How to Test Drive and Buy a Used Car

hey guys chrisfix here and today I'm going to show you what to look for when you test drive a used car and how I negotiate with the owner of the car and what to look for in the cars title to make sure the bank doesn't own the car or that it isn't a salvage or flooded car in the previous episodes of how to buy a used car we met with the owner did an engine interior and exterior inspection so all that's left is the test-drive so let's get to it actually I should mention this first only go for a test drive if you're really interested in the car because you don't want to waste anybody's time I know I'm gonna make Frank an offer as long as the car drives as expected and I just want to make that clear alright so get in the car start er up and then go over in your head the main tests you want to do on this test drive the main things that we're going to want to test are the engine transmission brakes and suspension to do that make sure you get some highway driving as well as city driving and I have everything you need to check on my checklist and you can download that with the link in the description so when you inspect the used car you won't forget anything now let's get going now you want to spend about 10 minutes taking the car for a test drive and just drive normally if there are any problems there's a good chance in those 10 minutes from just driving around normally that you're gonna find these problems and we're gonna go jump on the highway right away because it's right here so again right now I'm driving normally and it's a good idea to tell the owner of the car what you're going to be doing for example we're going to be doing a hard acceleration test and a hard braking test obviously you want to be safe when you do all this but you want to let the owner know just to be courteous and also because you don't want freaking out when you're jamming on the gas and jamming on the brake so here's a merge and here's a good chance to really accelerate hard so I'm going to do a hard acceleration here the engines warmed up it shifts nice for a 2.5 liter this thing has pretty good pet now I'm letting it Coast I want to make sure it's not slowing down too fast like the brakes are locked up or something like that that definitely passed the hard acceleration test I do feel a little bit of a shimmy you're talking about the the brakes being no good so that could be from the brakes don't forget to test the cruise control turn it on with the button back here comes on on the screen then you get set there we go beautiful it works then when you hit the brake it shuts off awesome and I actually get off here so it was a relatively short Highway test we don't have to go far we just wanna make sure it feels smooth everything felt really smooth do you ride this on the highway a lot or is your or your trips local I'd take it to the city every once in a while the handles pretty well on the highway my opinion but typically it's pretty local it's a good idea to ask the owner a lot of questions whatever comes to mind he knows the car you don't he knows how he's driven you have no clue you know these roads pretty well yeah I'm familiar with the area I'm about a half an hour away so I've been here plenty of times the malls right around the corner yeah so now we're kind of do the city driving we're just getting a feel for how it reacts on the stop and go so now I'm going to hit the brakes hard because it doesn't look like there's anybody around so go to speed limit and I'm going to try to lock up the ABS so the ABS didn't turn on we didn't get any skidding I'm gonna try it one more time there we go I felt the ABS in the pedal and that means it's working there's no ABS lights on in the dash so that's good that's what we want to see it stops straight when you hit the brakes even when I'm going so when you hit the brakes at stopping straight check for that here's actually a good spot that we could mess around with turning hard you want to turn the wheel all the way until you can't turn it any more this will test the front bearing cv joints and the axles the ball joints and the power steering you want the steering wheel to turn easily with no noises groaning or whining is going to be the power steering pump squeaking is a bad ball joint or bad tie rod a click could be a bearing or CV joint that's in the front X and then when everything sounds good you want to turn it the other way and feel and listen again this feels and sounds good so the test drive is going great all right at this point we can start heading back perfect timing some bumps in the road one of us Apprendi bangs or nuts that could be shocks or sway bar bushings going bad also make sure the steering feels comfortable and predictable that was really good test for the suspension suspension feels good it's nice and firm you would think it would be a little bit softer for a luxury car but this is like one of those luxury sports cars Farmar suspension so that pretty much covers what you want to do on a test drive there are a few tests that I like to do on every test drive which I showed you but for the most part just pay attention to the gauges pay attention to anything that doesn't feel normal or seem normal again hitting the brakes you can see there is a shimmy here but it's nothing horrible it's just like work brake rotors so I'm pretty sure that's where it is you said I need the brakes that's my guess yeah I'm thinking that front to Gregg's has to be replaced yeah that plus the tires in alignment could be what's causing the shaking the good thing about this test drive is the engine is buttery smooth and powerful and the transmission shifts are crisp and overall the cars handling great basically the car is something I would want to own it feels reliable and I feel comfortable driving and the last thing I want to say is always be nice and respectful to the owner when you touch drive in the car because it isn't your car that's what Craigslist gets exactly I've had a my fair share of people look at this car got some weirdos all right and there we go that's how you check out a used car we checked out everything on this checklist and thanks to Frank the owner of the vehicle for letting us film and everything and now comes to the fun part where we do the negotiation now before we negotiate this is what's going through my head I want the car this is the best one I've seen mechanically out of all the Jaguars I've looked at my main concern is the vibration in the steering wheel it's going to need new tires new brakes and an alignment right away plus the hood cable has to get replaced so the hood doesn't go flying and then it does need new wheels because they're not the right ones for this car which could also be causing the vibration at speed and then I need to figure out why the backup sensors aren't working but the car could still be driven if I don't fix that right away so he's asking $3,000 the car is worth about 2,500 in fair condition so I'm going to try to get the car for around two thousand dollars because that's somewhat reasonable but at the same time you don't want a lowball and because that's just gonna make them feel disrespected or mad and that's the last thing you want so what I do to prevent that is I explain my offer also a very important thing we learned from the test-drive is what he said right here I've had my fair share people look at this car so we probably wants to sell it already because he's shown it so much and I'm a serious buyer with cash in hand and I'm ready to take the car today right now so use that information to your advantage and here's how I negotiated let's go for it again thank you very much for letting us check out your car letting me film I really appreciate it I'm sure all the viewers appreciate it and not a problem and now comes to the fun part where we negotiate and I really I like the car this is the best Jaguar I've seen it does have a few things here and there the wheels and tires they need to be replaced I think your offer of $3,000 is a little bit too high you said you loved the car yeah no I do like the car but I'd like to make you an offer of $1,500 for this car I think that's what it's worth well I don't think I could do 15 I I need to put the money towards my new car so 15 is not gonna I can drop it a little maybe 26 we're still a little bit too far off I'll be honest like I I can't go above 2 that's that's too much I'm I'm really would you do 1,800 uh I can come down to 21 that's still for this car it's still a little bit a little bit too high one I'm gonna I'm gonna make you an offer 1,900 that's my final offer you have my number I'm here right now with the cash I'll buy it right now that's up to you I'm interested you know I'm ready to buy it right now take it off your hands right now and for 19 I think I think I'm gonna hold off for now I have a couple more people that said they want to come and look at it so I'm kind of set at the $1,900 mark I honestly just don't think the car is worth more than that I'm gonna be putting in about $1,000 but you have my number I really appreciate the test-drive letting me film and everything the viewers appreciate it so thank you very much and again you have my number give me a call if you don't sell it will do close but no cigar all right I'll tell you what change your mind I can do two grand I'm really firm at that 1,900 there's just there's a lot of stuff that need to get done to it I love the car for me I'm comfortable at 1,900 I'll give it to you for 1919 yeah we got a deal give me that camera get this handshake on camera got ourselves a deal I'm gonna just go over and park real quick all right sounds good all right look at that that is our new car that is awesome my dad is gonna love this I'm pumped to go bring this home this is I love the look of Jaguars and this one was the nicest one I've driven he's at my price range you know that's what I mean don't get emotional if he comes down he comes down if he doesn't he doesn't so now we're gonna go fill out the paperwork he's going to give me the title I'm going to give him the cash money and we'll go off of that all right the car is almost ours we negotiated we came to an agreement with the price now we have the title in our hand and we need to make sure we check a few things before we hand over the money the title or the pink slip whatever you want to call it is the piece of paper that you need in your name to own the vehicle so the first thing we'll do is we want to check out this top section here there's a lot of important information you want to make sure this VIN number right here matches the VIN on your car if this VIN does not match this title is not for the correct car and then you could also verify you know it's a 2003 Jaguar x-type it's a four-door and it's silver good and then right here is going to be the mileage that Frank bought the car at so Frank bought the car when I had one hundred and twenty nine thousand miles it now has like one hundred and thirty-five thousand miles so he put about six thousand miles on it right next to the mileage there's a letter right here and this letter is very important a means that it's the actual mileage but if you see an S that means the cars salvage or a T that means that the car was used as a taxi F is for flood peas for police LS for lemon law and so on so you want to check this out everything on this title up here is looking good there's one more thing up here we want to check we want to make sure that the person showing us the car is the listed owner on this title so Frank was showing us the car and he's the owner it also has his driver's license down here just in case you want to verify you know you could just ask to make sure the driver's license is the same because you can't have somebody else selling you the vehicle besides this owner listed right here now even if Frank is listed here he might not own the car the bank might own the car and that's what we're going to look at right down here if there's a stamp right in this section right here that means the bank owns the car now if there's a stamp here but then right here it says lien released by and it's signed off and there's a stamp on this that means that the lien was paid off so the bank doesn't own the car anymore Frank owns the car so once you check all this information on the front of the title now it's time to sign the back of the title this is where you need to focus and pay a lot of attention because you can't mess up here you can't have any cross-outs because then this title is void and then you have to get the owner to come with you to DMV if do all this paperwork and it's just not worth it just pay attention here take your time don't rush after everything's all signed off now you could give your seller the money take this and the car is now yours now you're going to go to DMV and take care of business thanks again Frank I really appreciate it made my day this is this is cool so driving home the new jag that is exactly how you do it that is how you buy a used car hopefully you learned a lot again comment below future Jaguar videos to come hopefully not repair videos but we do need new tires we need new rims and need some breaks and couple other things so stay tuned come on no one works

Channel: ChrisFix

Views: 5,992,192

Rating: 4.9278841 out of 5

Keywords: how to test drive a used car, How to Inspect a Used Car for Purchase, how to buy a used car, how to check a used car, how to check a car for sale, how to buy a car, what to look for when buying a used car, buying a used car, how to sign a title over, how to negotiate a used car deal

Id: drbhNLvYxGQ

Length: 12min 19sec (739 seconds)

Published: Fri May 06 2016

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[u/captainvaughn]

One of my favorites