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I have learned a lot over the years through buying, selling and parting out used vehicles. This video is an explanation of things I check for when looking at a used car.
When checking out a used car you should already be familiar with the vehicle and its common problems. If you opt not to take the vehicle for a pre-purchase inspection you should bring a check engine light scanner with you to check for any check engine codes. Scanners will also tell you if the vehicle computer was recently reset.
Always take used vehicles for a test-drive, its a good way to get a feel for how the vehicle shifts and what kind of condition the suspension is in.
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Hey E36 Fanatics, Steven here
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Today I'm going to be talking about a few car buying tips and tricks that I've learned
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over the years between buying and selling and parting out cars. Now if you're in the market for buying a used vehicle, you know, you can buy it from a third
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party or you can buy it from a used car dealership. I feel like third parties, you know, you have to be a little more weary about buying used
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vehicles from a third party. It helps if you're a little more mechanically inclined and know how to really look at the
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car and inspect the car yourself. When you're looking at a used car, that's when pre-purchase inspections come into play
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So me personally, I do the entire look through myself. But I've been working on cars for years, I take my scan tools and I know the different
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things to look for. But if you're buying an expensive used vehicle and you are not mechanically inclined, I would
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strongly suggest that you have a mechanic do a pre-purchase inspection. All right so what if you
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don't want to get somebody a mechanic to do a pre-purchase inspection you don't want to pay all
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that money you can do it yourself. Well there's a few important major things to look for there's a
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few questions I usually ask especially third-party sellers one of the most obvious things to do
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is to check your oil you know take a look see what color it is if the stuff's black
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if it's black if it's really dark then you know this guy hasn't changed the oil in a long time
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and that's a decent indicator that this car isn't being well taken care of so this vehicle that i'm
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looking at right now is a bmw they're known to have coolant issues so you want to take a look
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to see if there's been any obvious signs of any history of coolant leaks so here's one on this e36
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You see this white residue around the coolant reservoir? That is a sign that this vehicle has previously or is currently leaking coolant
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There's other signs down here. You can see all this white residue. That's additional signs that there has been a coolant leak
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Then the other obvious thing to do, take a look at your coolant reservoir
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See where the water level is on the vehicle. If it's really low then you know that it's pretty obvious that it has a coolant leak, an existing coolant leak
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So another thing to take a look for on valve covers sometimes you can see a little smoke rising or you can actually see oil dripping out of the bottom of the valve covers over here That indicates valve cover gasket leak Another thing
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to check especially with older vehicles, suspensions start degrading a lot as the years go by
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Even if you've got a car with only like say 40, 50,000 miles, you know it's a low mileage vehicle
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and but it's like 10-15 years old well with suspension parts with those rubber components
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it really doesn't matter how many miles the car has on it if it's got that age on it because the
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rubber is going to crack and wear whether or not the car is driven so with these e36s e46s what i
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would do before i went and test drove them is i'd push them up and down a little bit and if the
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suspension is in decent condition the thing won't bounce the thing won't bounce around like a boat
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but if it's in rough shape you bounce it once or twice and the thing keeps bouncing you know that
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your shocks and your struts are probably blown. Another really important thing to do is know the
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vehicle you're looking at before you actually show up to check it out but if you're if you find a car
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that you really like at a used car dealership it's best to go back home first and do your homework
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on that vehicle. For example, to look at an E36 or an E46 or really any 3 Series, I want to check
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out the cooling system like crazy because the cooling systems on these vehicles are notorious
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for having problems after a certain amount of miles. I also know to look at any of the power
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windows because BMWs, the 3 Series, are also known for power window issues after a certain amount of
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miles. My mother owned a BMW X5 and I didn't realize until afterwards that the 4.8 liter was
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known for valley pan gasket leaks, valve cover gasket leaks, and the reservoir cracking. So it's
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just good to kind of know what issues are common on the vehicle you're looking at and to have an
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idea to specifically look for those kind of issues when you go out and check out the car
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I have a code scanner. You can check the codes on the vehicle if there is any check engine lights on the car
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Here's my old cheapo OBD2 scanner. It'll do any car pretty much, but it doesn't give you that much information
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And it's, you know, it's a real cheap one. All right here my higher end one This isn a high grade BMW scan tool but understand that I pretty much only buy and sell and mess with BMWs
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So it made a lot of sense for me to get a BMW specific scan tool
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It's very helpful if I'm trying to diagnose an issue on a vehicle or see the condition of varying parts on the car
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Another thing to do with used vehicles is to test out all your power windows, all your windows, all the controls and electronics inside of the vehicle, the horn, you know, the AC system
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Test everything in the vehicle to look for and note anything that is not working and that's problematic
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If you're looking at a convertible, test the convertible top because when I first bought mine, I bought mine from a used car dealership
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I didn't test it. It was in the middle of winter, so a convertible top, you know, putting down the top wasn't on my mind
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Came back home, tested it a month or two later, and it didn't work
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All right, one other important thing about convertible top vehicles. You open the door, take a big breath of air
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Take a big whiff of the car. You smell anything smelling like mildew
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It's not necessarily an indicator you should walk away immediately, but that's a really good indicator that the convertible top is leaking and it's been leaking
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for a while. We have several BMW convertibles at my house and they all leak so we have to put them
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in the garage but sometimes we don't and it very quickly can cause damage to the interior from the
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from the rain. So what about questions to ask people? So the first one I'll usually ask people
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is what gas do you use in this car? And the reason I ask that is I usually, I'm usually looking for
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BMWs. They're only supposed to take 93. People who want to save money will put in 87 and the
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vehicles are not meant for 87 in the least. They specifically tell you that. And there's several
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reasons why I've looked at a BMW before that ran like absolute shit. And I was trying to figure
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out why the car was running so badly. And I was looking through the car and everything, checking
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and I asked the guy, I'm like, you know, what gas do you put in this thing? The guy's like, you know, I just fill up whatever's cheapest in the area
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I'm like, well, fungal. All right, I'm going home. That's it. You know, look at the inside to take a look, see if there's garbage shitting in there
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See if there smoking in the vehicle if there smoke stains and such in the vehicle Okay so one other question i always ask somebody who a third party uh third party person i always ask who who been driving the
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vehicle like whose car is this is it your car dad or is it your 16 year old kid that's been driving
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the car around if it's a teenager that's owned the car for a while been driving it for a while
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that's a big red flag for me not to touch the the test drive so whether you're buying a new vehicle
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or used you know you always want to do a test drive used cars you're looking for maintenance
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issues you're looking for wear and tear and what kind of condition the vehicle is in one of the big
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things that i mentioned previously suspension you know hit some potholes try you know do some fast
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maneuvering see how the suspension handles it it's really sloppy or you know it's really bouncy
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that indicates that you're going to need some serious suspension work on the vehicle you're
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also going to want to check the transmission how it shifts so you're going to want to drive the
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thing from zero to preferably you'll want to find the highway you know get up to 80 miles an hour or
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so basically go through the gears and see how it and feel how the car is shifting a lot of times
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when transmissions go out what I've noticed on most vehicles is it goes out from first to second
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gear or first gear. I got two vehicles like that right now. So look for that. You also want to try
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to get the car at a cold start. You know if somebody's already been driving it around that's
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okay but it's definitely better to look at these things from a cold start. Transmissions usually do
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better once they've warmed up if you got a worn transmission. Engine issues you want to listen
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for any loud noises, any ticking, knocking of course. And of course, what's a car without brakes
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Hit the brakes hard at one or two stops. Check that the brakes are working effectively
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That you don't have to pump the brake all the way down to the floor to get it to stop
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And when you're braking, look for any shaking of the steering wheel, any shaking of the car
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one last little tidbit i know everybody says this but you know i got to throw it in there
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you know whenever you're looking at a used vehicle always negotiate you know it's any price you see
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is is going to be negotiable on a car so i hope this video helped y'all out if it did
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please like comment and subscribe y'all have a good one
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