One of the difficulties of owning a foreign car is the repairing of damage to the body and engine. It is very true that many different countries have very different standards for building vehicles, and that the United States is not the best at following the guidelines that a lot of the rest of the world follows. So if you are someone who has been unfortunate enough to be on the receiving end of a car accident but are not sure who to go to when getting your car fixed, might we make the suggestion of looking at places that specialize in fixing foreign cars, like ourselves.

Let’s say that you make the decision to go to a standard auto center that deals in all sorts of cars. Sure you might get lucky and get a tech who knows a thing or two about the foreign standards, but the likelihood of that happening is rather rare. Many techs in this industry, unfortunately, see all cars as the same and do not differentiate between foreign and domestic cars, with the exception that they have to use a metric wrench set instead of the American system. In reality there are a lot of differences that can make a big difference in how your vehicle performs. Don’t believe me? Well take a moment to think about the types of cars that you see in places like Europe, china, and Japan. What do you see? You see small cars that are very gas efficient, and sometimes ones that run on alternate (and I use that phrase lightly) fuels like diesel and natural gas. These true “compact cars” are much more confined in how they are built because of the limited amount of space that they have to work with. This means that if the tech who is working on your car is not familiar with how to get to specific parts of the car, they might end up causing more damage than was there to start with since it’s so hard to get to some of the parts.

Now, I’m not going to say that all of the time parts are crammed together because of a lack of space. If my mustang has taught me anything, it’s that sometimes the designers just come up with bad designs and things get crammed together. Granted this is a domestic vehicle, but those design flaws can be found in both domestic and foreign vehicles. That is not an American accident, that is just human error coming into play. Sometimes things go wrong and there is no room to make something work. So instead of scrapping the whole design, which would cost hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars, they simply put it in as best they can and go from there. I don’t really blame them for doing that honestly, but sometimes it is designed to be tight on purpose, and that right there is where it comes in handy to have someone who really knows their way around a foreign vehicle.

One thing people will say is that owning a foreign car is expensive. So much so that it’s almost to the point of not being worth purchasing because you will spend more on repairing it than you will just enjoying what it has to offer. Well, that that we must say that we both agree and disagree with that statement. We agree that owning and repairing a foreign car is a bit more expensive than a domestic should something happen. This is true though only because of the shipping costs that are associated with getting the correct parts overseas. We completely disagree with the point however that it is to the point where it is not worth owning one. Foreign cars that you can purchase here are often luxurious and filled with unique abilities. Sure they are a tad more expensive to repair, but the value that you get out of driving one of these machines makes that risk worth it. Plus depending on the car that you choose it’s likely that the gas mileage is going to be higher because of the crazy gas prices overseas.

So overall we must say that you have some choices to make when owning a foreign car. You need to choose where you would like to have your car repaired so that you get the best deal, and you need to choose the best car for your situation so that you do not feel like it is going to be a burden on you later down the road. These however are true of owning almost any car regardless of where it comes from. So, all in all you could say that owning a foreign car is a very personal choice that is a little more expensive with some serious benefits depending on the model. Just be a smart shopper and do your homework before buying one. Know what you are getting into and that there is the possibility of more expensive repairs should something unfortunate happen. Being wise will be your best friend and your guide to owning and buying a foreign vehicle.