The pre-owned walkaround that pays for itself

Park across the road and look down the length of the car. Reflections do the work for you: a straight flank throws one continuous line of light, a repaired one throws a kink you can see from ten metres. Do this before the seller starts talking, because once the conversation begins you will be looking where he points.

Then walk in. Panel gaps are the giveaway on a car that has been apart. A bonnet that sits two millimetres low on one side, a boot lid you have to push to close, a door that drops slightly on its hinge when you open it: each on its own is nothing, but together they describe a front-end knock that somebody hurried.

Tyres tell you about the owner more than the car. Four matching tyres of the same make, worn evenly, usually mean a driver who maintained geometry. Two new cheap ones on the front and two tired ones behind mean the opposite. Feather the tread with your palm across the car, not along it, and you will feel the saw-tooth edge that comes from a bent tie rod or a kerbed hub.

Every tyre carries four moulded digits giving the week and year it was made. You do not want rubber that has been standing for six or seven summers, however good the tread looks, because Highveld sun hardens sidewalls from the outside in. On a car in the R250 000 bracket, four honest tyres in a common size cost around R6 000 indicative and that is a fair thing to negotiate about.

Lift the boot carpet and the spare wheel out. You are looking at the original factory welds in the spare well, which are little round spot welds in a neat row. A continuous bead of weld, or seam sealer that is thicker and greyer than the rest, says the back of the car has been rebuilt. While you are in there, check whether the jack and the brace are the right ones and whether the spare still holds air, because a flat spare on the R573 at dusk is a long evening.

A fridge magnet wrapped in a cloth will not scratch anything and finds body filler in seconds. Run it along the lower doors, the sills under the rubber, the wheel arch lips and the bottom corners of the tailgate. Where it slides off and refuses to grip, there is filler. A little filler on a city car is normal. Filler along an entire sill is a different car to the one in the advert.

Open the car after it has stood closed in the sun and smell it. Damp carpet, mildew in the boot lining or an air freshener working too hard are all worth an extra ten minutes. Press the carpet behind the pedals and under the rear seat with your knuckles. If water comes up, find out whether it is a blocked sunroof drain, a perished windscreen seal or something much worse.

Then sit in it properly. Run the driver's seat through its full travel on the rails and listen for the runners binding, which is a R2 000 repair on an electric seat and a nuisance on a manual one. Notice whether the seat base still has shape or has collapsed on the outer bolster from years of climbing in. Work every window, the mirror folds, the rear aircon vents, the boot release and the seatbelt retractors on both sides of the back seat. If grandchildren travel with you, fold the rear seat forward and find the child-seat anchorages before you fall in love with the car, because not every cabin has usable ones. Electrical faults are cheap to find now and expensive to find later.

Insist on a cold engine. Sellers who have warmed the car up before you arrive are not always hiding something, but it is the easiest thing in the world to arrange, so ask to come back. On the first turn of the key, listen for a rattle that dies after a second or two, which is often a tensioner, and watch the exhaust in your mirror for the puff of blue that says oil is getting past something.

Leave it idling and open the oil cap with a rag. Steady breathing is fine. A hard pulse of pressure or mayonnaise under the cap is not. Then put your hand on the top radiator hose as the needle comes up and feel for the moment the thermostat opens, because a lazy thermostat on the Highveld is a R2 400 job indicative and a sign the last owner stopped caring.