Nat

The seller states that interior is perfect, that he just spent $1700 to fix an engine oil leak, and that the transmission and motor are in excellent condition. He's asking $24,000. The right rear light has cracks in the cover. Tires are new. It's a 1991 964 with ~79,000 miles, no issues on CarFax. I see some deep scratch (or is it a crack?) on the right rear bumper. I'm hoping to schedule a PPI early next week. Comments please. Thanks.

warmfuzzies

First impressions are that it looks a little unloved.....pretty dirty inside and out, tail pipe drooping, oil around the filter housing, handbrake rather high, sound deadening dropping.... etc..

K

Nader Fotouhi

How much of perfectionist are you? The light interior is very difficult to keep clean. The cracks in the seat will look a lot more pronounced when you see them in person, but given the age of the car, are not unusual.

Bottom line, if you can live with cosmetic imperfections, it looks like a sub $20K car to me. I realize it has 80K miles, but would consider whether it has had
60K miles service, clutch replacement, and recent valve adjustment to determine whether I would offer $17-19K.

FWIW, we bought a 93C2 with 59K miles in near perfect condition for $23.5 last Feb.

Good Luck

38D

That looks like the reflection of the umbrella off to the right, not a crack/scratch.

Agree the car looks ratty for $24k. At that price, I would expect it to be much nicer.

joey bagadonuts

Yes, cosmetic issues primarily. As for the handbrake, I think it's just in the locked position. Oil mess below the filter was a good catch--there's a way to do that without spilling and certainly a conscientious owner would clean it up. The droopy tail pipe could suggest worn engine mounts or a loose tail pipe/muffler connection. Not too hard to fix.

I'm not a big fan of the lighter color interiors. They're pretty difficult to keep nice. Black paint looks sharp when shiney but takes work, too. If you can live with that combo, then it's probably worth finding out more about its mechanical condition.

Nat

Thanks for the responses. Please keep it coming; it's very helpful.

warmfuzzies

One who likes his car clean, but well used.

Grey on grey interior.

Kevin

911URGE

That car a had quite the leak based on what I see on the ground - hope its all fixed.

I noticed the clutch and brake pedals are not in the same position in picture #4. This may be an adjustment issue or a sign of something else.

Agree with the others that this car looks, umm, less than Rennlist standards. It may clean up quite well though. Watch for lots of swirls and marring of the paint. I bet this car went through lots of automatic car washes.

Sometimes the the fun of p-car ownership is going through the car and cleaning, fixing and modifying it to make it your own unless you are looking for a garage queen which this car is not even a princess.

jimq

Its over priced and if not then I am happy!
The lights will cost $600+ new to replace on the back.

Richard Curtis

Other things to ask about: When was the distributor belt last changed? You can buy taillights from dismantlers; IIRC, the cost is around $60 per unit. You can repaint all the rear lights with Candy Apple Red Transparent model-car paint + clear and they'll look like new. Even new lights from Porsche most likely will still be pink. $1,700 isn't very much in Porsche terms for oil-leak fixes. Ask specifically what was done for that $1,700. The droopy engine compartment insulation is not rare; easily fixed if the engine ever has to come out. I'd be only a little bit troubled that the current owner obviously didn't keep the car spotless, but the mechanical condition is much more important to a buyer (as someone above pointed out, cleaning it is relatively easy and usually involves only sweat equity, not huge $$$). Also, condition of paint and interior can sometimes be difficult to judge accurately from photographs.

Nat

Finding a suitable car is proving to be challenging. I'm like Julia Roberts' character in Pretty Woman, "I have all this money and no one will sell me anything!"

There's another '91 with a very swanky red interior that I like a lot, but CarFax shows it was in two accidents. I don't suppose anyone here has online access to police records and can look up how major the crashes were?

Indycam

Its a nice car , have you gone and seen it in person .
The price is just the asking price , not the real price .
I see a Mercedes-Benz wheel in the background .
Not everyone keeps there car clean clean all the time , I would not rule out a car because its not clean .
Some people actually drive there 964s like a normal car , just a car .

Bearclaw

If you can poke around in the $24K range as a purchase price, you can do a lot better than this car. Especially considering all the hand-wringing lately about 964 prices dropping.

When people aren't selling their car and don't clean it, that's just personal habits. But when they're trying to sell it and they don't clean it, I think that tells you something about the owner, and how the car might have been treated along the way. JMO.

As far as the Carfax-tainted car: Carfax doesn't catch everything, but when it does catch something, you should considering a gift and $25 well spent. Rule that one out. And TWO crashes? That's car's living under a bad sign.

And the Benz is leased, and the house is rented...

Nat

Heresy! Pretty funny.

I may be heading over to see the car either tomorrow or the next day. The drive will take several hours round trip over a snowy mountain pass, but at least this one is within driving distance. I am planning to call a shop tomorrow to see about setting up a PPI.

Other 964's I've found with similar mileage have an asking price of around $18K. That's a fairly large jump to what this seller is asking. KBB and Edmunds shows selling prices closer to $18K. I will point out some other ads and the KBB and Edmunds true market value figures if I negotiate a purchase.

There was a gorgeous '94 widebody with low miles listed for $25K but that ad only lasted a day before it disappeared.

Nat

I know, not just one crash but TWO crashes! That threw up red flags everywhere.

Maybe this guy just parked the car in his rich cousin's garage for the pics?