Buying a new car - looking for a suggestion

sharkufc

Hi guys, I'm here in Ireland from 1 year and now it's time to buy a car.
I was looking on how it works here about insurance, taxes and cars price.
I'm a bit confused because I could see insurances at 1k plus taxes 1k, is that possible? 2k/year just thrown away?
I was looking for a city car (let's say something similar to Peugeot 208), but I don't know if it's better to buy a hybrid, petrol or diesel.
Any suggestion on how to start without selling a kidney?:D

bazz26

Where are you getting the 1k for motor tax? Cars the size of a 208 generally are relatively cheap to tax.

Insurance in general is very expensive in Ireland and even more so if you hold a foreign driving license.

sharkufc

sorry, I was reading different threads here. But now I saw from the official table that it's much less, you're right.
As for the insurance, I'm converting my driving licence (EU) to an Irish licence, but I'm not sure if that's mean that is "full Irish".
Other than insurance and motor tax, is there anything else one have to pay to own a car?

Atlantic Dawn

The car must have an NCT once it's 4 years old, this lasts 2 years on cars between 4 and 10 years old, cars 10 years old must have the test every year, test costs €55.

More info here
www.ncts.ie

CiniO

sharkufc wrote: »

sorry, I was reading different threads here. But now I saw from the official table that it's much less, you're right.
As for the insurance, I'm converting my driving licence (EU) to an Irish licence, but I'm not sure if that's mean that is "full Irish".
Other than insurance and motor tax, is there anything else one have to pay to own a car?

Yes, once you swap to Irish licence that means you have full Irish licence.
When insurers ask how long you've held your licence, you should state the date you originally got it in your home country (that will be listed on your Irish licence).

Insurance might be a problem though.
Lots of Irish insurers don't want to insure people who moved from abroad, and those who will, usually charge crazy prices.
Do you have any driving history with insurer from your home country?
If so, what country is that? And how many years no claims driving you had and when your last policy there ceased?

If you have the above, you might ring around insures and beg them to accept it.
If not, then probably it's going to cost you over €2k to get insurance.

sharkufc

CiniO wrote: »

Yes, once you swap to Irish licence that means you have full Irish licence.
When insurers ask how long you've held your licence, you should state the date you originally got it in your home country (that will be listed on your Irish licence).

Insurance might be a problem though.
Lots of Irish insurers don't want to insure people who moved from abroad, and those who will, usually charge crazy prices.
Do you have any driving history with insurer from your home country?
If so, what country is that? And how many years no claims driving you had and when your last policy there ceased?

If you have the above, you might ring around insures and beg them to accept it.
If not, then probably it's going to cost you over €2k to get insurance.

Thanks for the info. I have my license from about 8 years with no claims at all. Home Country is Italy. I can ask my previous insurer to translate the no claims document. It is ceases few months ago. Do you think that this will drop down the price?

CiniO

sharkufc wrote: »

Thanks for the info. I have my license from about 8 years with no claims at all. Home Country is Italy. I can ask my previous insurer to translate the no claims document. It is ceases few months ago. Do you think that this will drop down the price?

Yes, it will.
If you have 8 years no claims driving history with your Italian insurer and Your policy ceased there just few months ago, this will push your insurance premium in Ireland way down.
You'll just need to find insurer who will accept your Italian no claims history as not all of them will.

Still don't get too excited as it will still cost you way more than in Italy (but IMO there is a chance for premium below €1000)

GavMan

Maybe try for something older than a 208. Something worth just a couple of k and get 3rd party fire and theft insurance to help build up a no claims policy here (if Irish insurers don't accept your Italian No Claims Bonus)

digitaldr

Out of interest - how much was your insurance in Italy?

CiniO

GavMan wrote: »

Maybe try for something older than a 208. Something worth just a couple of k and get 3rd party fire and theft insurance to help build up a no claims policy here (if Irish insurers don't accept your Italian No Claims Bonus)

There's no reason why they wouldn't accept his Itialian NCB. As I said - not all insurers will, but there are insurers which will accept it no problem.
Allianz is probably one of them.

Also, considering in Ireland difference in price between full Comprehensive policy and Third party, Fire and Theft is IMO negligible.

In my case it was never more than 10-15% extra for full comprehensive, with sometimes it being literally couple of euros, so I don't think OP needs to consider cheaper, older car for purpose of reducing insurance premium.

It's actually more likely older car would attract higher premium.

sharkufc

digitaldr wrote: »

Out of interest - how much was your insurance in Italy?

400€~ that's why I opened this thread after seeing AIB asking me 7000euro from online website.
Still, I don't understand why there are not cross insurer comparator website here :rolleyes:

sharkufc

CiniO wrote: »

There's no reason why they wouldn't accept his Itialian NCB. As I said - not all insurers will, but there are insurers which will accept it no problem.
Allianz is probably one of them.

Also, considering in Ireland difference in price between full Comprehensive policy and Third party, Fire and Theft is IMO negligible.

In my case it was never more than 10-15% extra for full comprehensive, with sometimes it being literally couple of euros, so I don't think OP needs to consider cheaper, older car for purpose of reducing insurance premium.

It's actually more likely older car would attract higher premium.

Yes, I was thinking on a new car because of the road tax and because I saw along the street advs with 0% finance on a new car, even though I don't remember the car showroom