What You Need To Check When Buying Used Cars
Written by man on March 13th, 2010 in Other.
You have no idea of the types of problems you might be facing when you buy used cars so it can be very risky to do so. It is impossible to be completely sure that a car has been well looked after or has never been involved in an accident. There are certain things though that you can check before you buy.
- Any paperwork you are shown should be examined completely. You can find information such as any engine information, details of previous owners of the vehicle and the chassis number on the V5C certificate (vehicle registration certificate. Try to establish how authentic the documentation is. The V5C should have a watermark and stamps.
- In order to ensure that the seller is who he says he is, you should ask for some identification.
- Look out for oil leaks and check whether or not the oil is clean.
- Check the condition of the hoses or engine belts in the engine.
- Examine the coolant in the radiator to see if it looks gunky.
- Look for any rust patches on the bodywork of the car.
- The condition of the tyres as well as the spare tyre should be checked out for worn patches. All tyres by law should have a thread depth of 1.66mm so you should check for this too.
- Make sure that the lights on the car are working properly as well as other instruments on the dashboard. Sometimes the odometers are tampered with to make it look as though there are less miles on the clock so check for any evidence of this.
- Windows should be checked to make sure they work properly.
- Look at the exhaust pipe and make sure it is not rusted and doesn’t have any holes in it.
- It would also be advisable to get your own independent mechanic in to check over the car.
It is probably not possible to completely avoid all the risks associated with purchasing used cars, but hopefully the above will make it far less likely.
Whenever you happening to be looking for used cars, you may end up much better off by thoroughly researching the cars that interest you. Good research lets you find only the best models available. And when you finally finish your research, you could find yourself leaving the car delears with a splendid used mini or even a used motability.
