Purchasing a car in Australia

[Lucy Colenutt]

Hi everyone ,

we have just moved to New South Wales this weekend and we are looking at purchasing a used car and would like some help with how it works out here.

Me and my partner are not insured on any vehicle, what are the rules on test driving ? Is it the car itself that is insured?

if we decide to purchase a vehicle do we sort out the insurance before driving it home? 

Also is there any other things to sort out like in the UK? Car Tax for example.

Thanks

lucy 

 

[aoca24]

When my husband and I first bought our car we looked up insurances online and compared. We went with RACV, and we pay $1200 annually. We signed up for it after we brought the car home. Also, make sure that if you have an international license. it can also be used in NSW or convert it.

[AussieMum]

ALWAYS get insurance before you drive your car home.  You can shop around and take out the policy to start on the day you'll be picking it up once you know the make, model, rego number, etc.  Depending on the value of the car, you can have full comprehensive, third party property or third party, fire and theft.   

I used to work in car insurance including handling motor claims.  If you have a collision and don't have insurance, the best case scenario is that there is only minor damage to your own car that you pay for yourself.  Other possibilities are that your costs aren't recoverable (either at fault, hit and run or single vehicle) but you cause expensive damage to your new car, other vehicles and/or to other property such as a house, fence, etc.  I've also dealt with people who had an accident where the at-fault driver was also uninsured so their only recourse was to engage a solicitor and take them to court to recover repair costs (often they were insured for another vehicle and decided to take the risk while they sold their old car or forgot to swap the insurance over). 

I'm not in NSW so can't advise re: Registration and compulsory third party insurance (which is for personal injury) as it varies by state.  For test driving, if it's a dealership they normally have insurance/self-insure.  If buying privately, you would need to check with the owner to make sure they don't have a listed-drivers-only policy. 

[Skani]

6 hours ago, Lucy Colenutt said:

Hi everyone ,

we have just moved to New South Wales this weekend and we are looking at purchasing a used car and would like some help with how it works out here.

Check out this website:

https://www.fairtrading.nsw.gov.au/cars-and-other-vehicles/buying-and-selling-a-car/before-you-buy-a-car

[Collie]

Cars in Australia have registration (rego) on them and need to have this to drive legally on the roads.

In NSW, to get rego, you need a pink slip (MOT) on cars more than 4 (?) years old and a green slip (CTP insurance).  It follows and is driven by the car, not the driver.

The car should be already registered for a test drive and will have so much rego on it when you buy it (vendor is responsible, dealers may have special exemptions).

After sale, ownership transfers to you after both you & the vendor notify the RTA (now called RMS, I think).

Additional insurance is optional (eg Comprehensive) abd can be bought from any of the big companies.

Have a look around the rms website, pretty sure they have guides on there (or the link above).

Edited November 20, 2019 by Collie

[goliaph]

Hi and welcome. I hope you're feeling so nice in New South Wales. Hmm, it's really a nice question but I can't tell you exactly how to find a used car, cuz I did it only once, but I am still gonna tell you about this experience. Well, it was last summer. I was navigating on the internet and just replying to some threads on a forum about cars. And I suddenly noticed an advertisement about the selling of an Audi a6 2017. OMG, I understood that I should immediately call the seller and purchase it. So I did it. I first get rid of my old car with the help of a vehicle removal service that gave me $5,000 for my old Mazda and then bought the Audi.