New Car

So we've arrived in Christchurch ok. Yesterday we set about the task of opening bank accounts, getting NZ licences, tax file numbers, insurance etc. Our first hurdle was that our Aus licences don't have issue dates on them. So we have to write to VicRoads to get a letter saying how long we've held our licences or the AA wont give us NZ licences. On the upside we can drive on our Australian licences for a year without needing to get an NZ licence.

After setting up home and contents insurance with the bank, Julie seems to feel that insurance here seems to be somewhat less regulated than Australia... Still it's dirt cheap (assuming we're actually covered for anything) I'll let Julie read the product disclosure statement and figure it out.

The car search has finished and we have purchased a 2004 Mitsubishi Colt Plus. It wasn't on our original list, but fitted the bill. It's sort of a wagon type version of the normal Colt - not available in Oz (our car is a Japanese import, which seems to be the standard thing here).

We had to adjust our original list after realising their just isn't much boot space in a small car like a Toyota Yaris/Echo or a Mazda 2. Their also seems to be a massive shortage of manuals here (I think we saw about half a dozen across several lots). So my original ambition of reaquainting myself with actually driving a car seems has been short lived. It came down to the Colt and a Mazda 323 SP20. The Sp20 was 5 years older and done a lot more kms, so we went with the Colt. The Colt is a 1.5L CVT auto. It should be nice and fuel effiecent. It drives ok too, the 1.5 engine seeming to be relatively zippy for what it is (a small, Japanese city car). We took it for a 3 hour drive on the highway today out to Methven and back. It was much better than the Suburu Impreza we had as a hire care 3 months ago, particularly up hills and above 80km/h.

I'm not sure how I did with negotating myself a good deal. The car already had $2000 marked off the original sticker price, but was still $2000 out of our price range. We did a test drive and then left telling the salesman we wanted to test drive some other vechiles. Upon returning we informed the salesman we were interested in a cheaper Mazda down the road. We then told him how much we had in our bank account ($2000 lower than what he wanted) and asked him what he could do. This was met with a stoney face and the reply 'we could give you some more time to get the rest of the cash'. Not a good start. Eventuallly we managed to wrangle a further $500ish off and 2 years of roadside assistance. So I'm calling it a $2500 saving... He did assure me that they were basically making no money on it (I of course trust the used cars salesman). It was a Mitsubishi dealership so at least we can get warranty services over on the west coast and wont have to drive back to Christchurch. Either or, we now have the following:

Oh I just saw this on the National News - sums up NZ really.