If your goal for keeping your car looking like new is only so you can sell it, Kristen Ziraldo of Niagara-on-the-Lake has a suggestion for you. “Give it to your grandmother to drive until you sell it”. This way you can honestly say a sweet little old lady only drove this car on Sunday’s to go to church.

One of the easiest ways to keep your car looking new is through regular maintenance. Jeffrey Geibel of GEIBEL Solutions Marketing suggests that the most critical basic maintenance items for your car to reach 100,000 kilometres are doing such things as changing your oil and filter every 3,000 to 5,000 kilometres, having a coolant flush every two years and getting the automatic transmission serviced at 30,000 or three years. If nothing else, make sure to get an annual check-up for your car.

Dan D., Car Enthusiast, spends a whole day every spring detailing his two cars himself. Starting with a good and thorough hand wash, including a spray and wash on the underside of the hood and engine bay he then moves onto a thorough claying of his cars from front to back. Although it may look like a piece of clay, it is in fact a synthetic Poly-Elastic resin material specifically made to remove embedded surface contaminants from your car. After the claying has been performed Dan touches up of all paint chips, which involves painting, sanding, starting with a 600 grit wet sandpaper and moving up to 1500 grit, then adding the clear coat and again sanding and buffing. He finishes up by changing the wipers blades and removing, cleaning and storing the winter tires. He finishes the day off by checking all the bulbs and cleaning the inside of the car.