Smart Auto Buying Tips !

At this point you should be feeling pretty confident that the car you’ve picked out is fairly sound in mechanical condition. You’ve applied my advice above. Now it’s time to get a professional mechanic’s view on the car.

You can take your candidate car to most any shop that displays the “ASE” standard, and be relatively certain that if you tell the service manager what you need is an independent inspection of a used car that you are considering buying, then he will most likely be very honest with you. Go spend $15 on a “Haynes Manual” that deals with your specific model of car. Have any mechanic that tells you of a problem look it up and explain to you the repair process which will be clearly laid out in your Haynes manual.

If the mechanic stumbles or worse yet is reluctant to show you the “wherefores and whys” in a Haynes manual, the he isn’t a true mechanic. You may even want to test and pre-qualify the shop by asking a specific question. For example, you could walk in, introduce yourself, and mention something specific like “My steering wheel shudders when I hit he brakes” A Haynes manual will tell you in advance why that is happening (probably because your front brake rotors aren’t perfectly flat).

If the automotive shop owner tells you it’s because the muffler bearings are worn out, then tell him good-bye. There is no such thing as a muffler bearing, and an easy to read Haynes manual will give you the confidence to either tell him good-bye or better yet, allow you to walk back to your car, get your Haynes manual and ask him to show you an illustration of a muffler bearing and how that affects your steering wheel shudder.

The above scenario is just an unlikely example, but if you have a Haynes manual in your possession then you will always have a way of getting any repair shop worth their salt to show you the exact process that they will need to follow to make any repairs to your vehicle.

Again, it’s very important to understand the same principle that applied to salesman Smith and salesman Jones. If the manager of this shop seems haggard and uninterested and tells you it will take 4 or 5 hours to get to you, then it’s time to move on. Unfortunately this will be the case in many automotive shops you visit, as many of them remain very busy. I can give you a couple of options to overcome this hurdle and save you some time though.

• Option #1 is to schedule an appointment with the repair shop in advance. By doing this you’ll also be able to get a price quote for their professional inspection and you can question their qualifications and training in advance also.
• Option #2 would be to just take the car down to your local “10 minute Oil Change” place. All of these mechanics see nothing but the underside of many different car models every day. Many of these mechanics will be ASE certified in one or more fields, usually brakes and front-end alignment. You’re not here to get the oil changed. You’re here to get them to give your vehicle a “once over”.

Tell them you don’t want them to change the oil. You just want them to inspect the vehicle for:

• Any major mechanical problems
• Any fluid leaks

Offer to pay them their going rate for a 10 minute oil change but tell them upfront that you don’t want an oil change. You just want a quick inspection of your candidate car. Most small oil-change shops will be tickled pink to pick out everything they see wrong with a vehicle in the hopes that you may bring this vehicle to them in the future to get these items repaired. They will be on YOUR side as the poor salesman cringes in the corner.