How to Buy a Used Auto

Get an Advantage...

We have been doing dialogues for our customers on how to buy a used auto, how to find one, and more important how to get good value, and an advantage.

Step 1

In most cases this process starts with finding a used auto that suits your specific parameters, and budget...How to Find a Pre Owned Vehicle. 

Step 2

What can the Internet do for you...Internet and Cars.

Step 3

The all important "What Price to Pay"...Prices of Pre Owned.

Most individuals stop after Step 3 believing they have done all the due diligence that they need to do, and hopefully get a used vehicle at a good price. These 3 steps made imminent sense a few years ago. The reality in 2007 is that you are just starting, there are a few additional steps to get an advantage.

Step 4

How to make sure that you get good value...Value and Cars...and...Strada Value.

Step 5

What is reconditioning...Reconditioning.

Step 6

What is maintenance...Maintenance.

Step 7

What are warranties...Warranties.

By doing a few additional steps you will have an improved understanding of how much value and peace of mind you are receiving from your purchase. You will also have a better position to alleviate your skepticism.

Step 8

How do you do a deal...The Transaction.

The preceding will make the process easier in your search and purchase of a used vehicle.

You have a question, get in touch with us, or leave us a comment, its that easy.

If you want to explore additional points that will give you an Advantage.

A - How do you empower yourself as a customer...Empowered Customer.

Transparency

We have mentioned transparency on a few occasions, we have also mentioned that technology is still effecting changes in the way used used vehicles are transacted. 

We have also talked about the "stories" or "urban legends" that most people know something about, and ultimately know very little.

Technology: 

Makes it possible to transact on a wholesale or retail level vehicles literally across Canada. Histories, accident reports, lien checks are only a few key strokes away. Toronto being the largest automotive market in Canada, numerous vehicles make their way to Toronto.

Its similar to sports cars moving south during the winter months in the US, and then moving north during the summer months.

Vehicles come in and go out of Toronto, technology enables this movement of vehicles, and makes it very transparent for all concerned.

At Strada all our vehicles have a record of their "provenance", which we share with you. Needless to tell you that we could easily get vehicles with a questionable "provenance", we don't get involved with these vehicles.

If a dealer cannot or will not show you the "provenance" of a vehicle, we suggest that you step back.

Urban Legends:

We are on our third generation in the automotive business, we have our own data base of "urban legends" going back many years.

With the technology that is available today, with vehicles that have balance of warranty, and we always bring our vehicles to the respective franchised dealer. Be assured that the vast majority of these urban legends are just that urban legends.

The exception is usually the case of someone knowing better, and for whatever reason preferring to go into denial mode. It goes like this " I heard about this xyz legend, or the friend of the friend got caught with this other abc".

We understand your concern, we understand your skepticism, but we would urge you to realise that technology has put most of these urban legends out of business. We surely cannot tell you how to or what to think, and we cannot tell you how others think or behave either.

The one thing we can tell you is that if you do business with Strada we make it easy for you, and we have all the provenance records on our vehicles.

Transparency:

There is an old saying "If you want to understand the other person, try walking in their shoes for a few kilometers" its also called empathy.

We have been in the automotive business long enough, and we have been dealing with the vehicles that we sell long enough to understand the expectations, and concerns of our customers. We constantly strive to make it easy, timely, respectful, transparent for all our customers.

If you are not comfortable with the transparency that a dealer is showing you, we suggest that you step back.

We deal with our customers, in the same fashion that we would expect to be dealt with.

As you can appreciate transparency is mutual, often prospective customers are quite opaque in their thinking. This opaqueness clouds their decision process, and becomes their biggest enemy in concluding a productive transaction.

Saving Money

We did a dialogue on how we save you money, and thought that we should include it in our How to Buy a Used Auto series.

Here is our dialogue on Saving Money.

Certified

On several occasions we have dialogued about the quality and reliability of used cars, and more important our philosophy and how we see the world at Strada.

If you are seeking specific points of our dialogues use the search feature, which is very helpful and will save you time.

We urge you to take a few minutes of your time and read this informative article from the New York Times...Certified.