When Buying A Car In South Africa You Have To Avoid Certain Models

source

With corrupt police and border officials one has to have insurance and more importantly trackers on your vehicle or try and avoid the hijacker shopping list.

When buying a car in South Africa you obviously have a certain model in mind and you also need to check the latest hijacking trends. The facts are dealing with crime is a way of life here and in order to avoid it you need to be aware of everything including hijacking statistics seeing what is in demand. 50-60 cars are hijacked every day in South Africa and these are often taken at gun point.

source

One would think the high end premium cars, but that is not necessarily the case and syndicates target certain models to steal , strip and sell the parts. We used to joke about midnight spares, but here they do just that as someone is ordering these spares and syndicates are fulfilling these shopping lists.

Both the Toyota Hilux and Fortuner have been on the list for years now for different reasons. The Hilux is very popular in urban and rural areas so it blends in easily due to the numbers on the roads. This makes it ideal for cross border smuggling using the off road routes. The Fortuner was using the same engine used by the taxi industry. Toyota realised this was a serious problem that directly impacted sales and changed the engine. Still it is still a car that will be stolen and will be heading across the border within hours.

One would have thought the higher end Toyota Land Cruisers would be targeted, but these are too risky as very few make it to the border and are caught far quicker than they used to be. I will explain why in the post further on.

Most of the cars hijacked in South Africa are being taken to chop shops to be stripped and moved on as quickly as possible. Cars that you would not think twice about and would never think they are even a target vehicle. Hard to think discontinued models would be sought after and the scarcity of spares places them in the wanted category. I would hate to own a Nissan NP200 model as this will only get worse when spares run out.

I was thinking about the Chinese cars today and the lack of spares available and when will these models start climbing the hijack list. The way these various brand models were launched with a fast uptake the popularity for cars that blend in is what criminal syndicates are looking for to help them use these vehicles for all types of crimes. The white and silver colors are popular as these are the common colors on the road and do not draw attention to themselves.

I mentioned earlier about how things have changed with smuggling cars across the border and this is rather simple and commonsense. The number of cars insured in South Africa is roughly 25% so 75% have no insurance. The madness is that the black population in South Africa are less likely to insure their vehicles.

The reasons are they cannot afford the premiums and could be down to where they live such as a township that would have a higher risk factor built into the premium. The lack of education has lead to a lack of trust believing insurance companies will not cover damages. This has actually left them financially vulnerable and criminal syndicates kind of know who has insurance which means tracking devices on their vehicles.

I know someone who has a high end premium vehicle and cannot afford the insurance so they would lose everything if it was in an accident. Makes no sense and why their vehicle is at high risk from hijackers. If 75% of all vehicles are uninsured why target a vehicle that most likely has insurance and tracking teams ready to hunt you down by specialist armed security teams. We often see the helicopters flying low over head chasing stolen cars and the hijackers have zero chance of getting away. Tracking teams are set up across the country especially at known border crossings and are well aware of what cars are heading their way if they have trackers fitted.

When we purchased our vehicle trackers were fitted the same day by the insurance company and we don't have one or two, but four fitted. The last vehicle I purchased we had only one tracker so insurance companies are taking no chances these days. This is fitted in a closed room so no one is aware of the exact position of the tracking devices. Hijackers know if they locate one or two that there is still others that need locating and is a deterrent knowing they are being hunted.

Watching and seeing how this list changes is interesting because it does change and will continue to change due to the demand for spares. The facts point towards the Chinese brands being on this list before the end of the year and thankfully my model will not.

Posted Using @cryptoandcoffee/when-buying-a-car-in-south-africa-you-have-to-avoid-certain-models-6kq" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">INLEO