Is That Used Car Reliable? – Five Ways To Find Out

on Oct 01 in What to Buy tagged reliability, used car checklist, used car inspection, Used Cars by jasonl

If you’ve found a used car that you think you might want to buy, use these tips to help determine if the car you like is going to be reliable.

1. Complete an Inspection.

We can’t emphasize this enough – inspecting a used vehicle is the best way to make sure you don’t buy a bad car. Luckily, you have lots of options when it comes to completing this step. You can use our Used Car Checklist — We give you a complete list of items to inspect, and we’ve got a complete step-by-step breakdown of every item on the checklist. You can also hire a local professional inspection service. Either way, this step is crucial. If you don’t inspect the car, you may come to regret it later.

2. Does The Car’s “Story” Make Sense?

When you’re looking at a used car, you always have to think “Why would someone sell this car?” Often times, the answer you get from the seller will make sense — the owner is moving, the car is too small, the car is too big, it’s no longer needed, etc. While these stories are often true, it’s important to remember that the seller could be lying to you. For example, a person selling a one-year-old car may tell you they’re getting rid of it because it’s too expensive. However, there’s a chance the owner is selling their car because it has some sort of incurable mechanical problem (in other words, it might be a lemon). Don’t get me wrong — you don’t have to doubt every person you talk to. Just remember to be a little skeptical when you find out why someone is getting rid of their car. If you have doubts about the seller’s motivations, feel free to walk away.

3. Generally speaking, there are a handful of features and options that reduce a car’s long-term reliability. Here’s a quick list:

a. Manual transmissions are always less reliable than automatics, simply because they’re certain to require a new clutch at some point in the future. If you choose to buy a used car with a manual transmission, make sure you can afford to replace the clutch at some point in the near future (just in case).

b. Vehicles with either Turbochargers or Superchargers are usually less reliable than vehicles without. Most likely, the person that owned the car when it was new drove it hard and fast. Turbochargers and superchargers also tend to be more maintenance intensive, so buy with care.

c. With the exception of some basic equipment, any vehicle with after-market parts and accessories is more likely to be less reliable than a standard vehicle. After-market (or non-factory) options like custom body parts, air intakes, suspension kits, performance chips, alarm systems, or expensive interior electronics could indicate the previous owner was harder on their vehicle than most people. If you see evidence of poor installation (like loose wires or missing pieces), it’s probably a good indicator that the parts weren’t installed professionally. Amateur installations are MUCH more likely to damage a vehicle.

4. Get a Vehicle History Report.
Before buying a used car, it’s important to purchase either a CarFax or AutoCheck vehicle history report. You only need one of these reports (they’re about $20), and you can use them to make sure the car you’re looking at wasn’t a “Manufacturer Buyback” vehicle (also known as a “lemon”), that it’s not a salvage title, see if the vehicle has any accident reports, open recalls, etc. While these reports aren’t completely accurate (sometimes I’ve found them to be missing data), they’re very good and easily worth the $20 you spend on them.

5. Hire a Professional Inspector

While our Used Car Checklist is very good for finding obvious problems with a vehicle, it’s no substitute for a professional inspection. A professional inspector (usually a former mechanic) will crawl under a vehicle, poke, prod, check fluids, etc. until he or she is satisfied the car is OK to buy. Professional inspections can cost anywhere from $75 to $200, but they often will travel to the vehicle to complete the inspection, and they’re almost always worth the expense. Unless the used car you’re looking at is almost brand new (say, less than 20k miles AND less than 2 years old), hiring an inspector is a good idea.

Is That Car Reliable? – Research It

on Sep 10 in What to Buy tagged reliability, research by jasonl

You’ve figured out your car budget, you’ve figured out what you need in a car, and now you’ve found a few cars that might work. But how can you tell if the car you’ve found is going to be reliable? Predicting reliability is predicting the future – no one really knows what will happen, but we can make some good guesses by taking the time to do a little research. Here are the best ways to find out if a car is reliable by doing some research on the internet.

1. Edmunds.com

The internet is full of free and accurate reliability information. While there are hundreds of places you can go, we think the best free site on the internet for researching a vehicle is Edmunds.com. Edmunds provides great new and used car research tools, including a nice combination of editor’s ratings and user ratings (see below).

While we really like the simple and easy to use rating system, there are a couple of problems. First of all, we’ve noticed that consumer ratings are always “off” – in our opinion, they never really seem to reflect the quality, value, and reliability of the car. It’s best not to put too much stock into the “Consumer Rating” number shown on Edmunds.com. However, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t read through the individual consumer reviews. There are usually some good ones worth reading, and you know the information is legit.

We really like Edmunds.com’s “Editor’s Rating” – it seems to be accurate almost all the time. As we’ve said, Edmunds.com is easily the best free resource on the internet. However, there is one drawback to the Edmunds site — they don’t offer many details when it comes to actual reliability. You’ll have to go elsewhere for that…

2. Consumer Reports

Consumer Reports provides quality reliability ratings for just about every vehicle, and when you subscribe to their website you get access to all their ratings (even if you only subscribe for one month). If you don’t want to subscribe online, you can go to your local bookstore and buy their annual Automobile Buying Guide in print (most bookstores stock them all year). The information we’re going to describe can be found in either place.

Consumer Reports has a fairly simple system for showing how reliable a car is predicted to be. The system is backwards, but basically RED = GOOD and BLACK = BAD. If you look at a rating and it’s blank (no color), that means the rating is “average”. Take a look:

Consumer Reports is dedicated to giving you a great deal of information, and they do a lot of polling and testing to come up with their data. If you don’t mind spending a few dollars, it’s a good investment.

The reliability reports show data for each major system of the vehicle from the transmission to the fuel system, but we don’t think all that information is very important to most people. Just take a look at the rating for “Used Car Prediction” in the bottom row. If a vehicle scores average or higher in the “prediction” category, it’s worth considering. If it scores below average, then you may want to rule it out (or at least look at the ratings for each item to see if you can figure out why the overall rating is low).

There is one thing we’d like to point out – in our opinion, Consumer Reports tends to be a little biased towards imports. If you’re considering purchasing a domestic vehicle, we think the Consumer Reports rating is a little lower than it should be. This isn’t based on a specific instance – it’s just that in our years of experience in the auto industry, Consumer Reports tends to favor foreign auto makers. None the less, they provide some great information, and they are also highly recommended. When you combine the Consumer Reports and Edmunds ratings, you should have a good idea of how reliable a car is going to be.

So you know where to go to get information. What do you do with it? We recommend you make a list of vehicles you’re considering and then look up the ratings for each vehicle. If any of the vehicles on your list score poorly on either Edmunds.com or Consumer Reports, you should consider scratching them off your list.

One more thing — Consumer Reports offers a “Price Report” for new or used cars for a small charge. While we’re sure it’s good information, don’t buy the Consumer Reports “Price Reports“, Edmunds.com has the same information for free. Edmunds offers “True Market Value” pricing free on their website and it’s very accurate and useful.