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In my last entry I wrote about how to save up money to at least make it for a car downpayment. Whilst not foolproof, it’s better than nothing. Also I realize it may not be practical for everyone to live as thick skinned as I was, you know, basically living off of other people. That aside, lets move on.

 

After my interview, I was pretty bummed for a few days. I was pretty worried on the outcome. To make matters worse, the weekend came and I’d only know my result the following week. There was only one thing I could do to get my mind off of it. As alcohol is pretty expensive in Malaysia, I had to resort to the next best thing, window shopping for car.

 

First before I started, I took a piece of paper and wrote down everything that I’m looking for in a car;

 

After listing a truncated list of possible cars that fills all the criterions I had set, I finally brought it down to just one; the 2011 Audi R8. The Audi R8 is the REAL REASON Cristiano Ronaldo is as good as he is in football.  The proof is on youtube, you can watch it yourself when you search for Cristiano Ronaldo tested to the limit, and it will be scientifically shown what the Audi R8 has done for him.

So now that I have decided on what I was willing to drive, it was time to shop for one. Off I went to Audi Malaysia’s website to have a look at what their offerings were.

0-100 km/h in 3.9 seconds and a top speed of 316 km/h, I was 99% sure of getting the car. So the car was OTR without Insurance at 1,250,000 RM. However, I felt, when buying a car of this speedy nature, it was of utmost importance to get Ceramic brakes. Unfortunately, I did not have enough money to get the car together with the ceramic brakes so I scrapped the idea altogether. I felt getting the car without the ceramic brakes was like riding in a death trap!

After I woke up from my dream that was under the illusion that I had the million required for the car, I checked my bank to see how much money I had that can be spared to pay for the car. I tried asking my parents if they were keen to put in a bit of money, but It was usually shot down with, No, wait for induction letter, what for, and eventually no need. I finally grew tired of it and decided to do something I’m not known for… I decided to try and live WITHIN my means. Yes, that’s right, I decided to do something practical. The heavens froze, or so I’ve been informed.

I scoured high and low for possible cars. I went to so many car dealerships brokering deals, trying to squeeze the best deal I possible could. Proton, Honda, Kia, Toyota, Mitsubishi, Hyundai, Nissan, and even Volkswagen. I didn’t bother with Audi because the sole authorized importers for Audi, Euromobil, decided to put whatever the hell they felt was enough for the cars, which meant an A4 would set you back 300k, an A5, 400k and the new A6, almost 550k.

After scouring all the new car shops, I was stuck between the Honda Insight and the Triton Lite. I know what you’re wondering. Dude, the difference between Insight and Triton Lite are worlds apart! One is a gas guzzler, the other is a hybrid for pete’s sake! You would be right, but I don’t give a shit what you think.

So I calculated how much loan I would have to take, and for how many years, calling up bank after bank getting the contacts of loan officers to negotiate rates. Thank God I have Unifi which gives me free landline calls, or else my phone bill would have been atrocious! For the most part, I felt the monthly repayment wasn’t too bad, even without the on-call system, I figured it should be plausible, if I spent less money on booze and other unnecessary things {such as games and prostitutes}.

With one side of the market fully explored, I opted to check the other side, the used cars market.

Day in, day out, all I did was look at forums online looking for possible cars. Not having a set budget in mind, I kept getting side tracked and looked at the GT-R’s that were for sale and various other sport cars that were out of my league. There were pictures, and that’s all it took. Eventually, I realized that this was a waste of my time because I won’t be able to make a good decision if I click on every damn link. I gave myself a modest <downpayment> that I was willing to part with and put some aside just to fix up the car wherever it was necessary. I even asked my friends to look around and see if they could come up with something.

As the Gods would have it, that proved to be equally, if not more useless. One friend kept linking me to sport cars, another to cars beyond my budget, and one more said she only found those automatic cars generating her interest. Anyways, I eventually found something that caught my attention;

 

A modest looking 97’ Proton Putra, with the asking price of RM 26,000. Not going to go through too much into the car because there’s too much to say, but instead lets keep this post limited to the actual act of purchasing the car.

So I set this car in my favourites list and kept looking, and finally rounded it down to four used cars.

– 97’ Proton Putra

-00’ Honda City {Cheapest VTEC}

-01’ Proton Perdana V6

– 92’ BMW 525i

 

The asking price for the BMW was the highest, at RM 48,000. It is converted to a 2.5L turbo engine that pulls about 350 bhp. The cheapest was the Perdana that was asking for RM 23,888. It also came with a very nice number plate, 8080.

I spent the next few days searching around scouting the prices for spare parts and rough maintenance of the cars. I also visited a few second hand dealers to get a rough estimate of the market price for the cars that I had rounded down to, to help with my negotiations later. If you are looking for a car in the market, MAKE SURE YOU DO THIS, cause this is weapon for your negotiation arsenal later. The BMW was a no go, primarily because it was easily the most expensive to maintain. The Putra and Perdana on the other hand were cheaper because some parts can be sourced locally, and others, there are mountains available at chop shops, if you can’t secure new ones.

Putra vs Perdana, I think you can guess what happened here.

So, I called up the owner, and told him I’d like to view his car, and if possible, get my mechanic to have a look at the car. We set it for the coming weekend, a Saturday. However, he had some time off during his Lunch break on Friday and gave me a call. Since I am a penganggur, I was naturally free and available. Called my mechanic, luckily he was available and we set to meet for lunch time. To my untrained eye, the first view of the car {We met at a Petrol Station in Jalan Ipoh and I was going to guide him to my mechanic}, the car looked flawless!

So we got to the mechanic and exchanged pleasantries as my mechanic started ripping everything apart. He did his quick inspection of the car and gave me a brief history. Rust on the roof, cracks on the windscreen, leaking gaskets, air-conditioning issues, and even the back where someone budged into the car, his trained eyes caught. Of course the owner was upfront to me about it over the phone, so he had no reason to hide it. Don’t forget to ask for service logs, and any and all receipts he has on his car. Ask where he does his services, how many KM intervals, what kind of engine oil he uses. The one bad news he told me was he only uses RON 97 petrol for this car, but I don’t think I’ll be able to afford RON 97, so I will eventually be bringing it down to RON 95 after I consult my mechanic, but that’s a story for another day!

#PROTIP!

ALWAYS GET YOUR MECHANIC TO CHECK THE CAR YOU’RE VIEWING. NOT THE SELLERS MECHANIC, NOT THE SECOND HAND DEALERS MECHANIC, BUT YOURS. IF THE OWNER REFUSES, STAY AWAY.

After my mechanic inspection, it was time to have fun. Took it for a test drive. When I was studying in Taylor College, I had a Chinese friend named Alex. {Yes, I have Chinese friends, I’m not racist}. Alex has twin sisters, but that’s a story for a different day. He also has several cars, one of which is a Proton Putra, which he has since sold off, as I understand it. During one of our lunch breaks, he let me test drive the Putra. It was a very fun car to drive and I told him that. This was despite how much I disliked the build quality of Protons. My opinion on Proton still hasn’t changed, their quality control is still shit, but credit where credit is due.

So we sat down over Teh Tarik to negotiate the prices like men. My first question to him was, How much is the car insured for, to which he said RM 15,000. I told him, well, that’s the value of the car. His face changed, as if he knew what I was going to suggest next. For those of you who know how cheap I am, you probably know what was coming next. However, I’ve learnt the art of negotiations well, thanks to dealing with vendors and Taxi drivers in Moscow. Many a times, I get Taxi rides cheaper than what my friends are easily willing to pay for. Once we wanted to go somewhere in a cab, and Shorty says it will take 300 rubs to get there, I got a cab for 150 and he didn’t want to believe that was the price till I paid the man at the destination.

Anyways, despite what you may think I said next, I asked him, how much are you asking for this car. He replies, RM 26,000 is my asking price on the Mudah.com, but I can go to RM 23,000 if you are paying it in cash.

I chip in, listen mate, once I get this car off of you, there is a lot of work to be done. The windscreen is cracked, the roof has rust, the gasket is leaking, the air conditioning needs fixing, the car also has been hit at the side by an idiot at the parking lot, these are all things I have to take into consideration, and the amount I have to fork out to make sure the car is going to run in tip top condition. Here’s what I’m going to do, the car is valued at RM 15,000 so I can only offer based on that; I will offer you RM 19.000.

He was a bit shocked, and said, I can’t let it go for 19,000, it’s way below what I think the car is worth. I can’t do it.

I replied, it doesn’t matter what you think the car is worth to you, what matters is what it is worth on the road. All your personal attachments to your car doesn’t add any value to me. Listen, I will go up to RM 20,000, that’s all.

He said he’ll think about it, and will call me later. I bid him goodbye as he left the mamak and ordered Uma Rani’s famous Milo Shake + Fried Ice Cream. All the way back I thought to myself, damn son is he going to bite?

Few hours later, I get a call from him. He says can you meet me halfway for RM 21,000. I said, listen, there are so much repairs I need to do to the car that will amount up to RM 5K by itself, whats the point of paying RM 21,000 and do repairs if it will amount up to RM 26,000?

I guess he realized at this point that there is only a certain amount you can negotiate with Indians and beyond that, there’s nothing much we can do. However, he told me that for Puspakom inspection to Lulus, he had to remove his tint, but it’s a shitty tint, and there’s no point in putting it back and I should get my own tint. I was okay with it and told him to go ahead.

#PROTIP, whenever you make negotiations over the phone, make sure you get a trail of it in black and white to avoid any disputes later. Here’s what we did;

We exchanged emails and I was waiting for him to send me his initial terms for our agreement. It came the same night, and it was written so professionally! I was impressed;

#PROTIP, When there are additional terms you wish to add, and if there were issues you were not willing to agree on, make sure you get it in writing on the email.

Whenever able, do not pay in cash. How are you going to carry RM 19,000 around town? Isn’t exactly the wisest of things to do!

Once both parties are satisfied with agreements and addendums, you finally set a date to do the transaction.

 

First things first, before a name transfer of the grant can be done, the current owner of the vehicle must go to Puspakom and do a Name Transfer Inspection at Puspakom. It costs RM 30, and can be done at the various Puspakom branches. Go early, or expect a huge queue.

Once Puspakom has passed your car for inspection, you may proceed to the next step, Insurance. When buying a second hand car, you can opt to take over the insurance the current owner  has. Basically it will be transferred to you, and you won’t have to pay for the current term, till it expires. It’s easier, but if you have your own insurance company you rather use, to save your NCD {NCB} then by all means. However, this car is 14 years old, so it’s impossible to get a comprehensive insurance coverage. If I was to go to any other company, they will either give me third party, or won’t even entertain. I was pretty limited to using his existing insurance, but their rates weren’t bad, so I didn’t have any issues with it.

Insurance transfer is a quick process, takes about 30 minutes, and you will be issued a cover note. To complete the transfer, bring along the existing insurance policy and certificate, together with a signed insurance transfer form signed by the current owner. A cover note is a temporarily valid certificate to indicate you have insurance for your car. You need Insurance before you can apply for a name transfer or even to renew your road tax. Name transfer usually costs RM 10 for Insurance

Next is JPJ. Go to JPJ with all the required forms, two of each and of course the car grant. If the current owner is not coming, you need him to fill up an additional form that has a photocopy of his IC certified by a commissioner of oath. The process is pretty quick, depending on the wait time you face while waiting for your number to be called, so this may vary. It costs RM 100 to get the name transfer complete. It took me 30 minutes to finish everything here.

While waiting to be called, feel free to look at the running numbers that you can buy. The common numbers sell for RM 210 for Wilayah Plates. Then there are tenders for special numbers, such as 1, 9999, 8888, and the such. Each has its own individual minimum bid that you can place. The tenders are anonymous, you drop your bid into the collection bin and wait till the allocated date. If you are the highest bidder, you will be able to purchase the number plate for the amount you bid. For clarity, few years back, the number plate MCA 1 was sold for RM 200,000. Other MCA singular digit plates went for RM 15,000-20,000.

Everything done, I finally drove the car I own, my first property, one that I purchased with my own savings, back home! Sniff Sniff, all grown up and shit.

I wanted to take several pictures of my car, but unfortunately the heavy rain today ruined all photo opportunities. However, here are the same pictures that can be found at the online advertorial;

 

 

 

If I get a decent camera, and if it stops raining I’ll try to get other shots, but I think these pictures capture most of it well enough.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 14th, 2011 at 5:06 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.