Plan B Advice: New to buy a car | SUV/MUV ?

[agentsmith2]

Thanks people. I'm just too burned-out haggling with the workshop, dealing with my insurance company and trying to get honda on phone :-/

If I may ask - can anyone throw some tubelight on the prices as well ? For Safari, Pajero, mHawk and Captiva maybe ?

My driving needs - drive a LOT. Drive Mumbai-Pune and around. I'd say 5000 KM per month.

Having said that, my choice of car is purely based on driving pleasure and NOW - the A.S.S. After Sales Service. Now, whether TATA has a good A.S.S [no pun] or HM[Hindustan Motors sucks?] we need to figure out.

Originally Posted by snaronikar

Pls inform us how much it has run. The vehicle price also depends on how many kms it has run. For more details you can go through the used car price thread here or carewale.com

About 50,000 KMs.

Thanks!

[cooldude1988765]

If you drive a lot you would need a car that is extremely reliable. AFAIK safari and scorpio are not very reliable ( Before supporters start bashing me : I have my opinion which is based on vehicles owned by friends and family and i am entitled to an opinion) Not too sure of endy, vitara and pajero though.
I suggest you wait for the toyota fortuner . Otherwise Innova is an excellent choice if you dont mind the looks and the lack of 4x4

[suzuki san]

Originally Posted by cooldude1988765

If you drive a lot you would need a car that is extremely reliable. AFAIK safari and scorpio are not very reliable ( Before supporters start bashing me : I have my opinion which is based on vehicles owned by friends and family and i am entitled to an opinion) Not too sure of endy, vitara and pajero though.
I suggest you wait for the toyota fortuner . Otherwise Innova is an excellent choice if you dont mind the looks and the lack of 4x4

I would tend to agree with cooldude. I also have a friend who has a 2 year old Scorpio Crde. Has had quite a few problems with it. Has also had to wait for spare parts for a week........Hello!!!!!!!!! I thought this was Made in India????

[flyingspur]

If this thread is still serving it's purpose, the new Captiva Automatic AWD is displayed at the Autocar Performance Show and will be available in January. What's new is exactly what the name suggests. Automatic and AWD. 1.5 lacs premium over the regular Captiva. Pictures tomorrow.

[sudev]

Is the AWD captiva only for display? AFAIK they are only selling 2wdrive.

[kuttapan]

Originally Posted by agentsmith2

My driving needs - drive a LOT. Drive Mumbai-Pune and around. I'd say 5000 KM per month.

Having said that, my choice of car is purely based on driving pleasure and NOW - the A.S.S. After Sales Service. Now, whether TATA has a good A.S.S [no pun] or HM[Hindustan Motors sucks?] we need to figure out.

I was going to say CRV and then I remembered that Honda is out of the equation. Does Hyundai still sell the Tucson? If yes, try it.

Safari and Scorpio - With so much driving involved, will they be spending more time at the A.S.S, is the question.

That leaves the Pajero, Captiva and the Endeavour . Take your pick.

Why not the Innova V version?

[flyingspur]

Originally Posted by sudev

Is the AWD captiva only for display? AFAIK they are only selling 2wdrive.

As I mentioned in my previous post, it's slated for a January '09 launch. AWD and Automatic for 1.5 lac premium.

[agentsmith2]

Guys, thanks. My now FD'd money is waiting for Fortuner to show up. If Toyota shows up early, I'll break the bank. If not - the longer the wait, the better interest I get. Sad as it may seem, I win on both counts.

[agentsmith2]

Another point: I've learned this lesson that no matter how good or bad a car looks, the single most important factor one should look for is A.S.S and the reliability of a machine.

Look around the posts: We've found Honda, Skoda, Mahindra, Tatas, Fords [even Passat and Merc] - all showing up low on reliability or after sales service. I think we need to do a straw poll. But even without that, I'm pretty much sure Maruti and Toyota don't figure at the bottom of that list. So purely on A.S.S and reliability:

Mahindra Scorpio: No
Tata Safari: Double No
Ford Endy: No

Right/Wrong ?
Let more people come out and share their A.S.S. experience.

[sudev]

Agree with you agentsmith - aside :do you work for MI5?? ;-)

Alphabetically Hyundai. Maruti and Toyota A.S.S. are best in business. One of main reason why I chose Grand Vitara instead of Captiva. Had bad experience with GM and Ford A.S.S. Endy i did not like - dated looks and heavy.

[raj_5004]

tata, mahindra will never come close to the after sales service what toyota delivers, my personal experience. so if that is your prioroty, in india, toyota is the best. watch out for expensive spares though.

[Raja]

I also feel that your experience with dealers will vary from city to city. Overall reliability is one thing, but you might find a good dealer for a particular brand that's excellent.
Amey speaks very highly of the Mitsubishi dealer in Pune (J Williams, Camp), while others might have had a bad experience with HM dealers in other cities.
I personally had a bad experience with the Mercedes dealer in Pune. When I went to buy a Mercedes, they were not interested in giving me test drives. I felt that if they can't be bothered to sell me a car, how will there service department look after me afterwards? I personally have found the Mitsubishi dealer very welcoming (still haven't bought anything from them) every time I go to see a new model released.
Maruti dealers all very interested in selling me the Grand Vitara when launched. Lots of follow up calls.
Honda dealer never bothered to follow up if I wanted to buy a car.
Toyota dealer never bothered to follow up if I wanted to buy a car.
Ford dealer in Yerwada made lots of follow up calls to sell me a car (read in forum of bad things about them, but just giving my initial sales experience)
Please not all the above a initial sales experience and NOT service experiences in Pune.
If I was looking to buy a car right now, I would head first to the Mitsubishi dealer and feel if I would be comfortable with them. PM Amey and he will be more than happy to give you his experiences or even better, come to one of our regular meets and get first hand knowledge, straight from the owners.

[raj_5004]

hey but i also think that benz are premium cars are they have their niche target customers hence they decline to give TDs unless and until they are cnvinced that you are really interested to buy their product. same happened to me when i went for a TD of the opel vectra! whereas the TD of the sail was easily available.
toyotas and hondas are already selling their cars well, hence their casual approach towards you. its not the same in the case of ford, they desperately want to move the cars...

[Raja]

@raj 5004: You have a very valid point, it's just that I did end up buying a Mercedes! (Bad case of judging a book by it's cover.)
Last year when the market was booming, dealers never paid attention to customer service because they know there is another customer around the corner. Now that the market is falling, focus on customer service and retention should become first priority for dealers. Agentsmith2 is a great example of how lack of customer care means he will probably never buy another Honda again and probably tell all his friends/family of his bad experience.

[agentsmith2]

Originally Posted by sudev

Agree with you agentsmith - aside :do you work for MI5?? ;-)

You're confusing Smith to Bond. That's Matrix Agent Smith works for - not MI5. Having said that, I'm #2 - #1 is now officially dead.

Alphabetically Hyundai. Maruti and Toyota A.S.S. are best in business. One of main reason why I chose Grand Vitara instead of Captiva. Had bad experience with GM and Ford A.S.S. Endy i did not like - dated looks and heavy.

I'm interested in knowing more about Grand Vitara. I saw a 2009 version in Singapore and it looked awesome!


I'm not quite sure why Suzuki doesn't market this well in India.