My story of buying a car in Australia

Unfortunately this isn't going to be one of those posts telling people about how satki my car is, and telling everyone how to buy a car since I bought one (and you can't because you are in Singapore, nyeh nyeh), neither is it a review of brands, etc. There are entire websites and blogs dedicated to this stuff such as caradvice.

Neither is it (fully) an article to gloat at Singaporeans that we can afford cheap cars. You can do the sums and figure out we can get a Toyota Prado brand new or a Porsche for what you pay for a Vios, just go to CarSales and compare the prices with SGCarmart.

 And obviously, tell me how I haven't calculated everything exactly to the last cent. Again, to make myself look smart and to make sure that my satki LSE Clementi education in economics, finance and accountancy didn't go to waste, here is a link to the definition of "materiality".

It is more my story about the things I had thought about when buying your Satki Black Vios. Basically, the type of shit that an arts graduate would blabber which has indirect relevance to your life and your thoughts. Organised, millennial style, into, what else but a listicle. And yes, its about me, my personality, and my thoughts. Me.

Just to save you the trouble of pointing out to me errors, the photos are generic photos taken from the web if you google the name of the car (keep up with the times old man) and obviously don't represent exactly the car I drove / drive. Did you really think I could be bothered to go and take pictures of my car every 5 minutes and post it on Facebook? I'm too busy taking photos of my breakfasts and sharing social media causes.

1. Choosing a car 

All of us agree that before we migrated, we all had a laugh about what car we said we were going to buy, and what we actually ended up buying. I, for one, started out in Singapore driving this:

The legendary Satki Black Vios 

Mostly funded by the FMB (Father Mother Bank)

I wanted a sports car that I could drive with one hand outside the window holding my Malboro Red and with chiobu XMM in passenger seat. Obviously, must be manual so when you shift gear can have the mmmm pssssst sound. So I moved from wanting to drive this:

The 2016 Ford Focus RS. 

or this: 

The legendary satki Subaru WRX with zhng spoiler, rims, etc.

To this:

A Volkswagen Golf R. 

or this: 

Takumi's legendary Toyota 86 for te-piaoing up and down the CTE, and the Monash Freeway.

I look somewhat like this in real life. 

I looked at my graduate paycheck and realised I didn't want to have a large mortgage on my car.

However after much deliberation, and careful asking around, and many test drives, and taking into consideration the wise words of Ris Low above, I ended up with this most satki beng mobile:

A 2005 Toyota Corolla wagon. 

For the following reasons:

• I'm too young for a midlife crisis 
• My car isn't going to get scratched / stolen 
• I can take my village around when they visit. Also useful for those road trips with multiple XMMs and XDDs. 
• And fit a fucking ladder, a pram, 2 cartons of beer and your XMM's shopping into it 
• I now have money to spend on more important things like smashed avo breakfasts and beer
• Low servicing costs 

You can almost feel the groan and the "I told you so" as this millennial gets a dose of reality. However, don't give up on your aspirations of owning the satki sports car or ute or whatever you've always wanted.

The fact is because cars here are so cheap, you can always buy two cars - one for commuting and one for comparing and showing off. You have higher purchasing power with your leftover income after paying for the car and associated expenses, so whatever you do with it, really depends on your priorities and whatever you think is important to you.


2. The purpose of the car, and as an extension of your identity 

You really have to go deep down and reflect what the purpose of the car is. Stereotypes on the type of cars people drive are usually true. Are you trying to solve one of the following:

• Needing to get to work 

• Needing to carry a village of people around on a regular basis (think kids)

• The classic male midlife crisis, easily solved by buying a red sports car

• Deep seated insecurities of your masculinity 

• A social media worthy automobile: 

Only you know the answer after much reflection. Choose a car that makes you happy and doesn't put you into crippling debt.

3. Finances 

Finances - the unfortunate reality, and usually the most interesting part of the conversation (sarcasm for those of you not so inclined, for which you shouldn't even be reading this. Go read an academic article). Finances (thriftiness) might have been a factor in choosing the fine example of automobile and motoring history I did.

The only things I find worth adding, apart from all the other stuff you can google or ask your friend who knows everything because he has bought a car are that you should consider:

The annual costs of running the car 
Think of the car costs as a yearly / annual cost of transport. You don't need to have a finance degree to know that the car isn't an asset, but annualising the costs gives you some visibility of what you're really spending.

I could draw a table but that would mean another 5 minutes before I get to my next beer, so the main factors to consider are the:

• Depreciation 
• Registration and other road taxes 
• Insurance
• Servicing 
• Finance costs if taking a loan

All of which should be considered on an per annum basis taking into consideration the expected lifespan of the car (or how long you intend to keep the car). There's also leasing and other options, which there are entire blogs written on, so google it.

Essentially, its the same as owning a car in Singapore, with the key difference being that the cars get scrapped after 10 years, so the focus shifts to the mileage of the odometer (rather than how many years of COE the car left), and an incentive to keep the car well serviced as a 10 year old car is still easily in good shape.

Happy driving!