Secondhand Hyundais

[mallmagician]

Im looking to buy a cheap runaround soon, and looking at the cars available here in Chiang Mai, I note that mid 90's Hyundais (E.G - The Excel) can be picked up from 50,000 baht upto about 100,000 baht. The ones I've looked at seem to be good runners, and in good condition for the year.

I just can't get my head around why they are so cheap here compared to a similar powered and aged Toyota Corolla/Corona, which would set me back about twice the price. E.g. The Toyota equivalent would be 100-200k whereas the Hyundai seem to be 50k-100k.

Are Hyundais just disliked by Thais? Or are they notoriously expensive here to fix compared to Toyota? or what?

I have owned Hyundais in the past, and I think they are pretty reliable cars.

Thanks

[canuckamuck]

I picked up a 93 Excel about 4 years ago, It works great and has needed only minor repairs.

If you don't care what the Thais think, the Hyundais are good value.

Hard to sell though.

[mallmagician]

Thanks for that. Yes, I think you're probably right.

Then you see Daihatsu Mira's for the same money that are falling apart, and the thai's fall over themselves to buy them. I know they're economical, but there seems to be some strange market trends here in LOS.

The Corsa's here are also a good price for Thailand - possibly similar reasons.

Cheers

[canuckamuck]

I heard that if you stuck wheels on a turd and stamped it with a Honda or a Toyota logo you could probably find a buyer here

[mallmagician]

Hehe :-) as I thought. I will stick with my gut and buy Hyundai :-)

[wildoates]

you are correct, they are stuck on a name, cause they see it on TV so it must be so. they are just now coming around to Ford,

[katabeachbum]

you are correct, they are stuck on a name, cause they see it on TV so it must be so. they are just now coming around to Ford,

for old cheap cars they are also stuck in the availabiilty of spare parts. Hyundai wasnt present in LOS for a decade, 1997 to 2007 as I recall (BTW are they gone again?), so spareparts can be expensive and hard to find.

here in Phuket its hard to get more than 29k baht for any Hyundai model older than 10 years

[mallmagician]

Ah, now that would be a bit of a spanner in the works (Excuse the pun).

Then again, I could always buy two, and have one for spares, given the price.

If anyone in Phuket wants to sell their Hyundai, I'll offer 30,000, plus 5,000 to drive it to Chiang Mai for me.

[canuckamuck]

You can get repairs in Chiang Mai, but it is more of a challenge.

Early 90's Hyundais are going for about 60k baht here in Chiang Mai, I think I will go to phuket and get one of those 30k units and sell it here.

[kartman]

Lots of mechanical bits same as circa 90's Mitsubishi but not necessary obvious model ie Elantra struts from Galant not Lancer just need to find garage/spares shop that knows whats what (probably of Chinese decent ). Trim parts source would have to be S/H.

[jackjones]

There is a guy in Chiangmai who specialises in Hyundais. Apparently he is an ex head mechanic from when they had the dealership here. I have a few friends who have Hyundais and they can get spare parts and any work done with no problems and from what they said the prices sounded reasonable.

[champken]

Just a suggestion for a cheap runabout, the Nissan NV is a great little run around and cheap enough for spare parts, you should be able to pick one of those up for under 100k

[LeCharivari]

Not only are Hyundai spares expensive compared to Toyota and Honda, but there are very few "copy" parts available. They're cheaper to buy because they're more expensive to maintain. Even the Thais know that!

[mallmagician]

Thanks everyone for the input.

The NV would have been a choice, but we are trying for a baby, and we need a car with a back seat that can take a baby seat, so the NV is no good for us really.

The Hyundais are really very cheap compared to the equivalent Toyota/Honda, so unless something catastrophic happens, I reckon that as good as cancels out the cheaper Toymota/Honda bits. Sounds like there are a few Hyundai specialists in CM, so thats good.

If anyone has any information for Hyundai mechanics in Chiang Mai, that would be good to know.

Thanks

[notbritish]

if you're gonna get yourself a old hyundai, try to get an elantra instead of excel, much much better car and the 360 view is impressive. I had one when i was 18 and wow could you see perfectly behind you and on the side when you park/check your angles

[culicine]

Thanks everyone for the input.

The NV would have been a choice, but we are trying for a baby, and we need a car with a back seat that can take a baby seat, so the NV is no good for us really.

The Hyundais are really very cheap compared to the equivalent Toyota/Honda, so unless something catastrophic happens, I reckon that as good as cancels out the cheaper Toymota/Honda bits. Sounds like there are a few Hyundai specialists in CM, so thats good.

If anyone has any information for Hyundai mechanics in Chiang Mai, that would be good to know.

Thanks

The NV also comes as a wagon. Was just browsing a Thai website and saw a nice one for 150K. A few posters have owned an NV and they sound like good solid vehicles. Performance is OK as they don't weight a lot. Search on TV and you can find some threads on them.

[mallmagician]

Thanks for the tips folks. Will keep an eye out for NV wagons, and the Elantra too.

Cheers

[thunder30101]

I have a 97 accent, no problems getting any parts for it and not expensive either contrary to what some may say. I paid 30k for it with a little over 100 km best buy in thailand I ever made, runs great gets good mileage. Sorry but the thais dont know squat about cars.

[ignis]

No idea what there like, or how many there are up there, around where I live there a number of CHRYSLER NEON's driving around and For Sale seen many 1996 - 1998 for under 100k + they have ABS + Airbags as standard

[WarpSpeed]

No idea what there like, or how many there are up there, around where I live there a number of CHRYSLER NEON's driving around and For Sale seen many 1996 - 1998 for under 100k + they have ABS + Airbags as standard

Neons are a solid car and come standard with a 2.0l engine too. We considered getting one and almost did were it not for the fact that I knew from going through it that it had been under water previously and they were trying to hide that from me...

That is something that you need to be cautious of too with all of the recent floods both north and south and the past tsunami of which there are still plenty of cars floating around pardon the pun..

Fortunately that pointed me towards SEATs and that's what we bought and we love it. It is VW under the skin with Spanish styling and more features then offered VW's here which would be cost even more while the SEAT Cordoba's are in your price range too. Quite a few of them around too..

JFYI the SEATs have 1.8l engines and weigh about 300lbs less then a similar Vento for example with the same engine and there are quite a few with LP installed and those engines are all but bullet proof so they hold up well against LP damage, so a good compromise all around..

Edited April 13, 2011 by WarpSpeed

[katabeachbum]

No idea what there like, or how many there are up there, around where I live there a number of CHRYSLER NEON's driving around and For Sale seen many 1996 - 1998 for under 100k + they have ABS + Airbags as standard

Neons are a solid car and come standard with a 2.0l engine too. We considered getting one and almost did were it not for the fact that I knew from going through it that it had been under water previously and they were trying to hide that from me...

That is something that you need to be cautious of too with all of the recent floods both north and south and the past tsunami of which there are still plenty of cars floating around pardon the pun..

Fortunately that pointed me towards SEATs and that's what we bought and we love it. It is VW under the skin with Spanish styling and more features then offered VW's here which would be cost even more while the SEAT Cordoba's are in your price range too. Quite a few of them around too..

JFYI the SEATs have 1.8l engines and weigh about 300lbs less then a similar Vento for example with the same engine and there are quite a few with LP installed and those engines are all but bullet proof so they hold up well against LP damage, so a good compromise all around..

SEAT Cordoba/Ibiza is 300 pound or so lighter than VW Jetta, as they are based on the much smaller VW Polo platform. have you seen any Cordoba estate here? they are really cool small estates, and would be fun with 1,8/125 hp

neon is rather fast with its 2,0 136?hp, but as Chrysler diappeared from LOS more than a decade ago, parts arent that easy. I know the Cherokee guys struggle with availability and prices for parts

Sorry missd your edit from Jetta to Vento. Cordoba still based on the smaller Polo platform tho

[WarpSpeed]

No idea what there like, or how many there are up there, around where I live there a number of CHRYSLER NEON's driving around and For Sale seen many 1996 - 1998 for under 100k + they have ABS + Airbags as standard

Neons are a solid car and come standard with a 2.0l engine too. We considered getting one and almost did were it not for the fact that I knew from going through it that it had been under water previously and they were trying to hide that from me...

That is something that you need to be cautious of too with all of the recent floods both north and south and the past tsunami of which there are still plenty of cars floating around pardon the pun..

Fortunately that pointed me towards SEATs and that's what we bought and we love it. It is VW under the skin with Spanish styling and more features then offered VW's here which would be cost even more while the SEAT Cordoba's are in your price range too. Quite a few of them around too..

JFYI the SEATs have 1.8l engines and weigh about 300lbs less then a similar Vento for example with the same engine and there are quite a few with LP installed and those engines are all but bullet proof so they hold up well against LP damage, so a good compromise all around..

SEAT Cordoba/Ibiza is 300 pound or so lighter than VW Jetta, as they are based on the much smaller VW Polo platform. have you seen any Cordoba estate here? they are really cool small estates, and would be fun with 1,8/125 hp

neon is rather fast with its 2,0 136?hp, but as Chrysler diappeared from LOS more than a decade ago, parts arent that easy. I know the Cherokee guys struggle with availability and prices for parts

Sorry missd your edit from Jetta to Vento. Cordoba still based on the smaller Polo platform tho

Yeah that parts issue was a concern for myself too, I figured in a pinch though I could possibly import if it was a last resort, the price was tempting enough to account for it..Few packages here with those features offered in that price range..

Haven't seen anything here but the Cordoba sedans, the Toledos and Alhambras, being from the states we don't have SEAT so I never considered them previously and I wish I had I never would have bought anything else ..

JFYI Polo is the new Golf, meaning they've all moved up..

[katabeachbum]

No idea what there like, or how many there are up there, around where I live there a number of CHRYSLER NEON's driving around and For Sale seen many 1996 - 1998 for under 100k + they have ABS + Airbags as standard

Neons are a solid car and come standard with a 2.0l engine too. We considered getting one and almost did were it not for the fact that I knew from going through it that it had been under water previously and they were trying to hide that from me...

That is something that you need to be cautious of too with all of the recent floods both north and south and the past tsunami of which there are still plenty of cars floating around pardon the pun..

Fortunately that pointed me towards SEATs and that's what we bought and we love it. It is VW under the skin with Spanish styling and more features then offered VW's here which would be cost even more while the SEAT Cordoba's are in your price range too. Quite a few of them around too..

JFYI the SEATs have 1.8l engines and weigh about 300lbs less then a similar Vento for example with the same engine and there are quite a few with LP installed and those engines are all but bullet proof so they hold up well against LP damage, so a good compromise all around..

SEAT Cordoba/Ibiza is 300 pound or so lighter than VW Jetta, as they are based on the much smaller VW Polo platform. have you seen any Cordoba estate here? they are really cool small estates, and would be fun with 1,8/125 hp

neon is rather fast with its 2,0 136?hp, but as Chrysler diappeared from LOS more than a decade ago, parts arent that easy. I know the Cherokee guys struggle with availability and prices for parts

Sorry missd your edit from Jetta to Vento. Cordoba still based on the smaller Polo platform tho

Yeah that parts issue was a concern for myself too, I figured in a pinch though I could possibly import if it was a last resort, the price was tempting enough to account for it..Few packages here with those features offered in that price range..

Haven't seen anything here but the Cordoba sedans, the Toledos and Alhambras, being from the states we don't have SEAT so I never considered them previously and I wish I had I never would have bought anything else ..

JFYI Polo is the new Golf, meaning they've all moved up..

SEAT must have done a good job while they where here, as I see quiet a few SEAT Alhambra around, but none of its siblings/clones VW Sharan or Ford Galaxy

[ignis]

There are 3 VW Sharan about I see often, never seen the Ford Galaxy [to the folk from the US the Galaxy in Europe is the same as Seat & VW all mini bus/ MPV's]

Same as Citroen/Fiat/Peugot MPV you only see the Citroen here, the Mini vans again most are Citroen, some Peugeot Partner about.

To the OP HYUNDAI ELANTRA seen some van/estate one here as well

http://www.one2car.com/HYUNDAI_ELANTRA/B160712113

Edited April 13, 2011 by ignis

[Chris Lawrence]

Nothing wrong with them, only the name. I have a Terrican and a bought a Elantra late last year. The Elantra was cheap at Auction. It had 130K's on it and had to fix the clutch, apart from that goes well. What does this tell you about me, I have no personality!!!! That's why they are cheap?

[westbounder]

I'm looking at buying a used 1994 Toyota Corona, 1.6litre, dual fuel system (LPG + benzene),

It has automatic transmission and looks like a great car.

Can anyone tell me if this should make me a good car for taking short and long trips here in Thailand.

I was curious if the engine is large enough and was wondering if it will have adequate power for daily normal driving.

Thank You kindly

Joe

[WarpSpeed]

Get some history of how long it has had the LPG as that is the likeliest weak point possibly requiring a valve job in the near future if not already..

Edited March 28, 2012 by WarpSpeed