Anyone near Modesto, CA that can look at a car for me?

[Jimsx]

There's a black '98 up there with 55k miles that I was gonna buy. Offer in and accepted ($39K) . Owner assures me the car is near flawless. Carfax doesn't reveal any odometer dampering but I'm getting suspicious. Still waiting for service records. It was going in for a PPI today. He just sent me some hi-res pictures and I think the paint is far from perfect. Also, the driver side seat is worn bad. Much worse than I would expect for the miles. It's a one owner car and he's been spoon feeding me how well kept the car has been but I hate to fly up there to pick it up and find out otherwise. Is there anyone around there that can go look at it for me? I would be grateful and will pay you $100 for your trouble. Thanks

 

[Big_D]

Still waiting for service records.

I wouldn't bother until you get them. Have him FAX them to you. The price seems cheap unless it has deferred maintenence.

Expect to see some paint chips on the nose, hood, and fenders. If it doesnt have any, I would suspect paint work.

BTW, When I was looking for a car I found a one owner car in Seatle that the owner advertised as "FLAWLESS" and it turned out haveing 8K worth of body work and paint due to an accident and the CARFAX was clean. CARFAX is only good for Odometer rollbacks...not accident history.

Hope this helps.

 

[Jimsx]

Thanks D. The car def sounded cheap to me too. I've been in the market for an '02+ and about 20k miles ($60K or so) when I came across this one. It sounded like a fantastic deal and since I'm gonna FI (425rwhp) or so the car, I thought this would be a more palatable platform if I 'grenade' the motor. I was gonna have him fax the service stuff today. If there are any holes in the timeline, I'm out. If the timeline is good I'd still like to have someone look at it before I go up there.

 

[clr1024]

There's a black '98 up there with 55k miles that I was gonna buy. Offer in and accepted ($39K) . Owner assures me the car is near flawless. Carfax doesn't reveal any odometer dampering but I'm getting suspicious. Still waiting for service records. It was going in for a PPI today. He just sent me some hi-res pictures and I think the paint is far from perfect. Also, the driver side seat is worn bad. Much worse than I would expect for the miles. It's a one owner car and he's been spoon feeding me how well kept the car has been but I hate to fly up there to pick it up and find out otherwise. Is there anyone around there that can go look at it for me? I would be grateful and will pay you $100 for your trouble. Thanks

With 55K miles the seat doens't look that bad, although its a tad hard to tell from that picture. My car had 58K miles when I bought it, black interior and was worn on the bolster as well. That is common, as many people tend to rub there butt on the bolster when getting in and out. However one picture does not paint the whole picture. Also one man's definition of flawless is another man's definition of trashed....get the maintenance records, I agree $39k seems low for a 98, but if you are going FI, depending on the car might not be a bad place to start...favorable results coming from the HP turbo kit at their current price point.

 

[Jimsx]

Thanks 1024. I've got a hi-res pic he sent that shows the bolster being much worse than the jpeg I posted here. I wish I could post it so you guys could look at it. I'm not sure if it's normal or perhaps he left the top off too much and UV killed all the leather and that spot the most. Oh well, this will play out as it should. Either he produces all docs and it actually has near flawless paint, I'm over it.