Buying a car in Mexico

Hell freezes over

In February 2023, I threw shade on driving cars to get around in Mexico, because there are so many other very good and affordable options for getting around.

With that out of the way, let’s talk about buying a car in Mexico!

😬

So yes, I did throw in the towel recently and I bought a car. But - now hear me out - I did it primarily so I could get my dog from point A to point B. So it was all in the service of animals. I’m such a humane and thoughtful person.

I’ve never purchased an automobile in Mexico before, so I wasn’t looking forward to it. I have purchased cars in the U.S. - new, used, leased. It’s always been an unpleasant experience. I didn’t presume it would be any better here. What I did know is that I didn’t want a new car; and in fact, had I wanted to buy a new car, it probably would have been a pretty straightforward and painless process. Buying new cars in Mexico is not like buying a new car in the U.S., where you know that the dealership is actively trying to rip you off, and thus you go immediately into self-preservation and negotiation mode and you play stupid games as the salesperson carries pieces of paper back and forth between you and the “sales manager”. The whole process is performative and weird. And annoying. No, in Mexico, the advertised price is the price. You accept the price or you look for a different car. No games, just yes or no.

But - I didn’t want a new car. I didn’t want to pay the premium prices that new cars demand or incur the immediate depreciation inherent in buying a new car. I wanted a used car, so that’s where I started.

Sticker shock

In Mexico, one finds makes and models of cars that aren’t available in the U.S. This isn’t all that unique: manufacturers create models that are intended for specific markets and not intended for others - often in response to regulatory issues or consumer demand. For example, there are many small car models in Mexico that just wouldn’t make it in the U.S. because the U.S. market is less interested (generally) in small cars.

I didn’t want one of these brands or models because I wanted a car that is available in both Mexico and the U.S., so that I can drive it between the two countries knowing that I can get parts and service for it in either. So, I was able to immediately cut my choices down drastically. I didn’t want a truck - I don’t need the hauling capacity of a truck and I didn’t want to deal with navigating narrow streets and tiny parking spaces in a large vehicle. I didn’t want a sedan because I figured I’d bottom it out on a tope sooner or later and I’d end up having to buy a new differential or something. I didn’t want a van or a large SUV for the same reasons that I didn’t want a truck. So that pretty much left me with a compact SUV.

In Mexico, the two most common compact SUV models that are also sold in the U.S. are the Honda CR-V (I don’t like typing that hyphen all the time - I think it’s pretentious, so from here on out I’m going to refer to it as a “CRV” - but you and I will both know what I really mean 😉) and the Kia Sportage. Kia is a very popular make in Mexico - they are all over the place. It would have been easy to find a used Kia Sportage. Kia is also popular in the U.S., but not the Sportage so much. For whatever reason, you don’t really see many Kia Sportages there. Honda CRVs, on the other hand, are very popular in the U.S., probably the most popular compact SUV in that market. Hondas also have a reputation for long-lasting engines, so for those reasons I sort of settled on the idea of finding a used, late-model Honda CRV¹.

I began by looking at the seminuevos (semi-new 🙄) departments of various car dealerships near me for late-model CRVs (2021-2023). But I quickly discovered the following truth: in Mexico, used cars hold onto their value like grim death. A 2022 CRV with 80,000 kilometers (50K miles) in Mexico costs about the same as a brand new CRV in the U.S. In Mexico, there is such a demand for used cars, that they typically cost considerably more than a comparable used car in the U.S.²

Semi-late-model

To compensate for this sticker shock, I had to re-tool my criteria a bit. I still wanted a CRV, but finding one that met my budget meant that the 3rd digit in the model year couldn’t be a “2”. So I began looking at CRVs that were manufactured in the teens. This also meant that I had to extend my search beyond the seminuevos at large dealerships, because they don’t typically deal in cars that old. Which sent me down a rathole of Facebook Marketplace, Mercado Libre, message boards, friend referrals, pool halls, seedy hotel rooms, and abandoned warehouses. I might be exaggerating a bit - but I was swimming in some dangerous odometer-resetting waters here. I was beginning to get the idea that finding a used car on my own was going to entail a lot of leg work and a lot of leaps of faith.

So I did what any self-respecting-yet-clueless prospective car-buying gringo in Mexico would do - I turned to my extensive network of fellow Mexico-based bloggers. Fortunately, Lola of Lola at the Rescue fame has traveled all around this country and has made a lot of really useful connections. She introduced me to a guy named Luis Martinez who just so happens to live in a town not too far from me. Luis has a couple of businesses going on, and one of them is helping people find cars. He has a brother in Guadalajara who owns a used car lot, and together they have a pretty good network of quality cars that they can get their hands on, and on which they can run diagnostics to determine if the odometer is accurate and if various safety mechanisms have ever been deployed (airbags and such).

After some back-and-forth on WhatsApp over various options, Luis ended up finding me a 2016 CRV with about 96K kilometers. Nothing fancy, no automatic seats, self-lifting tailgate or such. Just a good, basic CRV. Bonus points for it being white, which works well in the hot Nayarit sun.

Luis charges a small percentage of the purchase price for his service, which includes finding the car, buying it, and getting the title and plates changed over to the new owner. I barely had to lift a finger. He even delivered it to my home.

In the end, all I had to do (other than pay for the car) was go into a Nayarit drivers license office, take a test with 20 questions, and walk out with my new license. Oh, I also had to buy insurance; but Luis recommended a broker and the insurance deal was done over WhatsApp in a matter of minutes.

My original hand-wringing about buying a car in Mexico turned out to be unnecessary. For me, anyway, things seemed to have turned out quite well. I haven’t had the car for long - so who knows if it will fall apart in a few weeks. I kind of doubt it. The cobblestone streets around me will rattle it apart I think before any pre-existing conditions will. Now I just have the open road and arguing with the traffic cops about their annoying mordidas to look forward to.

As far as the actual act of driving in Mexico - this isn’t my first rodeo. But I haven’t driven here in a while, and I haven’t used laterals extensively, and my hand doesn’t reflexively go to the hazard lights button yet. In any case, I expect all this driving will generate some fodder for a future article or two, wherein I might actually define lateral for those of you who are not familiar, and explain why one’s hand might want to reflexively find the hazard lights button. In the meantime, if you are in Mexico, maybe stay off the road for a few days…

1. Why didn’t I consider an electric vehicle? While electric vehicles are becoming a more common phenomenon in larger cities in Mexico, outside of those cities there is simply no charging infrastructure. I don’t live in a large city, and I do plan to drive cross-country - so as much as I would have liked to be driving an EV, such an option is a non-option in today’s Mexico.

2. So why didn’t I just go buy a used car in the U.S.? It’s complicated. Bureaucratically. I’m a dual Mexican and U.S. citizen, and as a Mexican citizen, it is illegal for me to drive a foreign plated vehicle in Mexico. So I can’t go to the U.S. and buy and register a car there and then drive it into Mexico. If I was caught doing that, the car could be confiscated. I would have to “nationalize” the U.S. car in Mexico - which means paying a huge tax on the purchase cost of the car; this would have obliterated whatever savings I would have realized by buying it in the U.S.

I am, however, legally entitled to drive a Mexican-plated vehicle in the U.S. Go figure.