djmiroku

I'm looking at purchasing a 2008 Turbo from my local dealer. It's CPO certified and has 5,600 miles. What's the conventional wisdom on a PPI for a low mileage car like this? I'm not sure how long I will own the car.

trevor9098

I'd probably just bring it to another Porsche dealership, or to a Porsche specialist shop. Near me, there was a Porsche master tech, that opened his own performance business. I had him do the PPI on my 2007 TT w/ 21k on it. He found a couple of things the CPO missed, and I had them taken care of under warranty by the dealership.

Macster

It is your call.

In my case of buying -- back in June 2009 -- a low miles (just at 10K mlles) Turbo with a CPO warranty I bought the car and yet I didn't have it PPI'd.

But I visited the car several times more than a few times after hours to look the car over and yet not tip my hand I was interested in the car. (I do not beleive the sales staff reviews security tapes for people shopping cars after hours to spot a customer with the hots for a particular car.)

Even after maybe 6 visits I could find no reason to reject the car.

At the dealer with clear signs from me I was there to buy a car, I viewed other cars, even test drove a 2006 Carrera. But I let the salesman know I was not that interested in the Carrera.

He suggested the Turbo and I expressed some mild reservations and let him proceed to 'sell' me the car.

We talked at some length and then I got to sit in the car and view its interior and trunk and engine compartment. Areas that I could not easily inspect during my after hours visits. The engine was started and allowed to idle while I walked around the car. The engine sounded very healthy.

I was told the car's history, one owner who loved the car (an inside car cover was in the trunk -- the owner kept the car covered in the garage -- and mats to spare the real mats were in the car), that it was a CPO car, and had the salesman go over what that meant. He even gave me copies of the car's CPO paper work and I could see what warranty work, service it had done, and got the overrev readouts too. Nothing at all scary there and engine run time and odometer miles agreed.

The only thing the car needed to bring it CPO certification level was 4 new tires. The tires were not worn out just too old. They were the tires the car had on it when it was sold new back in 2003. Oh, this Turbo story is set in 2009.

A complication arose in that another buyer was looking at the car and in fact trying to buy it. So I backed off as did my the salesman. I didn't want to get into a bidding war and the salesman didn't want to maybe screw the other salesman's sale.

I made arrangements to visit the car the next day.

In the meantime I called around to other dealers and found out what other seriving it had received and every dealer I talked to gave responses to my questions that just increased my confidence the car was a very good, better than good, car and worth owning if the price was right.

So like I arranged with salesman I showed up the next day and the car was still for sale. The salesman took me on a test ride then I got to test drive the car and I decided to make an attempt to buy the car. I was ready and had prices and such all worked out.

After less than 2 hours of rather easy negotiations I ended up buying the car for a very agreesable amount below the car's asking price.

All done without the benefit of a PPI.

However, I did my own after a fashion, in my own way.

Yes, the car had a CPO warranty but even so I was very confident (confident enough to spend $57.7K) that the car was in great condition with no dark secrets, no skeletons.

Which proved to be the case.

Sure, the car developed some problems later on but these were things that were not related to any thing basically wrong with the car or even more to the point related to any thing a PPI would have turned up. These things developed after I had added thousands of miles (aorund 20K miles) to the car after I bought it.

And to a one the CPO warranty covered the problems 100%.

So, if you feel capable of doing your own PPI and can interpret the CPO paperwork, do your own phone work, leg work in order to learn all you can about the car and know you can can take a test ride then a test drive in the car and come back with the confidence you can make the right decision on the car then a PPI is not necessary.

Sincerely,

Macster.

TT-911

PPI on a CPO car is a waste of time and money imo. Just have them present you with a DME read out if you want something to look at.
If you would encounter a problem after purchase it's covered anyway.

malmasri

DME readout is all you want, I would not waste my time and money on a PPi if it is CPO car. tou have Porsche warrenty behind it for years

C2 Turbo

I agree DME read out and the paint meter reading is all I would want.

I don't think as a Porsche dealership I would let the car be taken to another Porsche dealership or to an indy.

No matter where you buy the car, you still need to do your own homework

Zeus993

As mine was out of warrenty I PPI'd and DME'd it. No problems were found and it was a local custom ordered car, owned by a guy who owned 3 cars, thus the low mileage. Minor blemishes the dealer fixed and thanks to this forum and reading as many post as possible looking for common issues, I sit today a proud TT owner.
I think for peace of mind you could get a PPI done by an indepenedent even on a CPO car. I would hate to buy a car that had been trashed (then again hardly suitable to be CPO'd) and even through covered my warrenty go through the hassles to fix it. Understand too that these cars are generally owned by high net worth individuals who have the cash to bypass the dealership and insurance companies to fix things off the grid. So again, a PPI by someone that know the details on these cars is not a bad idea. It will just cost you a bit upfront.

djmiroku

Thanks for the replies everyone. I'm probably going to skip the PPI for now. If any problems come up I'll just use the warranty.