If you’ve graduated from driving school and are thinking about a car, obviously the first thought is to buy a used one to learn how to drive better. School doesn’t make you an expert. You will have to learn some maneuvers on your own.

It is recommended that it is not expensive so that it does not burst into tears if it is accidentally scratched or hit.

Most of the ads are posted on sites that sell various things. There you also meet samsari in the form of owners who bought a car for them, but they need money, they did not have time to use it, so now they are selling it.

Looking for a car is a real adventure. Everyone is looking for a model with low mileage, but how and where it was driven is more important. You cannot compare a car from Germany with 100,000 km mileage with a Romanian one, especially if these kilometers were spent in the city. Chances are the one in Germany will last you longer or have less trouble with it.

This means investing less money.

Going back to our history, on classifieds sites you meet all kinds of people: some honest, some not.

The easiest thing to do is to call if the photos and information the seller has posted seem to have everything you want from the car.

You call, tell them you saw the ad, ask if it’s still up, and once confirmed, in many cases you talk to them on the phone.

He says at one point: I did it on “bagabontsa”!

I ask: what does this mean?

He answered: I put foil, special leather on the steering wheel and on the girls’ seats.

I understand that this was the car in which he drove to the gallows.

You also come across many cases where sellers claim to have all the paperwork but no insurance. They offer to bring him to a certain area to check, because there is no police there.

Obviously you can’t go drive it. You can’t take risks.

In general, if you don’t like cars, you should avoid convertibles. They are a little more demanding. One man had one that he said belonged to his wife. So far so good. He then tells me that he took it to the mountains without a cover, it had ice on it, then he put the roof back on and hasn’t taken it off since.

He wanted to say that she was resilient, that she was still going through what she had been through.

Another gentleman had a car for sale that appeared to be in very good condition. He did not have photos of the interior, but you arrange with him to look in the area where he lives. An honest man: He says he invested a lot of money in it and is fed up. He had various problems, but now he is doing well.

When he opens the door… it’s disaster inside. The seats are covered with some tape, the same on the steering wheel, lever, instrument panel. It also had a strange smell. I gave her a ride out of respect and she said she bought it from a girl who didn’t take care of her. He gave him a smaller car and a sum of money in exchange.

He knew by the tone of his voice that he had made a mistake. He said another €1,500 would need to be put in as there were still some issues, but otherwise it was good.

Before buying, check the car for service

You also encounter strange situations. The pictures showed a car about 10 years old in exceptional condition. He had numbers from another settlement.

It was sanitized, looked like new, including the engine. You make an appointment, he is very pleasant on the phone. You will find out that it is not actually his car, but a relative.

I ask: Well, how should I buy it if I like it?

He answers me: I call him, and he comes right away. If you like it, I will sell it to you now.

The logic would be as follows: it was bought in the name of another person, but for him. The story is not related to everything she told.

It looks like the car had some minor issues. I offered to go to the service for an inspection, at least to know what to spend money on. The real owner also got into the car on the track.

The service check was worth 150 lei, and this time I wondered how it got there. They destroyed everything, from the radio to the sources. Problems with the oil system, water, brake, flanges, etc. The list of faulty things was huge. Even the taillights didn’t work well, and there was even a threat of falling onto the trail.

I asked them if there was any point in telling them anything. They understood that such things cannot be bought.

Buying a car is a long process. The ideal is to find an owner who invested in it because they loved it so much. I mean, it was his soul machine. It is not impossible to find. You just have to be patient.

You can also call maintenance experts. Some also have YouTube channels and some videos are complete tutorials. You will learn many things from them.

At the same time, you should know that you will not find the perfect car without problems. We are talking about second hand. The main thing is that troubleshooting does not leave you with an empty wallet.

Photo source: Dreamstime.com