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Buying a 14-year old Toyota Corolla: Ownership Experience

8th September 2021, 18:29 by Chirag Moro

We then took the car for a test drive and it was running butter smooth as if it was new.

BHPian NODA recently shared this with other enthusiasts.

Introduction

Greetings to all BHPians. To begin with, first let me introduce myself. I’m Noopur Dangui from Goa. I’m a BTECH computer science student who has a keen interest in automobiles. I’m a newbie on this platform and since it’s my first thread, please forgive me for any mistakes from my side. This thread shares my ownership experiences of my 2006 Toyota Corolla 1.8E.

The backstory

Since my childhood, I have this strong love and passion for cars. My first favourite car was the legendary Qualis. The story rewinds back in 2006 when I was just 5 years old. That time, My Dad used to work as an Assistant service manager in a Toyota dealership. I remember they had once organised a drawing competition and had invited every staff member along with their kids. I remember I was least interested in the competition and was completely distracted by the cars which were on display in the showroom. That’s when I had the first look of the Corolla. I recall it was in the pearl white shade. The first time when I sat in the car was when, my dad had bought one of his client’s car for service. Since then, I was very fond of this car.

The need for an upgrade

Our long term car was a 1999 std Maruti 800 (Heena green colour). This car is literally a God’s gift to us. It served us in our good as well as bad times. My dad has still retained this car and it is in a mint condition.

Fun fact: I had my first driving lessons with this car.

Here’s a photo of our beloved Maruti 800:

Fast forward the story to 2020. Our Maruti 800 was serving absolutely fine to our family but now it was the time for our family to upgrade to something luxurious. My Dad is very fond of driving SUV but since SUVs were out of our budget, I somehow convinced my dad for a sedan. Now the big question was “Which Sedan To Go For.”?

By this time, we had shortlisted some cars: Maruti Swift Dzire, Honda civic, Mk1 Skoda Octavia, Toyota Etios. I personally liked the Civic because of its looks but my dad somehow was not convinced with the Civic because of its very low ground clearance and pretty expensive parts. Chevrolet Cruze was out of question because GM had already vanished away from India and acquiring the parts was a nightmare. But the question of which car to go for was still unsolved.

One fine day, I came across this thread by one of the senior BHPian in the username of @dkaile which was about his long term ownership review of a 2004 Toyota Corolla. I couldn’t resist myself reading that thread because the way he described his car part by part was just mind blowing to read. I would like to mention another Team-BHPian in the username of @vigsom who I think is a master when it comes to owning Corollas. It is because of his ownership reviews and guidance that I ended up convincing my dad to go with this car. My dad was also convinced with my decision since he knew the reliability of Toyota and that it can outlast their owners.

The Hunt

July 2020

Now the question of which car to go for was sorted, we had decided that we will go for the 9th gen Toyota corolla. Now some people may ask why not the newer Corolla Altis? I personally don’t like the interior of the Altis. The quality of plastics used on the dashboard is not up to the standards. Now the real hunt began. I started my search for corolla’s online. That time there were hardly 6 of them in Goa. I guess it’s because most owners love and retain their cars. One car which took my attention was a 2005 H2 variant in pearl white shade. The car was looked like it was in mint condition and had hardly done 80k on the odo. I immediately decided that we should go and check out the car. That night I showed the car to my Dad and he too, was also convinced for the meetup. But to our bad luck the very next day on the site it showed sold off. I was disappointed because there were hardly any good cars for sale. My Dad confronted me and told me to have patience and wait for a better one.

Mid-August 2020

The search was still going on until one day somewhere in mid-August there was this 2006 Corolla H2 1.8 E in Champagne Mica Metallic shade which was for sale and had just clocked 52,500 on the odo. It was a 1st owner vehicle and was in excellent genuine condition. Me as usual full of excitement, showed the car to Dad and we tried to get in touch with the owner and decided the meeting day. But due to the lockdowns our meeting got postponed.

Finally, the meeting day had arrived. I was super excited to see the car. I remember it was drizzling that day and we had reached 15 minutes before the said time. We were waiting for the owner to come at the meeting point and then, the moment of truth, the car arrived. Wow! what a sight. Turns out the car was looking even prettier in the real life. My dad being the master when it comes to inspection, directly went to inspect the engine bay of the car. Meanwhile I was looking at the interiors. Upon checking, I found out that all the electronics were working absolutely fine, original company glass all around, no signs of accident, corrosion free and it had the Bridgestone Potenza RE 88 tyres with surprisingly good grip. I also noticed that the centre console flap operation was perfectly fine (many of the older corolla had this issue). At first, we were a bit sceptical of the 52.5k on the odo because it is very rare to find a 14 year old car with just 52.5k on the odo. We had a talk with the owner of the car. Turns out that the owner was working aboard and had hardly driven his car. We then took the car for a test drive and it was running butter smooth as if it was new. So, our doubt about the odo was cleared. We then checked the car documents. We noticed that it was due for re-registration in 2021.The owner expected a price of 3.5 lakhs. But since the registration was due and to my dad’s amazing experience in evaluation of the car, we got the price down to 2 lakhs. And finally, after many conversations and discussions, we sealed the deal.

Back home, we all loved the car and decided that we shouldn’t make any more delays. But once again the lockdown was imposed. This time though, fortunately we were in frequent contact with the owner and to our surprise, he was quite cooperative for all the delays. With all the discussions with the owner we had decided to take the delivery on the 3rd of September 2020.

To be frank, I hardly slept the night before the delivery. The next morning, I got up early and was all ready to take the delivery of the car.

The delivery day

September 3 2020

This is one of those special days in my life which I will never forget. Finally, we were all set to take the delivery of the car. We went to bank to withdraw the cash and then headed towards for the delivery. The car was ready, for delivery. It was a simple professional experience, nothing fancy. We again checked the car minutely if everything was intact. (Like the car stereo, car stepney, jack, tool box and most important, the spare key). Touchwood, the car was in intact condition. We handed over the remaining amount to the owner and were finally ready to take the car home. I insisted that my dad drives the car as I was so used to driving the 800 that it was initially difficult for me to get the hang of driving such a long sedan.

We finally drove back home, where my grandparents were eagerly waiting to see the car. Dad then took them for a small drive and now it was the time for the rituals. But due to the covid pandemic, all the temples were closed. Fortunately, we found one temple near our house and got all the rituals done.

The first impressions

Under this I will be mentioning my initial driving experiences in the form of likes and dislikes.

Likes

Very silent but powerful 1.8 litre engine with 125 BHP which has enough oomph to scare you silly.
It has a free revving nature (it does get a bit vocal past 5000 rpm if you drive it hard. Drive it sedately and you won’t even feel that the car is moving).
Very spacious engine bay space with which one can easily work with.
It comes with hydraulic power steering wheel which provides good feel and feedback in the corners.
Overall good visibility from the cabin. (There is a small con here which I will mention in the dislikes).
Very powerful and chiller AC which cools the cabin in no time. A small tip: Put the AC on auto-climate with the re-circulation mode on for better cooling. (I personally never felt the need of rear AC vents).
Very premium interiors. (I personally like the soft touch material used on the dashboard. It gets wooden veener finish on the centre console and a leather wrapped steering wheel which adds to the premium feel. I don’t like the wooden finished steering which was available on the H5 model because of it’s leather chaffing).
Great seating comfort both in the front as well as in the rear seats.
The combined setup of headlamps and foglamps are so powerful that whenever we gave a high beam, the opposite car would immediately react by flashing the dipper.
Auto-retractable ovrm. (A feature which was only available in the luxury segment back then).
It has a very good low end torque. (It shows in bumper to bumper traffic, where one can easily pick up the car in second gear. No need of downshifting to first).
Decent fuel economy between 10-14 kmpl. (With the AC on).
Height adjustable seat belts. (Another feature which some car manufactures omit these days).
Supremely comfortable seats with high fabric upholstery (feels like you are sitting on the luxury sofa). Here I personally prefer the fabric seats over the leather ones as they tend to show cracks with age.
Optimal ground clearance for a sedan.
Vanity mirrors for both the front passengers. (A feature which many car manufacturers omit in the name of cost cutting).
Rear 60-40 split seats.
More than sufficient boot space.
For safety we have ABS, EBD & 2 SRS airbags (Note: They did not skip on airbags even for the lower variants like the H1. Kudos to Toyota for that).
Stupendous brakes with disc brakes for all 4 wheels.
10 spoke alloy wheels with Bridgestone Potenza RE88 rubber (the alloys of my car are finished in gunmetal grey colour which compliments to the overall look of the car). I also appreciate that they gave an alloy for the spare wheel as well unlike the newer modern cars which do not offer an alloy and rather come with a smaller sized spare tyre.

Dislikes

The bonnet is way too long, I’m 6 ft tall and still, with the seat height set to max position, I still do struggle with the judgement.
Slightly notchy gear shifts (Not an issue, once you get used to it).
Features I miss: Rear sunshade / sunblind (feature which was available on the H5 variant), an Auto-dimming IRVM, automatic headlamps (I don’t feel the need for this feature but would have appreciated if it was present. Again, available on the H5 variant).
Average fuel economy display option in the instrument cluster would also have been appreciated.

Some add-on accesory

My Corolla has the original 6-CD changer music deck which has support for MP3, FM and even cassette which is working absolutely fine but is a bit old school. And with all the new cars having music system with in-buiit Bluetooth and Pen drive support, somewhere my car was lagging behind. I wanted an upgrade to Bluetooth feature without hampering the original deck.

I did my research online and came across this awesome product. It’s called the FM Bluetooth Transmitter. What it does is that it allows you to play music through a FM frequency wirelessly. I saw all the reviews and ordered one for my car. Now I can seamlessly play any music track wirelessly. (That too without fiddling with the wiring).

I was thinking of going for the Sony xav-ax3000 with 6.95inch display but I’m not sure whether it will perfectly fit my car. (Support for Bluetooth, Apple CarPlay & Android Auto are my requirements). I would really appreciate for your advice and suggestions for the infotainment system and also for the frame bracket for the same.

With this I would like to wrap up my first thread on My Corolla. I would soon do long trips once the pandemic gets over and would like to keep you’ll updated with more threads. I haven’t named my car yet so I would appreciate for some cool names. Now enough of my talking. Set back and have a look at my beautiful car.