I was in college when I told myself, I will buy my own car before I turn 25 years old. That did not happen. I finally had the money to buy one when I was already 35 years old. And my first car was not brand new. Well, I decided to buy a secondhand car then because of first, its affordability and second, I was just a new driver, so I was having this thought that it won’t pain me too much if ever I get it scratched! 🙂

Buying a secondhand car has its pros but also has a lot of cons which I just wished I was able to read or know about while doing a bit of research before jumping into buying one.  Normally, I would just read about making sure that the engine is in good condition and most of what I read have suggested to ensure you have a mechanic, whom you can fully trust, to check this for you.

Fast forward to the present time, we are in a pandemic, and owning a personal vehicle is becoming a necessity to mitigate the risk of catching the virus while doing a public commute. Depending on your budget or financial capacity to have one, you can either go for a brand-new car or a second hand one. If you are considering buying secondhand, do remember that it doesn’t come with warranty. With this, it really pays to check and inspect the car carefully prior to you making the payment. I hope my list below will save you enough pain if you decide to buy a secondhand car yourself.

1. Buy from somewhere near your residence – I live in Cavite and while me and my brother was around my hometown, Batangas, I saw the car that I wanted to buy along the road. To make the long story short, I ended up buying it from as far as Batangas without knowing there will be hiccups along the way which will make it so complicated to bring it back to the seller to get them sort it out themselves. I ended up making lots of phone calls to them and bringing the car to the car electrician by myself! Cost me time and money there!

2. Test drive for long – yes, do the test drive as long as you can and run it over different terrains to see how the car would react. Test drive it doing sharp turns as well and do pay attention to any alarm in the dashboard. I had an initial check engine problem after driving my car few kilometers away from the seller! So do test drive it as far as they would allow you to.

3. Sprinkler for wiper – I only found out that the sprinkler for my wiper was not working when we already reached home! Again, I needed to get someone to fix it first.

4. Wiper – same as the sprinkler, I only found out that the wipers are so stiff and makes a squeaky sound when we already reached home. I needed to buy a new set to get this fixed.

5. Mileage – Do not trust the mileage as this can easily be adjusted or turned back to fool buyers that the car hasn’t run as much as it did.

6. Lights for dashboard – check this and normally an issue on the dashboard light can immediately give u a hint that somebody could have tweaked the odometer.

7. Tail, head, and signal lights – don’t forget to check this out. Normally we test drive during daytime so you need to ensure these lights are tested as well else your security will be at risk.

8. Speakers/antenna for radio – do play the radio and use the speaker while test driving to make sure that all the speakers are working, or the antenna is having reception.

9. Wheels and spare tire – I had a very memorable learning on my wheels. We thought the wheels of my car are perfectly OK because they looked brand new. Well, they are indeed brand new but we just found out that it was too big for my car when one day we run it loaded. Suddenly we heard some noise from the rear, and we even thought that there was a problem with the shocks. Again, I brought the car to the mechanic to check. They said there was no problem on the shocks, so they suggested to bring it to the car wheel shop. That’s where we found out that the tires were too big for my car and needs to be replaced immediately. And not only that, but we also found out the spare tire is also of different size! 🙁 So, yea, make sure you do a load test as part of your test drive too!

10. Aesthetics inside the car like handles, seat belt – Yes, engine and the car exterior is important but you shouldn’t neglect the accessories and aesthetics inside the car as well. I have found out that one of my seatbelts is not working and one of the car handles are broken weeks after I bought my car. As little issue as it can be, the car dealer needs to get it fixed before they handover to you the car.

11. Blast a/c to check for foggy aircon – the ac of my car is very good and very cold. However, it gets too cold that for some reason it fogs up my left window at night and makes it hard for me to drive. So do remember this when you test drive to ensure you don’t encounter a similar issue.

12. Tint and alarm – if you want your car tinted and have a car alarm, you need to ensure that the car seller get it set up before you pay for the car else this will again cost you few thousand pesos to get it done. It would be better if the tints and alarm are just newly installed so you can at least get a warranty for it.

 Good luck on your car shopping! 🙂