Tips For Purchasing A Low-Cost Automobile
It all starts with the purchase of a car. Which car do you choose? Will it be a used car or a brand new car? Of course, the budget that you have is decisive for the choice of purchasing a car. But you can certainly save when buying a car. By the way, you can visit this site for a better understanding.
Save on car insurance
Are you going on the road in your car? Then you must have car insurance. Insurance comes in all shapes and sizes. Look and inquire about everything carefully before you take out insurance. Check all the rates of insurance companies and put them next to each other. Sometimes you can quickly save euros by switching to another insurance company. But be careful! Look carefully at the ‘small print’. Sometimes insurance companies indicate that they are the cheapest with car insurance, but what they do not say is that it is an entry fee and all other costs are added. They make the monthly insurance amount extra expensive. It is also possible that they state a basic rate without mentioning expensive costs that are charged if, for example, there is a need to recover from the insurance company in the event of damage. If necessary, get good advice from an independent advisor.
Save on car costs with the road tax
If you have a car, you pay road tax (also called motor vehicle tax). Here too you can easily save on costs! Pay attention to the weight of the car you are purchasing. The amount of road tax you have to pay on your car is calculated based on the weight of the car. If you have a very large car, it is probably also quite heavy. This means that the costs of road tax are automatically higher than when you buy a small light car. Please note: since 1 January 2010, a large number of cars with low CO2 emissions no longer have to pay road tax. There are differences in weight classes with regard to road tax. The Tax and Customs Administration has a tool where you can calculate how much motor vehicle tax you pay in your weight class. When purchasing a car, check whether you can fall under a certain class. This can save you as much as €100 per year, depending on your province and fuel type. Extra savings on road tax of a few euros can be achieved by paying the road tax in one go once a year instead of once a quarter.
Adjust your fueling behavior
One of the car costs that recur monthly, for some even weekly, is the petrol costs. How do you refuel smartly? Avoid refueling on Mondays; on other days of the week, there are more discounts, the ANWB reports in a survey from 2017. Most discounts are available on Sundays.
Watch your driving style
If we can easily save on car costs, it is driving behavior. With the following tips, you can easily save on the fuel consumption of your car! Driving evenly saves money. So try to break as little as possible (if this is possible of course) and let the car roll out more often. For example, if you see well in advance that you will have to wait for a traffic light or by taking bends less quickly. By letting the car roll out more and driving calmly in a traffic jam, you save a lot of fuel.
In addition, avoid driving in the center of cities. Because you regularly have to stand in front of a traffic light and accelerate again, you use a lot of fuel. This can save up to 20% in costs! Driving in the right gear can quickly reduce fuel consumption. The guideline is to drive in fourth gear at 50 km and shift to fifth gear at about 80 km. Drive as much as possible at a constant speed with a low RPM in the highest gear. You can see this perfectly on your meter in the dashboard.
Save on maintenance
Do you like to drive through? Try it a little less hard, which will easily save a few euros a month on maintenance such as tires, oil, brakes, etc. And… you will also arrive at your destination much more relaxed. 😉 Tips that can ensure that the costs of maintenance on your car remain as low as possible: Top up your oil, brake, and coolant yourself if necessary. It saves a lot of money (labor) by refilling it yourself and it saves fuel from the trip to the garage. In addition to labor costs, this also saves the cost of gasoline to drive to the garage. Don’t drive too fast. Driving fast causes tires to wear out faster. Also, try to break as little as possible at the last moment and very hard. The brakes wear much faster when you brake hard or at the last moment.
Share the car costs
A completely different way to save on your car costs, but certainly not too small, is: share the car costs. For example, go carpooling with your colleague more often and alternate this. And don’t you use your car that often? Use it as a shared car. This can be done through car-sharing companies or you can share it yourself with someone else. There is even shared car insurance for that, so you don’t get into trouble with insurance costs.