If you’ve ever forgotten where you parked your car, a car finder can do it for you. When parking space isn’t easy to find, especially in high-traffic neighborhoods, a car finder can save you a lot of time and grief. By simply switching on your cellphone, a car finder can direct you to the exact spot where you parked your car.

A car finder is a type of vehicle tracking system that combines GPS or GLONASS and cellular phone technologies to determine the last location of your vehicle. Combining both active and passive tracking, a car finder transmits the tracking data to a server when a signal is available. To have a car finder, you will need a special GPS tracking device installed in your car and a GPS capable cellphone with special software. Here’s how one model works.

When the car is started, the GPS tracking device activates your cellphone’s GPS and begins to track your vehicle’s location.

• When you turn the engine off, the GPS tracking device switches off and records your vehicle’s last position.
• You turn on your cellphone when you want to locate your car.
• Activate the app installed in your cellphone and a map appears that will show you the location of your car.
• As you get nearer to your car, the map zooms in to guide you to the exact spot.
• when you start your car again, the GPS device resumes its tracking activity.

Finding a misplaced car with a car finder is one of the simpler applications of GPS tracking technology. The same system is used in:

• Recovering stolen vehicles – GPS tracking systems like the ones used in a car finder can be modified so that police can activate the tracking device directly and follow the vehicle that has been reported stolen.
• Improving fleet efficiency – Businesses with fleets make use of GPS tracking systems to keep track of delivery vehicles and divert them to meet special customer demands.
• Maximizing sales performance – Companies use GPS tracking not only to know where their salespersons are at any time but also to give them driving directions to find new customers and update their appointments.
• Optimizing service – With GPS tracking, field engineers or repairmen can be re-directed to attend to urgent customer requirements when necessary.

For most people, however, a car finder is probably one of the most useful applications of GPS tracking technology.

As easily as a car finder can help you find a car, a car finance calculator can help you calculate car payment. We all tend to get starry eyed upon finding the car of our dreams. This makes down-to-earth tasks like calculating payments difficult. In the case of car financing the different deals, rebates, discounts, extras, interest rates only serve to make matters worse. A car finance calculator can take the hassle out of the process and let you calculate car payment quickly.

A car finance calculator, like any computer, still obeys the law of GIGO so how helpful it is depends upon what you punch into it. This means that you have to do your homework, shop around and understand what goes into the calculations of car financing. Once you’ve done that, the car finance calculator can do its part.

But, first of all, you need to know how car dealers or financial institutions calculate car payment. The company arrives at this figure after they have determined the

• amount of the loan
• idown payment
• repayment period
• your credit rating (where applicable)

Other data like

• trade in value (if you are trading in your car)
• sales tax
• interest rate
• are also considered where these data apply.

Some online car loan companies that provide a car finance calculator ask you to register for an account and make the payment directly to the car dealer.

Before getting a car loan, you must know exactly how much you need to borrow. This includes not just the purchase price of the car itself but other add-ons like undercoating, alarms, insurance and accessories. It also must include discounts (but not rebates which come afterwards) and other cash deductions you manage to negotiate including the trade in value of your car if any and your down payment.

Once you have arrived at the total amount of the loan you need to get, the term or length of the loan is the next most important information. The longer the term the lower the monthly payments but the overall payment will be higher. A car finance calculator can help you experiment with different payment terms so you can see which one is easier on your wallet.

The interest rate is another variable in a car loan that a car finance calculator can help you with. If you are free to shop around for loans, the ones with lower interest rates will obviously be your choice provided that the loan conditions are favorable.

By knowing how financing companies calculate car payment, you can make good use of a car financing calculator to help you arrive at the right decision.

A car is one of the biggest investments a person makes in his life and a car finance calculator can be a valuable help. After finding the car of your dreams through a car finder, you must know how much you’ll need to make that dream come true. That’s where a car finance calculator can help you but it’s only as good as what you feed into it. Therefore it’s best to know the nitty gritty of car financing before you switch on the car finance calculator.

If you’re like most people, you’ll need to finance the purchase of the car and work out a car loan with the dealer or a bank. Dealers either finance the loan with their own money or work in tandem with a bank. Either way, all parties work on a commission basis. The higher the loan, the more they make. The extras like undercoating, alarms and special insurance are usually not part of the car’s purchase price so they’ll try to sell you on getting those, too. The first thing you have to input in your car finance calculator is the TOTAL amount of the loan.

The next thing you’ll need to punch into the car finance calculator is the interest rate. Sometimes, you’re locked into the financing scheme of the dealer. If you’re not, shop around for competitive interest rates. Your company’s employee loan association might offer lower rates. If you have other policies with an insurance company, they might give you better terms. Remember that longer loans get higher rates, and the newer the car the lower the rates.

Figure in the special deals. Offers like 0% interest often have a catch. Most of the time, the lower the interest, the shorter the credit term. This means that your monthly payments may be higher than you anticipated. At other times, a 0% interest limits you to getting what’s available on the floor and you’ll have to forego your choice of color or other “free” accessories. Also, by choosing the low interest rate, you are not entitled to any cash rebate. Use your car finance calculator to figure out whether you should take the deal or look for financing elsewhere.

Down payment matters. Many buyers gloss over the amount of the down payment. Remember that your down payment is cash in hand. If you kept part of it in a bank account, it would earn money even if you would have to pay higher monthly amortizations. Use a car finance calculator to compare different combinations of down payment versus monthly payments in order to arrive at a mix that fits your pocket best.

A car finder can cut down on the time it takes to shop for a used car to buy. Buying a used car is a lot more difficult than buying a brand new one. You may be looking for a particular make or model which is hard to find. Or, you have a fixed budget and don’t know what it can get you. Still another problem is that you don’t know where to start looking.

When shopping for a used car to buy, you have several options. You can ask friends and relatives, wade through the classified ads or hop from one used car dealership to another. All these take a lot of time and effort without necessarily producing any results. A third option is to use a car finder and get the job done quickly and comfortably.

An online service, a car finder is a web site that gathers information about cars for sale and brings buyers and sellers in contact with each other. Think of it as an online classified ads section but with more information and pictures, too. Or, you can also think of it as an online used car dealership. By using a car finder you can roam the entire market from the comfort of your desk or specify the type of car you want to buy.

There are a number of car finder sites online which you can visit. They generally provide the same services and vary only with respect to the inventory. If you’re selling a car, a car finder will let you post an ad on its site. You may need to register first and provide the car finder with the necessary information. The wider reach of a good web site puts your car before a larger market than a newspaper or real-life dealership would.

If you’re in the market for a used car, a car finder will let you look at everything that’s available. You can specify what you’re looking for by type of vehicle, brand, model and price range. This narrows your search and saves you a lot of time, gas and shoe leather. Because most car finders post pictures of the cars for sale, you can immediately eliminate those units that you don’t find appealing.

Many car finders offer extra services on their web site. Some feature offers from car insurance companies, repair shops and spare parts dealers. Others show the latest news reports about cars and trucks. Using a car finder can actually put the fun back into looking for a used car.