So you wanna buy a new car

Abstract

You know I’ve had my current car for 14 years now and after more than 300,000 kilometers on the road and bare minimum maintenance, it’s in a pretty bad shape. If you follow me on Mastodon, not a day goes by that I don’t grumble something about the car. The suspension is whacked, I feel like I’m riding a horse-drawn carriage. The paint job is awful, tyres are balding, rain water is flooding the floor of the passenger seat on one side and there’s the check engine light that’s been a permanent feature of the car for the past two years or so.

So why I don’t just fix them all? After all it makes more environmental and economical sense than getting a new car. Well, it’s not that straightforward. I’ve asked around a few workshops and the rough estimate to fix everything’s that’s wrong with my car would cost and upward of 5,000 ringgit. I could easily pay for half the deposit of a new car with that amount. Furthermore, when you’ve been in a car that’s very old and outdated in term of style and function, you had that niggling feeling that it’s time for a new car.

Don’t get me wrong, that 7-seater MPV had been a loyal servant of the family. Three of my children literally grew up with the car, I took us places far and wide without causing any major troubles. It had been on top of hills, wade through 1 meter flood water and been to roads that should only be traversed by four-wheel drive vehicles without skipping a piston beat. But despite all that, I feel like it’s time to let go. My kids are almost all grown up now and my wife bought a shiny new SUV 5 years ago while I’m stuck with that beat-up car.

So what’s stopping me? You guessed it, financial commitments. You know, my income and spending is pretty much fixed every month. I do contribute for half of the new SUV payments which in fairness, we both use as the main family car. And you add that with the other monthly bills, I don’t have much left from my pay check in the end. Plus my salary had not risen as much as I hoped for in the past few years. In a nutshell, I can’t afford to buy a new car.

Then what changed? I finally managed to reach a compromise with my wife for the car payments. She (albeit reluctantly) agreed to cover the instalments for our family car so I can afford another new car. I am forever in her debt (literally and figuratively).

How to buy a car

First thing first you’ve got to take a good hard look at the mirror and check what kind of car you can afford with your current salary minus existing commitments. Now that you’re back to reality, forget about that European or Japanese car, yes settle for national cars. In my case, I wanted the stylish rebadged Geely Emgrand aka Proton S70 but the 700 ringgit monthly instalments is way out of my budget. That leaves us with the Proton Saga, the Perodua Myvi and the Perodua Axia. I never liked the Proton Saga design and the Axia is simply too small both in term of size and engine power so Myvi it is. If I have slightly more money to spend I would have preferred a sedan but the rebadged Daihatsu Sirion is not bad-looking at all in my opinion.

After deciding the car of your dream (or crushed dream), you may want to go to a showroom and test drive the car. Unless you have driven the same model regularly before, it’s prudent that you get a feel of the car you want to spend the next 10 years in. I did that and the sales advisor was all too eager to help me. I rode around Bangi section 7 with my wife and kid in the Advanced model 1.5 Myvi. He explained to me what documents to submit, how much the car would cost and how much my current car estimated cost for trade in. Very helpful the sales advisor guy.

Too bad I can’t help him with a sale because I’ve already got an agent who will do everything for me. Kimi was a former colleague of my wife and we’ve known him for a while now. From the beginning, he helped me every step of the way. The next step after the test drive and you’re happy with the car is to submit the required documents for the bank loan. Yes, never pay anything cash even you’re rich AF. That will only trigger red flags at a few government departments and agencies. Usually they will need a copy of your identity card, your current driving license, 3 months pay slip and a bank statement showing your salary bank account. You don’t need a license to buy a car but you do need to have to have a valid driving license to register the car at the Road Transport Department (JPJ).

Now while waiting for the loan application, you will want to trade in your current car. That is unless you’re planning to use it or give to a family member to use. The worse thing you can do is leave the old car unused because trust me, it will deteriorate and break into a pile of junk over time. You’ve got a few options - sell it yourself on Mudah, sell it to a used car dealer or sell it to online platforms like Carsome or Carro. They all have their up and downside but for me, selling it yourself on Mudah can take a long time and you’ll have to deal and negotiate with prospective buyers yourself. There’s a good chance you’ll get lowballed for the car’s price. I simply don’t have time for that so I sent my car for inspection at Carro. I went to their inspection centre in Kajang and after an hour-long inspection, they valued my car for a measly 9,000 ringgit.

You know, that car was not exactly in a good shape and got tons of defects but 9k is a bit low even with all that. So my agent suggested his used car dealer friend in Serdang Raya which offered 10k for the car. That’s a slightly better price so I agreed. You can contact the used car dealer Terry check your old car and have him offer a good price at +60173747222 .

Now that you have sold your old car and got the cash, you can use it all to pay for the 10% downpayment. Of course you can also choose to pay more than 10% but my advice is to save some for the window tint, car mat and other accessories for the car. I excitedly bought a complete set of car mats for my new car plus a boot tray and some magnetic window shade. When I got the car, my agent fixed me some free Perodua car mats and a boot tray to boot. As for the window shade, my window tint was dark enough that I don’t really need to use one. So check with your agent or sales advisor what kind of freebies he or she will get for you or you can even ask for some. Also if you’re strapped for cash, there’s an option to pay zero deposit (despite it’s not officially allowed by Bank Negara). The sales advisor will simply mark up the car price for the bank loan by entering a different, pricier model and adding extra accessories that you will not get. It is possible but you will ultimately pay more in instalments so choose wisely. Do you need to pay for road tax and insurance? No, they will be included in your loan amount.

The sales advisor or agent will submit your loan application to several banks to see which one offers the best rate or if you have a terrible credit rating like me, approve your loan in the first place. This usually won’t take long and you should know the result of your loan application within a week. After your car loan is approved, next you will wait for the car dealership to get your stock from the factory. Depending on your luck and the competency of the dealers, that will take somewhere between a week (this is where they claim ready stock) to a month or even 5-6 months. While you wait, you can decide wether to get a special number from the JPJ MySikap website or simply follow the current running number. As always, you can get a number from any state or even districts in Sabah and Sarawak. To get a custom number from MySikap, the booking fee is 310 ringgit including administrative tax. Once you paid for the booking, you share the receipt with your dealer so they can register that number.

I sold and surrendered my old car before the new one comes out so that I can get the cash to pay for the deposit. In between that, I was without a car for two weeks so bear that in mind if you only got a single vehicle in your household. My wife use her car to get to work every day but lucky for me, I still have my old trusty bike for the purpose.

Traditionally, you will only sign the loan agreement once the car is in stock at the dealership. After the agreement is signed, the car dealership will deliver the car to you within days. In some special case they could deliver the car to your doorstep but normally, you need to go to the dealership to collect your car. There they may wrap your brand new car in ribbons and take pictures with a big placard.

So that concludes my new car buying experience. All in all, it took me just 46 days from submitting my documents to collecting the car at the dealership. That is pretty fast thanks to my agent, Kimi. He took care of everything from submitting my loan applications to recommending a good used car dealer to finding a new car dealership with ready car stock. You can contact Kimi at +60149224887 if you’re looking to buy a new car (or even used car) of any model or make. If you’d like a good car window tint shop that I’ve used for all the cars in my family, contact Tim at +60123858527 where he has a shop near Pandan Indah.

Below is the estimated timeline from start to finish.

Week 1
Test drive Submit documents - IC, current driving license, 3 months pays slip, bank statement Submit car loan applications

Week 3
Send car for used car inspection - Carro, MyTukar or used car dealer

Week 4
Car loan approved Surrender old car to used car dealer and get cash Pay car deposit to new car dealership Book new car registration number online

Week 5
Wait for new car stock to arrive

Week 6
Collect new car at dealership