True Miles Unknown. For some folks these three words conjure up the fear of a car with more miles on it than the Grateful Dead. Others simply head on off to Carfax and try to approximate the mileage figure.
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Posts By: Steven Lang
The good old days of late summer 2009.
It was a great time to buy a new car. Monthly new car sales in North America had plummeted to under 10 million units. Access to financing seemed to be near impossible for a lot of consumers. Brands were orphaned. Leasing collapsed. Banks were picky. The future was uncertain and… raw materials were cheap.
It was a good time to buy new at a deep, deep discount. Has that time passed?
Air conditioning, Automatic, Leather Seats, and what passes as true luxury for those Northern types who are used to keeping an old European car. A rear defroster! This age old beauty will be sold this week at a nearby auction in Atlanta.
Name it. Year, make, model, prior owner, their phone number… anything that would help me buy it when I’m bidding against 80+ dealers. I need all the help I can get.
755,507 miles.
This Ford F250 has truly lived up to all the rigors of what a long lasting truck represents. Mileage beyond the moon. Scuffs aplenty. Vinyl seats. Not to mention an engine and powertrain that truly stood the test of time.
The time has come. After oh so many years of driving the same old beater, it’s finally time for you to pass the torch to the next owner.
God help them. (Read More…)
Tercel. Echo. Yaris.
When the history of great cars is written, these models will likely not be anywhere near the short list.
The first generation Insight was a commercial failure. Eight years yielded fewer than 20,000 unit sold and a lingering doubt about the genuine interest in two seat commuter cars.
Honda tried again with the CR-Z, and apparently George Orwell’s early Animal Farm analogy about ‘four being better than two’ may be all too true for the American automotive marketplace.
Nobody wants an uber-frugal commuter car with two seats. It’s either four or no sale.
9:15 A.M. Labor Day.
I get a surprise message on Facebook this morning from a guy who bought an old Volvo 940 wagon from me nearly six years ago.
“That BMW? What did it go for?”
A month ago, I posted this article regarding the grey market Bimmer. It had sold on the block for a mere $2,300 due in part to a broken odometer. I clicked on the Ebay listing hoping for a fair disclosure. Instead I got…
Editor’s note: There is a review of this model back from the Farago days. We have an awful lots of old reviews. So feel free to read up on them.
Hello again, Steven,
You may recall our email last March regarding our 1992 Lexus SC300 5-Speed. Thanks for the reply; guess the timing was bad for you with tax time coming up. As you may recall, the car is all original, black with gray interior, looks and runs great, and has slightly less than 25K miles. Here’s the backstory:
Whether you drive a $30,000 or a $1,500 a car, one variable in life stays constant.
You want to minimize your costs.
When it comes to buying a used car there are two basic negotiating mindsets. You can either be fair and decent or unfair and obnoxious. If you seek to chisel and deceive then chances are you will get a bad car. Only the desperate and deceitful are willing to put up with that type of BS.
Want a ‘great’ car? Then realize that many sellers respond extremely well to honesty and decency. Win – win is no sin. So, karma lovers, here’s some tips for negotiating the purchase of a used car by observing the Golden Rule.
Congratulations!!! And my condolences.
You have just bought yourself a vehicle that may be worth more dead than alive.
Did you follow my car buying advice? Of course not! You wanted cheap to the extreme and now you got it. Bald tires. Doors that may be lovably ‘scrunched’ just a little bit thanks to those pesky inanimate objects. But hey, at least the ashtray still works.
Now you just have to figure out what to do with it?
There is a well traveled myth in the animal kingdom when it comes to dogs.
Seven years = One human year. In reality, dogs will often reach their version of adulthood within the first year to two years of their life.
The same is true with certain sports cars.
[Ed: Part one of Steve Lang’s updated used car buying guide is here, part two is here.]
You can rigorously apply the tests described by previous installments of this series without encountering a single setback. However when it comes to buying a used car, it pays to assume one simple salient fact: you don’t know the complete truth.
At least not yet.
Sometimes there is no point in buying new.
Case in point? Well consider the folks who are the anti-enthusiasts. The ones who look at cars as rolling spreadsheets where the owner simply needs to divine the biggest bang for the buck.
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