Where is My Car

Do you sometimes ask “where did I park my car?”

In this article, I will explain the best ways to find your lost or parked car and discuss the benefits of each.

Ways To Find Your Car

There are a few ways to find your car:

• A Parking Finder App.
• A GPS tracker installed in your car.

Parking Finder Apps

There are many apps that you can install on your phone that may help you find your parked car.

They work like this:

you park somewhere, then you must open the app and click Park to save your car location.

Later, if you don’t remember where your car was parked, you open the app and click Find My Car.

The app will show a map with your current GPS location and your car’s GPS position that you saved when you parked.

You then start to walk in the direction of your car on the map.

Parking App Problem

There are a few problems I have found with parking apps:

1. You must remember to open the app and save the location when you park. There are many times I didn’t remember where I parked but didn’t remember to save the location in the app either.
2. Most of the time I remembered where I parked, so I wasn’t in the habit of using the app.

A Better Way to Find Your Car

I wanted a better way to find my parked car, and did not want to pay the high monthly fees of traditional GPS trackers which are typically $20 / month.

I wanted to install this in both our cars and keep the monthly cost very cheap, a $5 data plan for each car was fine.

So, we had some old cell phones that were not being used, my wife’s old iPhone and my old Samsung Galaxy Android phone.

See why cell phones are better GPS trackers.

I got the cheap data plan for $5 for each phone and ordered the SIM card kit. Once the SIM cards arrived I got the old phones working.

The next step was to download and install the Trakkit app on each phone. This will allow for tracking and locating your car.

I created a different email login for each phone, something like mycarphone1@gmail… you can use any email you want, just use a different one or create a new one, if needed.

Then I tested the Trakkit app and phone by driving around with the phones in my area.

The next step was to permanently mount the phones in each car.

Since I had the phones, the charging cables and a cheap data plan, all I needed was a way to install a 12 volt to USB charger adapter in the car.

Every car has a fuse panel usually on the drivers side panel.

Here is the kit and adapter I used.

Once installed I just routed the phone charger cable under the dash and secured the phone under the dash with a velcro strap.

There are more details on hardwiring the phone in the car.

This method of finding a parked car has many benefits:

1. You don’t have to remember to open the app every time you park the car.
2. The car has a permanent GPS tracker installed, so if it is stolen or towed, you can find it.
3. In the event you can’t find your car, open the Trakkit app and see where the car was parked.

Using a parking app, you have to remember to save the location of your car in case you forgot where it is parked.

With a phone tracker installed, you don’t have to remember anything, just use the Trakkit app in case you forgot where your car was parked.

Did Someone Borrow Your Car?

For example, maybe you lent your car to a friend and you want to know where they took your car if something should happen.

You will be able to see a GPS trail on your phone app that shows where your car traveled and for how long. Did they stay at a reasonable speed limit?

This feature is available if you use the Trakkit app.

Is my Car Towed

Perhaps you parked your car somewhere and it was towed. A GPS Tracker will help you find your car to make recovery easier.

if your car was towed you will be able to find it by tracking its last know location or current GPS location. You can also get an Alert on your phone the second it is moved.

Is my Car Stolen

There are many cars stolen every year, see the statistics below:
Stolen Car statistics

You may also get a reduction in your car insurance rates if you have a GPS Tracker installed, check with your insurance company.

Additionally, for those looking to further enhance their vehicle’s security and surveillance, especially during nighttime drives, check out our article on the best front and rear dash cams with night vision.

Conclusion

Finding where your car is parked can be critical and offer security from being stolen

A GPS Tracker can bring you peace of mind and added security to your car.

See more details on how to track a car.