buying a car in the philippines

For the price your paying, its going to be an older car. Any used car less than 5 years is well maintained as the cost is so high. When I go for servicing my Ford, the service bay is packed.

Beware of cars imported from Japan. These would have been right hand drives and will be switched to left at the port. The work can be spotty and they often dont fix the lights and such which will aim more to the left.

I have several friends (expats) that all bought Suzuki vans and never had a problem with them.  if you maintain it, it should last for several years.. and you can even get all your money back when its time to sell it if it still looks good

Thats fine. Just make sure your mechanic checks out the steerage linkage and all if the conversion was done in the Philippines. If in Japan, then work done is better.

ok.. good advice. thanks 

Hi. Since we are in same area. Maybe u would consider my supplier. They sell only good condition with lowest price. No disappointment coz this guys value their clients and especially the company name. Let me know if u want to take a look.

sure, id love to but im in cdo, not manila

We were also warned by nearly everyone we spoke with about buying a car from other than a dealer. After checking into a few local listings we understood why. Problems with registration, shiny but in horrible mechanical condition, mileage changed, etc. 
So we reluctantly agreed to abide by the advice of those who have spent a lifetime here, (how wise of us eh), and we started checking dealers in the area for used vehicles and texting the LTO site with the plate number for problems. We had a few locals recommend a dealer in Imus (close to home), and we went looking after researching and asking mechanics, family and friends for car suggestions. We were told by a few mechanics that their list was for passenger vehicles. 1. Toyota  2. Honda and 3. Mitsubishi depending on the model and age and engine. The Toyota per mechanics was the most reliable overall and parts were very easy to come by and less expensive than Honda and Mitsubishi and down the line. We checked numerous websites and blogs and they seemed to confirm what the mechanics had told us.
Knowing that a dealer is adding his percentage to the cost, we went to the recommended one and found a Toyota Altis G 1.8L that was owned by the owners/mechanics wife and went through it with a fine tooth comb, they even offered to put it on the lift for us!.  It had 46K on the odometer and his wife after having a couple of children not was trading up to an Innova to accommodate the larger family.  We took it on a 2 hour test drive and drove the heck out of it and came back satisfied. Let the dealing begin.  Asking price for this 2005 was P455,000, no way.  Two days later and after a number of texts we settled on P370,000 and they took care of the registration and insurance. That was about four months ago and the car is running great and the mechanic/previous owner also will be doing the service work if needed.
The Toyota dealer is also about 15 minutes away if needed.

Long winded, but sometimes the details seem to help in a large transaction. Just my two cents worth.

With regard to the Suzuki van or Multicab.  They also get a high rating at a great price. We needed an automatic for my wife and the car fits a couple more people than the multicab.  The van is great but no AC and most of us are a little old for the heat in a van.

Jim and Terry
Silang Cavite

Yep, that's some good advice right there! Thank you sir!