golock911

Yes, 3-4 days a week 65mi round trip. And weekends. To be fair, my engine was redone 12k mi ago(to guaranty reliability for the next 10+ years), and I've changed out the suspension and wheels. But the car is bulletproof. It's so good, I sold my never fail Prius.

I'm almost convinced that if you find a car that has NOT been sitting, has documented 6 month oil changes, fewer owners, you're golden. Good luck finding that car. It will be higher mileage. But that's OK. Drive and smile...

theprf

A guy in the 996 Turbo forum just hit 700,000 miles on his car. He lives in RI (I think) and commutes to Boston. Year round. For the last 23 years.

dcsjc

Bought my 2004 C4S in 2005 with 7k miles, raised my kids in it, and daily drove it until 2022, and since then 1-2days per week. Now has 104k miles. Live in the SF Bay Area and have taken it down to LA, up and down highway 1, over to Yosemite, and up to Lake Tahoe plenty of times. Always reliable, only one breakdown ever (water pump), have kept up with all the standard maintenace and replaced all the usual things. Get ready to buy plenty of tires, esp if you drive in a lively manner (like me!).

Mike Murphy

There are many daily drivers, but back in 2005, when I frequented the air-cooled sections, having had a then 17 year-old 911 with 90,000 miles on it, we would always say to “budget $1000/mo for maintenance and repairs.”

Many folks get lucky and have no failed
items. They drive their car for 2-4 years and sell it at the same price they bought it for. It’s like a free car.

Other folks need to drop $25k on week 2 because their engine failed (there was a reason the PO was selling it).

Many in between are doing “proactive” maintenance, replacing all fluids, rubber hoses, upgrading the AOS to Skip’s solution, doing engine mounts, fuel injectors, plugs/coils, refreshing the suspension, water pump, coolant tank, doing the IMSB, new clutch/RMS ‘while you’re in there’, etc. Make no mistake, add up the above, and it’s five figures.

There is a difference between a hobbiest and an enthusiast. A hobbiest will do the above proactive work, much of it themselves, and it’s a labor of love. They sit back and know their car now runs and handles way better than before. This is the price one pays for an expensive hobby, although this is still cheap compared to how crazy one can get with a car (my friend spent an additional $160k on his Corvette after buying it new).

An enthusiast (that’s me) might just fix stuff when it breaks. While I had my 986 Boxster S (arguably similar in reliability to the 996), it only suffered two failures: a fuel pump ($600), and a door micro switch ($400). Otherwise, nothing, over about 3 years.

I’ve had my 996 for 7 years now. I have been both lucky and unlucky. The only major costly repair was two sequential back to back solenoid failures, which ultimately fried my DME. That was a $7k repair in all (included tensioner pads at two different shops at two different times). I’ve also spent money on paint correction and ceramic coating ($1700), a new top ($2,000), and tracked my car a few times ($800 each time due to insurance, oil changes, brake fluid and brake pads each time).

If I only include maintenance and repairs that were required, including tires and brakes, I’ve spend about $10,000 in 7 years. And of course, my car has gone up in value nearly that much since then. Anyone buying a 996 today will notice their car is likely to be worth more in the future. The bottom pricing for these cars is in the history books.

This is a very long winded way of saying that these cars are very good value, very reliable, sometimes #2 behind Toyota (not kidding), but you need to plan for a rainy day scenario (eight figures) and face that threat head-on, eyes open.
There’s a reason people on the street yell “nice car” or think ‘I’m rich’ even though I drive an old car. They say, ‘yeah, but it’s a fancy car.’ Most people cannot stomach the idea of a five figure repair, although they do so all the time when their home’s HVAC fails, they need a new roof, or they want their kids to go to college (6 figs?).

So plan for the worst and chalk it up to the price we pay to drive these cars. If you take cost out of the equation, I’d drive a 911 all day, every day. There is no better daily. There is no substitute.

Szabi

Thank you everyone (so far), for the insight and guidance it's been very helpful. Finding that well maintained daily driver will be the challenge, as in my experience most people do not maintain their vehicles well, and that goes for these cars also. I am looking to unload an Audi wagon first and hopefully start looking at potentials in the coming weeks. I would prefer an early coupe with LSD and rear wiper and thats about it.

911Dreamer

I have been on the forums for a long time, I was a lurker in Rennlist when I was getting info for the 996 and mostly on Pelican when I DD my 1980 SC Targa converted cab…

My 911s purchases were not been PPId, when I bought and shipped them to me, some may call me a fool or just lucky that nothing major occurred during my ownership. What I did do is gather from the knowledge I learned from both Pelican and Rennlist, did the research and got documents for the cars I wanted to buy. I was lucky to contact the PO of my 2004 Targa and pick his brain and get documents of maintenance he did. He now owns a 991.1 coupe, so I knew he was a Porsche enthusiast as we laughed about the IMS fear on the boards as we chatted about the Targa.

Unpopular opinion there is a lot of fear on the boards and in some cases, the Vendors are the ones making money off this fear and I don’t care because I experienced the same chatter about stud pulling away from the case on the 3.0 Engine, sump plates, CIS injection blah blah. Have these Vendors created better updated parts? In a sense yes for the crowd that wants to fully drive the 996 to its limits, but for me as a street DD, I will continue to use OEM parts.

Are the above warranted? Yes and No, as well know all 911s have issues no matter what. The important part is to maintain the 911 to high levels, especially is one is to daily drive it.

I got my 2004 Targa with 68.5k miles on it and 2 recent 60k services. 1 from a well-known Indy shop and 1 from a Porsche GA dealership. The paperwork had no indications of problems or parts that needed current repair. Both shops gave it clean bill of health. We shall see if, if this true in the next 2 weeks.

I have had this Targa for 5 months and it’s on my only vehicle and DD 4 to 5 days a week since my ownership. Groceries, gym, concerts, NBA games, happy hours, etc. You name it, the 996 is there with its 6 speed.

I do have to admit on short trips to the gym or to drop off packages, I must let the 996 fully warm up to operating temps and that means driving longer than I would on a short trip, its not a Toyota or any other normal car. This is not a normal car in a sense that you have to abide by the engines operating routine and not some car that you can turn off or on in for a short trip.

As you stated the 996 is very DIY friendly and there are so many videos on Youtube that can help out with repairs. That being said, my oil change is coming due and this is were the costs are going to go up for me.

I am going to have the shop have a look at my Targa and see what is currently needed to continue to maintain it to high standards as the POs did and for items that I need to be proactive. When the oil change is being done, I will ask the shop to collect the old oil for me to send that out to Blackstone to get analyzed.

I already know at 73.5 miles the Expansion tank needs to get replaced, hoses checked and replaced, water pump replaced, coolant flushed. while I am in there Clutch, IMS, RMS, AOS. While I have no issues with the above, I know these are proactive items that need to replaced.

I also know that I need a suspension refresh and while I am in there, I will be adding coil overs. These are all DDs items and I know some I missed like the 997 oil cooler update, variocam etc...Which otther may chime in are part of the cost of owning a Porsche.

You also need to check out which 996 you want, for me I wanted a Targa unaware that the 996.1 had 5 chains vs the 3 chain engine 996.2. I also wanted a glovebox and better headlight design ( )

dporto

“Most people cannot stomach the idea of an eight figure repair”

Does that include the two figures after the decimal point? Even so, I’ve never heard of a 6 figure repair either… If it was going to cost over 100k (that’s “6 figures”) to have a repair done I think I’d just buy another car…
Or did I misunderstand what you were saying?

DBJoe996

Better hurry up and make your choice...all our ICE cars will soon be banned, according to our President.

Szabi

Not sure I follow, if all ICE cars are banned then why hurry?

911Dreamer

Where's the link? Or is this just a FL thing?

California is gearing up to prohibit the sale of new gas-powered cars. A measure approved by the California Air Resources Board in August 2022 requires all new cars, SUVs and pickup trucks sold in the state to generate zero tailpipe emissions by 2035. The policy won't take existing vehicles off the road, but automakers and car dealers will be restricted to selling electric vehicles and certain plug-in hybrids.

Considering how the EV junk is going these days....That ban of new ICE cars could change in the future...

DBJoe996

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/bid...to-be-electric

911Dreamer

I'll take that news source with a grain of salt and it also states, "'This regulation will make NEW gas-powered vehicles unavailable or prohibitively expensive for most Americans,

What does this have to do with with our current 996s, 997s, 991s, 992s?

Szabi

Does not apply to used vehicles, again not sure how this impacts anyone looking for a used 996 or any other vehicle, unless you are talking about future purchase costs.

Porschetech3

What will happen is that 70% of the people will stop buying NEW vehicles .. This will kill the US Auto Maker Industry, but will bolster the Auto Repair Industry.....
There are already hundreds of thousands of EV's sitting that will not sell.

The way our system works, you can't "force" people to buy something they don't want, they will do something else...lol

DBJoe996

I was being a bit sarcastic. But what Porschetech3 states is correct. I hate when government dictates what I, as a consumer, can buy. This is America...right?