Going around a few car dealers on Monday to try and find a used car for my partner, something like a Suzuki Swift or Toyota Yaris. Besides telltale signs of rust, what areas of the body or electrics should I be looking at?

If everything works and the carpets are not soggy then its probably ok.

33 minutes ago, giddyup said:

Going around a few car dealers on Monday to try and find a used car for my partner, something like a Suzuki Swift or Toyota Yaris. Besides telltale signs of rust, what areas of the body or electrics should I be looking at?

Don't buy from a tent. Buy from the manufacturer, they are certified, they have been checked, they come with a warranty.

Toyota Sure is Toyota's official used car outlet. You can search by model, by year, by mileage, by location, by price etc.

https://www.toyotasure.com/home

Other brands like Honda also have certified second hand cars. I don't think Suzuki do.

Honda certified: https://usedcar.honda.co.th/

I repeat, do NOT buy from a tent, they can't be trusted. Only buy certified or from a private seller.

28 minutes ago, josephbloggs said:

Don't buy from a tent. Buy from the manufacturer, they are certified, they have been checked, they come with a warranty.

Toyota Sure is Toyota's official used car outlet. You can search by model, by year, by mileage, by location, by price etc.

https://www.toyotasure.com/home

Other brands like Honda also have certified second hand cars. I don't think Suzuki do.

Honda certified: https://usedcar.honda.co.th/

I repeat, do NOT buy from a tent, they can't be trusted. Only buy certified or from a private seller.

My partner has just had a look at some reviews on Pantip.com and toyota.sure doesn't do too well, more bad reviews than good.

56 minutes ago, giddyup said:

My partner has just had a look at some reviews on Pantip.com and toyota.sure doesn't do too well, more bad reviews than good.

I looked at the posts on pantip from 2025 to 2018  majority of them were postive for toyota.sure although they all did state that the price will be higher than a tent

They offer different certifications such as 

Certified 5Y number of cars 285

Certified 12Y number of cars 144

Certified Gold number of cars 3

Certified 12Y+ number of cars 4

Your partner should be able to tell you the differences between each type of certifications

https://www.toyotasure.com/promotion/surecertifiedbytoyota

2 hours ago, giddyup said:

Going around a few car dealers on Monday to try and find a used car for my partner, something like a Suzuki Swift or Toyota Yaris. Besides telltale signs of rust, what areas of the body or electrics should I be looking at?

If you don’t have the experience of what to look for then find a vehicle with a full service record with no gaps. Also most vehicles that are under ten years old will have an insurance claim if it was damaged and you can run the vin number to see if any claims were made.

1 hour ago, giddyup said:

My partner has just had a look at some reviews on Pantip.com and toyota.sure doesn't do too well, more bad reviews than good.

Ok, well I have never used them, so no first hand experience, but generally they are supposed to be trustworthy.

Anyway, up to you. 

There are sellers that make a living cleaning & selling flooded vehicles.....Unless you have the ability to pull a door panel to examine the "well" area of the door beware of tent sellers & auction vehicles.....

In Chiang Mai the auction lot fills up with cars like clockwork 2-3 weeks after large flooded areas are in the news....

The carpet in a car that has been flooded smells like a wet dog. Though this is not your only worry when buying a used Thai car! As a former motor trader and car salesman I am amazed at the things I have seen here. Take someone with you who really knows about cars. 

On 11/1/2025 at 6:40 PM, novacova said:

If you don’t have the experience of what to look for then find a vehicle with a full service record with no gaps. Also most vehicles that are under ten years old will have an insurance claim if it was damaged and you can run the vin number to see if any claims were made.

do you have a link to the Thai website to run a VIN on ?

On 11/4/2025 at 3:38 PM, DaRoadrunner said:

The carpet in a car that has been flooded smells like a wet dog. Though this is not your only worry when buying a used Thai car! As a former motor trader and car salesman I am amazed at the things I have seen here. Take someone with you who really knows about cars. 

Mine got flooded inside years back. Just took it to a detailer and got it fully cleaned out. Good as new. So its more to do with how the car was treated after being in water. And Im sure a LOT of cars in bkk have been in this situation. I remember a coworker who also got her vios flooded and never bothered to get the carpet cleaner. A nutter. She used to come to work for 2 month and the glass was always foggy lol Those are the cars to avoid. Just pull up the carpet. 

On 11/1/2025 at 9:14 PM, pgrahmm said:

There are sellers that make a living cleaning & selling flooded vehicles.....Unless you have the ability to pull a door panel to examine the "well" area of the door beware of tent sellers & auction vehicles.....

In Chiang Mai the auction lot fills up with cars like clockwork 2-3 weeks after large flooded areas are in the news....

Pulling out the seat belt all the way can also expose a flooded car.

On 11/1/2025 at 4:22 PM, giddyup said:

Going around a few car dealers on Monday to try and find a used car for my partner, something like a Suzuki Swift or Toyota Yaris. Besides telltale signs of rust, what areas of the body or electrics should I be looking at?

Get a hold of an old speaker magnet wrap cloth around it so as not to scratch the cars duco and run it over all the likely places that would have rust magnets won't attach to anywhere that's been bogged.... Check for flooding... Use your nose, the smell of a flooded car is something you don't forget

On 11/4/2025 at 3:38 PM, DaRoadrunner said:

The carpet in a car that has been flooded smells like a wet dog. Though this is not your only worry when buying a used Thai car! As a former motor trader and car salesman I am amazed at the things I have seen here. Take someone with you who really knows about cars. 

There's nothing like some hardwood sawdust put into an automatic gearbox to tighten the belts up

First I’d open the trunk and you pull back that little not really carpet but whatever you call it on the side of the trunks and if you see water levels on there you know there’s flood damage also I’m not sure where you’re in Thailand but I don’t like Chiang Mai They have auctions every week and you can usually get a very good deal

On 11/6/2025 at 12:32 AM, DavisH said:

Mine got flooded inside years back. Just took it to a detailer and got it fully cleaned out. Good as new. So its more to do with how the car was treated after being in water. And Im sure a LOT of cars in bkk have been in this situation.

 

Mine was flooded not long after we bought it new, back in the epic 2011 Bangkok floods. The water level was over the transmission tunnel, so the transmission was completely replaced, along with a few other things. Off the road for nearly six months, covered by insurance. It runs perfectly fine to this day. 

 

On 11/4/2025 at 7:38 PM, DaRoadrunner said:

The carpet in a car that has been flooded smells like a wet dog.

 

I think most people with flooded cars that aren't junkers would get them cleaned professionally.  I had a car years ago that didn't have good rust protection. Every time it rained, it smelled off, but it wasn't worth it, getting all the work that needed to be done, so I drove it until I could afford to buy something better. If it isn't a very old car, then I think most people would get flood damage sorted out under insurance. Cars that get fully submerged, if they are insured, may get written off if they aren't worth the cost of repair.

 

My experience in Thailand is cars don't get written off as easily as in the West. I did get taken to a very interesting, out-of-the-way repair shop once where the cars they were repairing would have been 100% written off anywhere else. I think the low Thai labor costs must have made it viable. They were cars I would not have wanted to buy, destined for the tents, I guess.

19 minutes ago, VR333 said:

My experience in Thailand is cars don't get written off as easily as in the West. I did get taken to a very interesting, out-of-the-way repair shop once where the cars they were repairing would have been 100% written off anywhere else. I think the low Thai labor costs must have made it viable. They were cars I would not have wanted to buy, destined for the tents, I guess.

Many years ago a bought a brand new Subaru Impreza WRX. I'd had it a week, still on red plates. I was stationary waiting to turn right in to my condo when I was rear ended at high speed by a pickup truck (driven by a drunk). It was shunted up the road and spun 180 degrees, and completely crushed the back half of the car. I had been to Villa and put the shopping on the floor behind the front seats. I had cans of tomatoes in there which were crushed. My stereo ended up in the back seat. 

Unbelievably they wouldn't write it off. It was off the road for eight months, it was tied up by chains to a machine that slowly, millimetre by millimetre, stretched the core chassis out over a period of weeks. I couldn't believe it, but there was nothing I could do. 

On 11/1/2025 at 6:40 PM, novacova said:

If you don’t have the experience of what to look for then find a vehicle with a full service record with no gaps. Also most vehicles that are under ten years old will have an insurance claim if it was damaged and you can run the vin number to see if any claims were made.

Been here a while never heard a VIN could be used to find past claims. @novacova more information or details on this would be helpful. Tks

5 minutes ago, oceanbluejewell said:

Been here a while never heard a VIN could be used to find past claims. @novacova more information or details on this would be helpful. Tks

Take the vin to an insurance company and then run it, or take it to a different car dealer and pay them to run it for you.  Or if buying from a dealer, have them run it while you watch the results on their computer screen.