure.

What to Check in Used Cars

• Check the engine, the body condition as well as the hanger condition. The easiest way to find the rust is checking the boot floor. If, on some reasons you were not allowed to check the body floor, take care and look over your shoulder. Please note, sometimes polishes hide rust.
• Try to avoid buying cars damaged in accident. The payoff here is that your car can be infirm thus requiring new wheels more often. To get rid of the situation to buy that car, check the car body for gapping spacers on the doors, windows and other irregularities. Check it by sampling the diagonals (should be equal). If you find the car with original (factory) painting, that would be perfect, because in this case you see all the defects of the body.

To find out more, please choose our community at Pikaba.com. Registering at Pikaba allows you to buy and sell cars, post your request and have the best quotes from local community.

There is a big concern these days about going green; caring for the environment. One of the biggest forms of pollution is cars simply because there are so many of them. Hundreds of millions of cars are running all day long, every day of the year. Some cars are newer and have better controls built in so they run cleaner and get better millage. However a lot of cars are still very old and run poorly.

I'm sure many people would love to get a new car but a lot of times they are not affordable. Newer cars can be expensive. Newer 'green' cars such as hybrids and natural gas cars tend to be even more expensive than your average base model car. So what can a person do to drive a newer car, get better millage, help reduce pollution, and save money?

One answer, believe it or not, is to get a used car from an auction. Government auctions happen all the time and are a great place to find used vehicles. These used cars for auction are not your run down old junkers. No, they instead tend to be newer cars usually from within the past 10 years or less.

You might think that's still a bit old. Not all old cars are that bad. Within the last 10 years or so regulations have been put in place to control emissions and get better gas millage. Some car companies like Toyota or Honda have been doing this all along regardless of laws. For example I drive a year 2000 honda civic. Its not the pinnacle of 'green' technology but think on this I get around 25-30mpg. This car is now 9 years old. Many cars today can just match that, and some can't even reach that high of millage.

It also has always passed California smog check and emission checks. California is notorious for its strict emission control standards. So if it can pass those tests it's a good, clean running car. And since the car is quite a few years old it's not going to be all that expensive, especially if its found at an auction where you say how much you're willing to buy it for.

The available types of cars at an auction will very. No particular car is guaranteed to be there because depending on the auction, the cars will come from various places. Government agencies, like police or FBI, auctions will get their cars from law enforcement related deals like impounds or seizures, or other places. Government auctions sometimes come from selling old government vehicles.

Bank related auctions get their properties from repossessions. So the places the property comes from will vary and thus the selection will vary. However thanks to websites like the one promoted here you can sign up and research what auctions are available, where and when they will take place, and you can browse the available stock to see what types of cars there are. Then you pick a few, go to the auction and check them out, then bid your price on them.

The beauty of buying at an auction is the prices. Often times cars are sold for half their blue book value, or even less. The process to buy from an auction is a bit more involved, but to save that much money is worth the time and effort. So buying an older car can be economic saving you money in both costs and gas, and it can help the environment at the same time. Good luck with your auction pursuits!