Author – Dana Boyd from Awesome Car Loans.

One of the mistakes that many people make when buying their first car is they buy one on impulse. This means they either go for something showy and fancy, or something that is expensive and will boost their self-esteem. However, there are more important things for your first vehicle. The first and foremost thing on your mind should be that the vehicle will last you a few years, or even longer. The longer it lasts, the more money you will save in the long run by not getting a fancy vehicle.

However, you also do not want to run into the situation where you buy a budget car for what appears to be a meager price, only to find that you just bought a vehicle that will break down after a few months. Sometimes this happens no matter how careful you are, but you still have a good bit of control over this.

You want to ensure that the vehicle you have is insured, either through the dealership that you get it from, or insurance that you get for it yourself. Beginner drivers might get into accidents or have problems with vehicles and not know how to deal with things, so the insurance kicks in and can help quite a bit.

You also need to make sure that your vehicle is going to have good enough gas mileage to make it worthwhile. Sometimes people buy car or bigger vehicles that take tons of gas and get bad mileage. In the end, they spend so much money on gas that they don’t get to enjoy the fact that they got a new vehicle.

Other than mileage and insurance, you want a vehicle that is going to protect you more in the event of an accident. This means you need crash ratings to be ones that you’ll survive and not be too injured if you get into an accident. Paying a bit extra for a vehicle like this is well worth it, especially if you’re going to end up driving quite a bit on freeways or in crowded areas.

If you live somewhere that gets a lot of rain and snow, the tires that you get need to match. You don’t want to get tires that aren’t good with ice if you live somewhere that has long winters. You also need to either get all-season tires or be prepared to have another set of tires for when the weather gets bad.

All in all, the choice is up to you. Being young means that you can make mistakes and learn from them, but taking advice from those who know more about vehicles is always important. After all, your first buy car should be memorable, not a horror story of breakdowns and constant repairs, and multiple trips to a mechanic.