soroboto

Hi folks, I'm new around here so please let me know if I'm out of place. I'm looking at a 2001 Porsche 911 Carrera convertible with 58,000 miles. The Carfax is a bit odd as it jumps from 2001 to 2009 when the first owner who drove it 4,131/yr finally shows a service. It was sold in 2010 to its second owner who drove it 782 mi/yr until it was purchased by the dealer in 2021. The carfax shows no accidents, 2 owners and 5 service records. It comes with the removable hard top.

There are no service records to speak of. I am assuming IMS has not been done. The car itself is in good cosmetic shape and it is in the color combo that I have been looking for. I did take it for a pre-purchase inspection which showed: 0% brakes left in front and 25% in the rear. Brake fluid needs change, windshield washer pump needs to go, the RR wheel was apparently repaired at some point (welded), HVAC throws out pieces of foam at times, smells slightly moldy inside and it has 4 SNOW tires with little tread left. I got an estimate for $4K to sort out all of its issues and put on four all-season tires.

The listing price is 27K and I was able to bring it down to $26K. They are telling me they can get at least 26 at auction so will no lower it although I showed them the inspection report and the work that would need to be done. I know the market is pretty high right now and I don't want to miss a potentially good local deal, so I wanted to get some opinions from others to see if I should definitely walk away from this car or take a chance on it. The good thing is that I've had a chance to test drive it and see it in person vs other deals I'm looking at which are remote and would involve shipping. Thanks for any advice to a first time Porsche buyer!

hatchetf15

OP - Welcome and good luck with your search. What area are you in? Is this car a 6 speed? What color, wheels, etc? Any options worth note? $26k seems pretty steep for a .1 cabrio unless the car has LSD, great color, mint interior/paint and such. IMS, clutch, brakes, good tires are gonna be more like $6k+. Broken wheel and heater blend door foam, mold smell (possible the ragtop?) are not great signs of a well-kept, garaged car.

Mike Murphy

The biggest concern would be potential lack of routine fluid changes. I would try to find out who the original owner was and see if you can find out what was done.

soroboto

The color is forest metallic green with tan interior. It's an auto with tip (I know). I am in Ohio area. I wouldn't say there are any notable options on it, it's a RWD, power seats, comes with the hardtop (in my search many of cabs have had the hardtop delete). The interior is not mint but no major issues either. I would think this car should be worth in the low 20s but like I said, in the current market I wonder if they have appreciated for the foreseeable future as I am not finding many good condition 996's with low mileage at much lower price.

Thanks for the concerns and the fluids! Unfortunately the original owner is now far removed from me so I wouldn't have any way of finding out.

jdbornem

I haven't searched the market in a while, but a Cabrio auto is going to be lower than others. Forest green is a nice color, and better than your typical silver/black.

I would look at it like this: how much can you afford to spend? Because it won't cost you just $26k.

You've already identified that it will cost you $30k-32k, all in, once you get the issues that you know of sorted. Unknown issues could put you anywhere from $33k - 52k (engine rebuild). So, the question is, what is the probability that you currently know all issues with this particular car, or that there are other, potentially major and costly, unknowns?

No brakes and bald winter tires (now, at the end of the summer) means that it wasn't taken care of at all, and that it's been sitting or has been with the dealer for 6-8 months minimum. The dealer doesn't care about it either, or they would have at least changed the brake pads as part of their prep for sale. It's not hard and surely their service people could have handled it, and I can't imaging them being okay selling a car with no brakes and bald tires. These cars, when well prepped for sale, can sell for good premium, just look at Bring A Trailer.

The mold smell would be seriously concerning. It might be the top, and a clean will fix it, but mold is the kind of thing that you could pursue forever and never be rid of. Was the car flooded at some point? Cabrio top drains can get plugged and will flood the cabin leading to water and mold in the carpet. There's certainly no indication that prior owners would have shown enough care to clean the drains, or that the dealer would have done anything other than a superficial clean to hide it.

Brake fluid needs changed, and given the apparent care of the car overall, do you think oil was regularly changed? I wouldn't. So what's the actual life expectancy of the engine?

Overall, I would rate the chances of finding new and exciting (expensive) issues with this car as pretty high. So, if this car will ultimately cost you $32-$50k, why not just look for another car, which seems well sorted and taken care of, for somewhere in the low $30's? It will be more upfront, but it might be much less in the long run.
Which is why I ask, how much can you afford to spend? If you can only afford $26k-30k, then this is not the car for you at this time. If you can afford more, find a better car.

Of course maybe you know everything and this car is a great deal. I personally wouldn't regret passing on what might have been a great deal, when it also might have been a money pit.

All of that said, I tend to be pretty conservative with respect to risk, so I may have missed out on more than my share of great deals. If you are more risk tolerant, go for it!

philbert996

Do you have your heart set on a moldy cabrio with an automatic?

If not, there’s plenty of nice 996s out there.
You just have to be patient.
Good luck with whatever you decide.

Mpfaff

Jdbornem,very good points,well written.

Optionman1

Great color but otherwise this car is a hard NO. A Tip Cab is the least expensive combination and should never command a premium. This car has not been well maintained and its next owner will quickly find out just how expensive a 996 can be. Keep looking for a better 996, they are out there.

jcr847

That’s a terrible buy. Others have covered the relevant points so just chiming in with the headline…

Fishah

Ok this made me chuckle but... You're not wrong.

GC996

I would be very concerned that there are no service records.

I would be very concerned that there are no pads left.

What this tells me is there has been little service performed, few oil changes, which means a boat load of potential problems which means a lot of future costs.

Not a problem if you love the car and want to keep it until you can't drive it any more, and are willing to potentially kick in 20-30k for an engine rebuild.

But what if there is a 996 carbrio with service records out there?

I suspect there is. But it's easy being an arm chair QB.

At the very least get an in depth PPI performed with a bore scope to eliminate that variable.

soroboto

Well, this has been extremely helpful and you have all far surpassed my expectations of posting on this forum. Thank you all for helping me avoid a costly and potentially moldy mistake, particular thanks to jdbornem for the great write-up which really clarified every bit of this decision!

I'm ashamed to say I never learned how to drive a stick, I'm not sure a Porsche is a good first car to learn with. I'll increase my budget and look for some automatic 996s and possibly 997s in better shape and hopefully the tiptronic/PDKs will save me some money over the manuals.

Flyfishnick

Sticks are a blast to drive and it won't take you long to learn it, trust me. Take a friend who knows how to drive a stick and have them test drive with you in it. Just gotta get in and try it and after a bit, you won't look back. However if you are going to DD the car in traffic, a manual is not fun. Ask me how I know: I live in Seattle

azlvr

My thumbs shift a lot faster and easier than my right hand. My left leg is happier too. I stopped buying manuals a long long time ago and never regretted it.

dporto

^^^... I suppose whatever works for you is fine, but to me a “sports car” has a manual transmission - end of story. All this being said, this car is priced way high for what it is...