Checking the Car Out

Getting the Car's History Checked

Several organisations will check the car's history for you to make sure it is not on any registers as having been an insurance damage write off, a finance bad debt, or stolen. All you need is the car's make, model and registration, so this is something you can do before you even make a trip to view the car.

These operations have extended their services to a limited mileage check (where past mileages have been recorded). Mileage records depend on honest information having been supplied in the first place and are not always up to date for every car.

The best advice is to treat all odometer readings as suspicious and to get in touch with previous owners listed on the car's V5. If you are buying from the first owner of the car and he is a man of the cloth, then the mileage is probably correct. If you are buying from a freelance commercial traveller, then, if the mileage is low, it is probably not correct.

For what to look for in individual models see the Car by Car Breakdown.

First Impressions

When you first see the car, what do your instincts tell you? Do you get a funny feeling in the pit of your stomach?

Trust these feelings, because they are your natural defence mechanisms at work. All too often we ignore our instincts and talk ourselves into making a bad decision.

That's what salesmanship is all about: getting you to think nice thoughts about what you're going to do with the car or how easy it will be to pay for it, and to put out of your head the obvious fact that the car is a heap of junk.

Beware the car dealer who pre-qualifies your financial status over the phone so that, when you arrive at the car lot, the finance is set up and all you have to do is choose a car. By that time, you are pre-sold on buying a car from that dealer come what may and, when you leave home, you leave your brain and your instincts behind.

Assuming - and only assuming - you have a good feeling about the car, you can check it out yourself or have it independently inspected. The downside of an independent inspection, of course, is that it may take some time to get an appointment, the vendor may sell the car in the meantime, and you'll still have to fork out the inspection fee.

So, even if you're not mechanically minded, it makes sense to carry out some preliminary checks before you go to the expense of an independent inspection.

Inspecting a Car Yourself

First and foremost, does the paint match? If every panel is a different shade of red, for example, the car has been in several accidents. If the paint is fresh and new and all the same colour, the car has been in a big accident and has been rebuilt. If just part of the car has fresh paint, for example the bonnet, it may merely have had a minor scrape or been repainted because it was badly stone-chipped.

Other tips for looking for signs of repaired accident are to peel back bits of rubber trim and look for 'tide marks' underneath, to open and close all the doors and check for even shut lines, to look under the boot carpet for fresh paint and a lack of the usual manufacturer's stickers, to look under the bonnet at the inner wings and on the engine, gearbox and suspension, for flecks of spray dust, to crouch down in front of the car and look for ripples in its sides. It's not that hard, is it?

One final tip: when a front wing is replaced it is resprayed in situ and they don't usually make much of a job of the section hidden behind the closed door. Feel the paint there, and if it's rough the car's had a new front wing.

Except on Mercedes and older small Fords, rust is less of a problem than it used to be and paint is now so expensive it's simply not worth filling a car with pudding and giving it a 'blow over'. But if the car is getting on, check all the usual places - round the wheel arches, under the valences (if they're steel), round the edges of the boot floor, under the carpets if they will lift, in the bottoms of the doors, round the headlights and along the outer tops of the doors.

Next job, check the tyres. Uneven wear may be due to incorrect alignment settings, or it may be due to bent suspension components from kerbs, pot holes or road humps. So be particularly wary of uneven front tyre wear. Check the nearside front wheel for rim damage. Has it got a new wheeltrim? Does the wheeltrim match the others? Are all the wheeltrims wrong? (A cheap set of four costs less than one correct wheeltrim from a franchised dealer.)

You've done paint and tyres. Now on to the interior. Dirt cleans off, but tears in the seats and broken bits of trim are notoriously difficult and expensive to put right. One fag burn can be invisibly repaired using new techniques, but a lot of fag burns will cost you £50 each and the repairs won't be invisible. If the entire interior stinks of tobacco smoke you'll be up against it to get rid of the lingering odour. Has there been a dog in the car? Has it scratched the paint? Has it left a smell? Don't feel you have to be polite about this to the car's owners, however nice they may be. It's your money they're after, not your friendship.

Open the bonnet and check all the fluids. Makers like Ford very helpfully paint yellow all the things you need to check. But what you want to look at is the oil on the end of the dipstick. Is it up to the mark? What colour is it? Castor-oil yellow is excellent; light brown is good; dark brown is okay; a tar-like black in a petrol engine spells disaster, though lubricating oil in all but the latest HDI diesel engines will always be black.

Unscrew the oil filler cap. If there is a deposit of whitish or creamy-grey 'mayonnaise' underneath, it means one of two things. The car has led a life of very short runs from cold starts, has never warmed up properly and the condensation this has created has mixed with the oil. Engines run like this have less than a quarter of the life of engines run properly, so a little old lady's car with 10,000 miles on the clock has really done the equivalent of at least 50,000 miles and should be valued accordingly.

The second problem 'mayonnaise' can reveal is a blown cylinder head gasket. It may be straightforward to replace this, or the head may need to be skimmed because it has warped. This gives the car a higher compression ratio and may mean that it simply won't run on 95Ron unleaded petrol. Have a look under the radiator cap or in the radiator expansion tank for similar emulsion to confirm the problem, and also look for white smoke (steam) from the exhaust.

Have a look at the condition of the power steering fluid. It should be red, not black. Same goes for the automatic transmission fluid (most autoboxes have a dipstick). It is a good idea for automatic transmission fluid to be changed every two years (essential with CVT automatics). It is also vital that the ATF level is kept up to the mark.

Look under the car for leaks. Is there oil on the vendor's driveway? A leak from a cam-cover gasket is common and no big deal, but a bad oil leak from a cylinder head gasket means the head has to come off and, if it does, manifold studs may break and stretch bolts will have to be replaced. A leak from the timing belt cover is bad news because it means that the camshaft end seal or a jackshaft seal has gone, contaminating the timing belt - so you won't just need a new seal, you'll need a new belt. If the gearbox/final drive is leaking from an output shaft seal, the lack of oil in the transmission may have led to premature wear.

Now ask to see the service history. Not a book full of stamps; the actual bills for all the work on the car that the owner has paid for, or, if a fleet car, a computer print-out of its service history. If, from this, you find that the car has been 'overserviced' (had its oil and filter changed every 4-6 months), then be willing to pay more for it than the guides suggest. If, on the other hand, it has been 'underserviced' (with gaps of more than a year), then pay substantially less than guide price. If the car has a timing belt rather than a chain, in general this needs to be replaced every 60,000 miles or every 4 years, whichever comes first. On some cars, such as Fords with Zetec engines, the replacement cycle can be pushed to up to 5 years or 80,000 miles whichever comes first, but no longer. If the service bills don't show a timing belt change, then budget £60-£200 to have it done. (The job is more expensive on Peugeots and Citroens because there is an engine mounting in the way.) Automatic transmission fluid should have been changed every 2 years; brake and power steering fluid every 3 years, but every two years if the car has ABS (most now do). If the car has a manual gearbox and the oil in that was changed within its first 18 months on the road, this is a valuable plus point worth paying more for.

You have now made a number of checks that will have provided you with a lot of information without having to pay anyone. Now we'll get onto the road test of the car.

The Road Test

First, are you insured? If you own and insure a car yourself, your policy will usually cover you to drive another insured car third party only. But this means you will be personally liable for any damage you do to the car.

Switch on the ignition and look at the lighting display. If there is an ABS light, make sure it goes off within seconds of starting the engine. (If not, that's an MOT failure.) The engine should start instantly and, when it does, are there any rattles? With hydraulic tappets you may hear a brief rattle before the tappets pump up, but this is nothing to worry about unless it persists.

If the car is manual, where does the clutch take up? If near the top of the pedal travel, there is likely to be less than 10,000 miles of life left in the clutch. If you can get it to slip, reckon on less than 2,000 miles.

If the car is front-wheel-drive, do a full lock reverse turn in both directions. This will tell you more about the condition of the clutch, but if you also hear clonking, there is wear in the driveshaft universal joints and these are expensive to replace.

Does the car accelerate smoothly? If it's an automatic, do the gears change smoothly? But don't expect all automatics to change into 4th or even 3rd at town speeds. If it's a manual, do the gears change easily with no graunching and can you change down smoothly, particularly from 3rd to 2nd, without having to double de-clutch? Is there any gearbox whine or whirring noises? A lot of gearboxes do whine slightly and, though it's an irritant, it may be nothing to worry about. Similarly, a bit of diff lash may be terminal, or the diff may soldier on for years. But the likelihood of a transmission repair should be budgeted for and the price you pay for the car chipped down unless it already accounts for this.

Do the brakes stop the car straight and true? If you feel juddering, the discs may be warped. If retardation is slow, the discs, pads, drums, linings may be worn or grooved. Do the brakes lock up front or back during an emergency stop? If so, the rear brake compensator may be u/s.

Finally, check all the electrics: wipers, sunroof, windows, everything. If the car has a trip computer, get the owner to run through its functions. (But, obviously, if the car is cheap, you don't worry about a non-functioning trip computer.)

Having the Car Inspected

If the vendor has the time and patience, it makes sense to have the car professionally inspected.

Used Car Inspections: www.usedcarchecks.com, www.dekra-vi.co.uk and www.rac.co.uk/web/vehiclechecks.

Vehicle inspections: Independent inspections, including specialist, classic and modified cars: www.eliteinspections.co.uk.

Vehicle Inspections in Scotland: www.scotiavehicleinspection.com.

Inspections tend to cost £100-£250 for the average car, the inspectors 'come to the car', and you are provided with a written report afterwards. Some include an HPI status check.

Sports and high-performance cars need specialist inspections by experts in the particular make and model. An AA or RAC inspection of a Porsche, for example, simply isn't enough. Best to get a written report from a Porsche dealer or Porsche specialist and to pay the extra for a compression test on all six cylinders.

The problem is, no vendor with any sense will give you right of first refusal on a car subject to inspection at a later date unless you pay them a non-refundable deposit. If you can't cut a deal like this with the vendor, they will simply sell the car to the first buyer who comes up with the right money and you could end up forking out an inspection fee for a non-existent 'sold' car.

Condition of Older Cars

Where cars are more than ten years old, whatever the make, there is likely to be some rust somewhere.

In general, except for Mercedes, German cars with metallic paint finishes seem to rust the least. But this is an oversimplification because German build-quality slipped quite a bit between 1988 and 1992. Since 1986, all Audis have incorporated hot-dip or electro-galvanised panels, but, since 1988, so have most FIATs, starting with the Tipo and carrying on even with Unos and Pandas from around 1990.

Where the car has spent its life also affects its propensity to rust. Nothing rusts a car worse than a saline solution that allows corrosion batteries to form on a car's body and suspension. In northern counties such as Northumberland, roads are heavily salted from November to March, and if you go into any Northumberland market town you can see the effect this has on the cars. Cars in coastal areas are affected by airborne salt and sea spray.

In general, cars that have spent their lives in the South East and at least 20 miles from the coast are least likely to have been affected by premature rusting.

Keeping a car in a garage does not necessarily prevent rusting. If a car is put away wet and salty in a poorly ventilated garage, the atmosphere in there will accelerate the rusting process. On the other hand, a warm, dry car driven into a dry, well-ventilated and possibly even heated garage is least likely to rust while stored. Remember, though, the floors of most garages, even integral garages, are usually below the damp course of the house and condensation is likely inside such garages during the winter.

Agreeing a Price

How good are you at negotiating? Most used car sellers will have checked the value of their car as a 'private sale' in one of the consumer car price guides available from newsagents. ('Parkers', 'What Car Price Guide', etc.) They are likely to have followed the guide advice to build an amount into the price for negotiation.

The simplest way to check out their bottom line is to ask, 'OK, I know the advertised price, but what's the lowest you're prepared to take for the car?' They may smile sheepishly and tell you straight away, or getting to their bottom line might be like pulling teeth.

Remember, though, that even when you get to what they have told themselves is their 'bottom line', it might not be as low as they are prepared to go. Much will depend on circumstances, such as the urgency of the sale, how long the car has been on the market, and/or how few people have come to see it. So think like a detective. If the bloke's bags are already packed, his furniture gone and his curtains down, he's probably leaving for Australia that afternoon. If he's already bought a replacement car, he may need to sell the older one urgently. Just chatting to the fellow may elicit little hints that tell you the true circumstances.

It's hardly a moral approach, but it's up to you to take advantage of whatever you can.

Obtaining a Warranty

Even if you buy a used car privately or at auction, you can still purchase an aftermarket warranty for it from Warranty Direct, tel: 0800 731 7001, website: www.warrantydirect.co.uk.

Buying at Auction

The other way to buy used is at auction. But that requires an entirely different section, read it here.