Buying a used car in UK

Hi,

I'm moving back to the UK in March with my husband and two children and am looking for any advice or experiences about buying a used car. Ideally, I want the car to be ready for me when I arrive or shortly after, so that we can use it straight away and avoid having to hire one. I have asked family back home to help and they are willing and we have the funds all ready to go over there. But does anyone have experience of doing this? I'm worried that it may not be possible for my brother to buy a car in my name and get it insured etc in my name. In Australia it's the car that is insured rather than the driver and I'd forgotten that things are different in the UK.

Can anyone offer any wisdom?

Thank you!

Nobody buys insurance in person anymore. It's all done over the internet so I don't see any problem in you buying it in advance of returning. You're unlikely to find an insurance company that will accept your Australian NCD but you may be able to find one that will give you a large introductory discount because of your years of driving experience.

More of a worry is do you trust your relatives judgement of a good used car? You don't want to find you don't like it and photographs can be deceptive! Could be cheaper in the long run to rent for a few days.

We did this and I have to admit it was a bit problematic - we had a mechanic friend look at cars for us and he was happy to pay for it until we were back. We looked at possible cars on line and he then inspected them, once we found a car we liked and he was happy with he bought it but this was where it got difficult, the garage would not sell it to us as we were not there & it had to be taxed and insured to drive away and an insurance certificate was needed to tax it.

I don't know why it was so difficult for us to get insurance - maybe to do with providing an address (if you are staying with family when you come back that might be easier) but in the end he bought the car in his name and accepted the 'one month free' insurance the garage provided - he then collected us from the airport in it and then we immediately sorted out insurance. It was then easy enough to transfer ownership via DVLA.

The real problems started when the car developed problems - literally on the way home from the airport. As we hadn't bought the car we couldn't return it and without going into months of stress it ended up with an out of court settlement from the garage but it soured the relationship with our friend as he didn't really want to be involved - I think being a mechanic in the area made it uncomfortable for him as I guess you don't know who knows who and where you may want to work. He probably also felt guilty but the problem was a damaged CAT which would have been impossible to inspect without being over a pit.

With hindsight I would have had the friend pay a deposit on the car so it was there waiting but actually complete the purchase ourselves and either manage without a car for a few days or hire one.

Of course if you bought privately you would probably avoid some of these problems, although having someone else choose the car still leaves the possibility if it all goes horribly wrong (& buying privately there is little come back) then it could leave them feeling pretty bad.

Nobody buys insurance in person anymore. It's all done over the internet so I don't see any problem in you buying it in advance of returning. You're unlikely to find an insurance company that will accept your Australian NCD but you may be able to find one that will give you a large introductory discount because of your years of driving experience.

 

More of a worry is do you trust your relatives judgement of a good used car? You don't want to find you don't like it and photographs can be deceptive! Could be cheaper in the long run to rent for a few days.

Quite a few accept Australian NCD - we're with Aviva.

Quite a few accept Australian NCD - we're with Aviva.

Budget accepted mine from AAMI,

it was back in 2001 though.........

Nobody buys insurance in person anymore. It's all done over the internet so I don't see any problem in you buying it in advance of returning. You're unlikely to find an insurance company that will accept your Australian NCD.

Aviva accepted our Australian NCD six months ago.

You can get around the address problem by using a relative's address. We changed all our addresses (on Australian bank accounts, super etc) to my sister's address a couple of months before we left - that way we had bank statements etc waiting for us in the UK when we arrived, which we could use as proof of residence for things like insurance, UK bank accounts etc.

I think it would depend on what budget you have. If you are looking to spend a few thousand then it may be worth getting one from a reputable garage and getting one with a 12 month warranty (although you do pay over the odds). You can look on line at Autotrader to see what is for sale in your area a few days before arriving back to give you some options to go and look at. Once you're back here and find one you like the sale can be done that day or the next, it's all pretty quick.

Why not see if a friend/relative will insure you or your husband as a named driver on their insurance for a week and then you can borrow their car to go and have a look at some you are interested in? You could offer to pay the costs of being added.

A new law came in to place a few months ago to protect buyers who were buying used cars

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/content/new-laws-protecting-car-buyers-come-into-force-on-october-1st

Also bear in mind that tax disc law has changed over here too and you can no longer buy a car with tax on it. If you buy a car towards the end of the month (even on the 29th or 30th for example) you have to pay for that full month from the 1st, so I would suggest you buy a car at the beginning of a month where you get the full benefit of that month's road tax. This applies to all sales, so if you buy privately and the owner has already taxed it for that month then you will have to pay to tax it again for the same month. This is where DVLA make more money as a result of scrapping the visible tax disc!

When I got car insurance about 8 months ago, I got several quotes from companies including those that recognised my Australian NCD, e.g. Aviva. However, I found that Direct Line insurance worked out to be cheaper even without my NCD. They do not appear on the insurance comparison websites, so might be worth a phone call.

http://www.cargiant.co.uk if you are flying into the UK at heathrow, well worth a look ... all decent and cheap cars well say cheap, cheap for modern cars nto a beat up 1990 toyota corolla what you would pay 15k over here for.

Personally I would hire a car for a week when you arrive and then use that time to find a car which is very easy. You will have no trouble finding an insurance company to accept your Australian no claims, I'm not sure why some say it's a problem to be honest.

www.cargiant.co.uk if you are flying into the UK at heathrow, well worth a look ... all decent and cheap cars well say cheap, cheap for modern cars nto a beat up 1990 toyota corolla what you would pay 15k over here for.

I did look at car giant. I'd read the reviews.

buying a used car is easy. We have a few sites to look on and they are very effective. autotrader, ebay, aa, etc

you can look on parkers, they do checks on all the cars the advertise so its even easier for buyers.

When buying a car, do a hpi check on it, txt the reg to 83600, this will come back if the car has been stolen, ritten off or registered oversees.

need anymore help, send me a messege

Not sure what you mean by wanting a car that's ready, you can buy a car in 5 mins once you've found one.

Have a look at auto trader website to get an idea. We bought a car after half a day looking. You buy tax online ( no car comes with tax anymore) and Aldo insurance, we got short term insurance while we shopped around ( online) for an insurer who would accept Oz NCD ( we found RAC the cheapest) I would get a letter from your oz insurer before you go stating your ncd in years ( not %, must be in years) drivers name etc and how long you held insurance. We actually used a compare website in the end , it brought up quite a few who would take overseas ncd

you will save on stress by test driving and finding a car yourself Esther than letting soneone else organise it..

Google real mpg too if economy is important to you.