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Two points before answering your question. First, you cannot buy a normal Corolla Axio from Toyota anymore. The only Corolla Axio Toyota dealers sell is the business car version. The business car version does not have all the bells and whistles of the standard version X, G and WXB grades. Also...most dealerships will not sell the business version unless you are a business and buying a fleet. So if you want a brand new one from a Toyota dealership, you need to go with a Corolla sedan (which might not work for you considering the tax structure in SL). Secondly, YOU, as a citizen of Sri Lanka CANNOT buy a car at a manufacturer's dealership in Japan (even if you go there on a holiday to buy a car). You will need a friend or a Japanese car dealer who exports cars (most honest Japanese owned ones do not send cars to Sri Lanka) or a car dealership in Japan that is Sri Lankan owned (typically) who may or may not have offices in Sri Lanka. 1. It is safe to buy a low mileage car from a Japanese Auction as much as it is safe to buy a "0" mileage car from a Toyota Dealership in Japan. The issue is the agent/car dealer you use. Yes..the Sri Lankan car importers have offices in Japan staffed by rather questionable Sri Lankans living in Japan. Those are the guys who cannot be trusted. That risk remains irrespective of whether you buy a car from auction or a car from a Toyota dealer.... These bad car dealers buy low mileage accident cars or high mileage cars from auction. The original auction documents will indicate the actual condition of the car. However, these bad dealers fix the car up or roll back the mileage and then sell it to you with forged documents. So the documents you see indicate that the car is low mileage and of a high auction grade in really good condition. When you are buying a car from a Toyota dealership in Japan....well..you can't. Car dealerships in Japan are by law allowed to sell only to Japanese based customers. Thus, the dealership needs to register the car under you car dealer's name in Japan, then you car dealer needs to deregister it. So you do not get brand new cars from Japan (or any other country) through grey importers...they are always reconditioned/used. This is where the issue is. Your agent can easily buy a cheap new car from auction....fix it up..show the de-registration certificate etc...and sell it to you as a new car that he bought from the Toyota dealership. Sometimes these damaged cars are available at the dealerships themselves (eg. accident damaged Toyota rental cars, leases, etc...). So...you need to find a trust worthy, transparent car importer who will let you see everything they do...they will let you pick the car from the auction site, etc...so if you find a dealer like that...you are safe and it really does not matter if you buy at auction or "0" mileage from the Toyota dealer. 2. & 3. Brand new cars from the Toyota dealership does not require shaken. When a manufacturer releases the car from its production line it has a certificate of compliance from the manufacturer. This states that the car is compliant to all emissions and safety standards set forth by the Japanese government and is road worthy; which is what the shaken tests for anyway. Thus, a shaken in not needed. Brand new cars do not need a shaken for the first three years of its life. The value on the website indicates base price with and without tax. When you add accessories and delivery charges the price increases. Plus, there will be a registration charge and then road tax. When you de-register a car for export, you have to pay a de-registration fee and then you get a refund on the road taxes. So at the end of the the day your "0" mileage car from the dealership actually costs more or less the same as a "0" mileage car at auction (you do get those at auction). A slightly used one will be a bit cheaper because of depreciation but it still has registration and deregistration fees anyway.... Whether that is worth it for you or not depends on you. You cannot calculate the CIF price by yourself. You need to find a car importer and get quotes....you can get a rough idea by looking at what the freight and insurance charges for similar cars are....but it won't be very specific as you will not be able to calculate inland transport charges in Japan. Also, your car dealer would keep a profit, and then there might be wharf charges in Japan involved as well. If you are looking at a Corolla Axio...I am guessing the Corolla sedan will not work for you because it will be over budget due to the tax structure...so your only option is to buy a Corolla Axio at auction because a Toyota dealer might not sell you a business model car (but some car dealers/exporters have inside contacts who might be able to pull it off...but it still won;t be as nice as what you can get at auction in terms of accessories and features for the same price...).

So you are our Chris Columbus!!!

Well the first set of Raises have landed it seems.. A friend of mine is expecting to buy one and I went with him today and inspected one (Z grade variant) at a car sale. Seemed decently put together not as plasticy as I expected. But, like @iRage reiterated it is nothing fancy and the interior isn't as spacious as the dimensions sounded. Average leg space and headroom was there in the back (this is when the front seats were not dragged to their back most position. But, the position it was set in didn't cause any problems for the front passengers either). I felt 3 fully grown adults might struggle to travel in the rear (hatchback like room was there). The luggage space was also in a decent hatchback territory. The thing that caught my eye the most was how tiny the accelerator pedal was (me being a Civic FD owner I'm used to a large accelerator pedal). As I saw the rear had torsion beam suspension and drum brakes (I might be wrong here because it was just a few minutes with the car)

As much as I have a soft spot for CHR (Maybe cos it looks like a stormtrooper and I'm a Star Wars fan) its not really utilitarian. It has a lot of curves and edges and the interior is a bit packed and maybe a little claustrophobic at the back. The CRV is proper Compact Suv :Practical and well put together.

You will be wasting a permit on a 1L Civic. Ground clearance should not bee to much of an issue as I've managed quite a number of poor roads with just being extra 10% careful. I'd go with the Mazda... nice little regular car..looks pretty too.

I found this list recently. probably more accurate.

True that. Me being in the same profession, bought my first car, a 1995 ek3 at 1.6M in 2014 with a loan and still running it (and still enjoing). Now I have 2 permits at hand and trying to sell them so that I can settle other comittements and upgrade to something around 3M. So you my friend, are in the previledged lot! ?

If you want an engaging drive....then the Civic is the winner....Corolla and Mazda3 are tied for second. If you want a sensible..day to day car...then the Corolla Sport wins and Mazda 3 and Civic come in second..but Corolla IMO wins by a bit due to its conservativeness (it does not do anything really well but does everything pretty well and does not yell out saying woo hoo look at me...unless you get it in pastel blue). If you want a decent all rounder and old school charm...go for the Mazda 3. Have you ever considered the Corolla Sedan or the touring wagon ? And yes....the 1L Civic is pointless for your permit and is actually, IMO, a compromised variant in the Civic family....

All-WHeel Drive/Real-Time All Wheel Drive/etc...all refer to different sub families of 4WD. Yes...listen to rear diff while in any 4WD vehicle...even if you buy a RAV4 or XTrail....listen to whine...check for oil leaks around the diff. Do not go by badges to identify whether it is AWD or FF. For JDM variants.... 2.4L AWD model code was RM4. and the 2.0L FF was RM1. To be honest...if you drive a 2.4 and then get in to a 2.0 variant..you feel that the 2.0 variant is sluggish....the 2.4 is much nicer (and easier) to drive If you cannot be bothered with numbers....then...go to the rear of the car...get down on your knees...and then look under the car to see if there is a rear differential Having checked if there is a rear differential...check if there is a prop-shaft running from the front transfer case to the diff (in older AWD cars..people had a tendency to remove the prop shaft so that the rear does not work...they did it because the diff was broken and they did not want to fix it or tried to save money by converting it to a FF..it does not work that way). **if an AWD vehicle has e-Four (i.e. electronic 4wd), you will not see a prop shaft as what it will have is an electronic motor in the back. As for resale value.....yes....there is a myth that anything with a Toyota badge will get sold and that it is as good as gold. Do not count on that....any car as long as it has been well taken care of and is honest. It will get sold...we have had RAV4s and CRVs and had never had any trouble selling either off.

That's what every Sri Lankan felt about the tenure of the former prez ?

Kia Picanto

Oh hell No ! I saw this at the Tokyo Motorshow (see the Japanese Car News Thread for a long discussion). This is pretty much the size of a Vitz but taller and maybe like 10 or 15 cm longer. The interior is decent but does not have the refinement of a CHR nor the spunkiness of the new Yaris. The seats too are not as huggy as the CHR. But it is not bad. This is a Daihatsu....not a Toyota...a Daihatsu with a Toyota badge and bits and pieces from Toyota. So finally Sri Lankans are willing to embrace a Daihatsu after about 3 decades (albeit they will be doing so without knowing and be in denial forever) Toyota calls this a passenger car with SUV LOOKS ! Not a mini SUV like our car salesmen keep harping about. This is NOT a competitor or an alternative to the CHR or the Vitara (even the Vitara is larger than this). This is much smaller. This is an alternative for a Vue or Kwid or a Redi-Go (i.e. a small crossover if a Hatchback does not cut it for you) Most of our Sri Lankan car buyers are going to go for this because it is cheap and looks like a 4WD (so gives them added excitement and ego strokes). This will not be as comfy or as refined as the CHR or the Premio/Allion which some people are thinking of replacing with this This is the replacement for the Terios/Rush. Ironically neither the Terios nor Rush did that well in SL (except for the few permit imports) but this will probably be a hit because it is cheap due to the low engine capacity and the taxes that it will attract.