I found a 2001 Silverado, extended cab with a 4.8L. It's in really good shape, the engine bay is ridiculously clean as is the interior. There are two issues that I'm having with it.
1. The front end on the right side was in some kind of slow moving accident..it put a really small bend in the bumper and the fender. It looks like the plastic above the bumper can no longer attach to the bumper. It's been drilled and was secured to something in the undercarriage with a metal strap. I asked them to get an estimate as to how much it'll cost to get fixed and might add that into the price.
2. The mileage..it has like 150K miles on it. Again..damn, that just seems like a lot to me. I know you guys say it's not much but it seems like a ton! If they didn't take care of it during those 150K miles it could be on it's last leg. It starts up and sounds perfect, idles fine, and the test drive is tomorrow.
They were wasking 9.5K for it, I said I'm paying cash so they dropped the price to 6.3K immediately..no haggeling involved. What do you guys think? What do I need to look for? I check the transmission fluid and it has an odor..burned I can't say, I wouldn't know. It was pretty clear though..I don't know what else to look for honestly...driving it will probably tell me a lot.
Tomorrow there's no way I can pick it up, so the soonest I'll be able to say it's mine is probably Wednesday morning..just like to get your opinions.
Will race for food
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stay away, far away.
-Borsty
Reasoning?
Will race for food
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I think you win the award for most posts on buying a car, 4 posts all on the 1st page! Congrats...
Yeah, I'm getting really pissed about it...things have not been going my way at all with this and more than anything it's frustrating the hell out of me. It'd be easier if my wife would make up her damn mind about what she's OK with...one day it's one thing the next it's not..getting @!#$ old.
But thanks for pointing that out...
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My boss has one with a 5.3, 190,000 on it and it's still running DAMN good.
If they willingly dropped the price that quick though, that's odd.. very odd. That's a huge drop. Something tells me to stay away and find something better.
1983 Camaro Z28
I honestly think the guy messed up. He pulled out a paper and looked at the pricing and said we'll take this much for it..I think he saw how low he could go and read that amount.
This isn't the first car dealership that's done this. The first one I went to dropped 2K when I said cash..from 9K to 7K with no negotiation. Another dropped it 1500 the same way. I've only had one place tell me theyd only go down a couple hundred with me paying cash.
Will race for food
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Another thing, if you decide to buy a truck from a dealership tell them you want to see a carfax report before you make the final decision in buying it. Any decent dealer will have a carfax account and won't argue with your request. Those aren't always accurate but they do offer a better piece of mind.
My dad has an '00 with the baby V8 and its still kicking strong with over 200K Miles on it.
The over 200K miles is promising. I put about 6K miles a year on my primary vehicle..and this is a second..so we're looking at like 4K miles a year max.
The wife and I talked about it..and we hate the idea of buying a used car..but it's kinda like..if stuff breaks, just get it fixed. It happens and it's a risk you take with buying anything used : /
The way I look at it..unless you're buying from someone you know...you have no clue what you're getting. Carfax is a really good idea, going to definently do that.
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From the sounds of it you need to check an auto trader maybe. I mean if all these dealerships have high mileage trucks, check the locals. I mean if your paying cash you might find a better deal, at least lower miles.
How many steps to heaven, Doc?
...Ah, metaphysics.
Jonathan Pike wrote:From the sounds of it you need to check an auto trader maybe. I mean if all these dealerships have high mileage trucks, check the locals. I mean if your paying cash you might find a better deal, at least lower miles.
I agree. You can't beat buying a used car from the person that actually knows some history of the car. The dealer will just be guessing how it was maintained.
Rob
Sold 2/2/05
Hellion179 wrote:I honestly think the guy messed up. He pulled out a paper and looked at the pricing and said we'll take this much for it..I think he saw how low he could go and read that amount.
This isn't the first car dealership that's done this. The first one I went to dropped 2K when I said cash..from 9K to 7K with no negotiation. Another dropped it 1500 the same way. I've only had one place tell me theyd only go down a couple hundred with me paying cash.
Which is more weird because dealers hate cash. They make WAY more on the financing then they do on profit from selling the vehicle.
Rabbit(AKA RedAssassin) wrote:Hellion179 wrote:I honestly think the guy messed up. He pulled out a paper and looked at the pricing and said we'll take this much for it..I think he saw how low he could go and read that amount.
This isn't the first car dealership that's done this. The first one I went to dropped 2K when I said cash..from 9K to 7K with no negotiation. Another dropped it 1500 the same way. I've only had one place tell me theyd only go down a couple hundred with me paying cash.
Which is more weird because dealers hate cash. They make WAY more on the financing then they do on profit from selling the vehicle.
Actually dealers love cash or check or credit card etc... Depends if they really marked up the vehicle to #1/excellent condition pricing territory when in reality the vehicle is in #2 or worse then the dealer can still make a big profit depending on how much they paid for it to begin with if they come down a few grand for a cash paying customer. Take for instance when my wife was shopping for a used Saturn SL1 last year this one dealership had one with 88,000+mi on it and it was listed for $6,500. First thing out of the salesman mouth was we can come down to $5,500 and then we took a test drive and heard a problem with the motor so we had it checked out by a mechanic who gave us a $500+ estimate to fix all the problems and told us he wouldn't pay a dime over $4,500 unless the dealer fixed everything. Obviously the dealer marked the car up more than it was worth and either fixed the car or sold it to a sucker. When buying a car do your homework, borrow a Kellys Blue Book from the library and have it checked out by a mechanic but if they don't want you to have it checked by a mechanic just walk away because that can only mean the vehicle has some major problems.
carfax doesnt mean crap, we use to check it and stil sell it.
thats why i got out of it.
yea repairs are expensive
I drove it today..the steering wheel was not centered and it pulled to the right..same side as the accident. I said I would not buy unless it was checked out my a mechanic..and I wouldn't buy until it was fixed. They wouldn't adjust the price at all, so I walked away. Probably a better idea anyway.
So I spent the remainder of the day looking..I drove to some nearby towns and looked there, found a lot of nice vehicles..but they just refuse to go down on the price...My wife and I decided we're buying an F150..she likes the styling and so do I. I agree with others on buidl quality..but I'll be driving it so little I hope it won't matter. Oh well..This makes about four 8hr days of shopping..getting tired.
I tried autotrader too and called some people up..met them and all that..Seems like they want more money than dealers do..oh well..I'll keep looking
I left my name and number at a lot of places and I get about 10 calls a day..it goes something like..I have a 1998 for you, it has 186K miles but they only want 8500...I'm like O.o
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Yea, my wife and I spent months before buying a car. I hate car shopping.
Rabbit, what did you guys do? Just keep going to the same small dealerships or how did you go about doing it? I left my number at just about every dealership and they've been calling me, so can I count on that for when they get new inventory?
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is this truck daily driver? snow driver? car hauler? what will it be doing for the rest of its days 4.8s remaunufauctured are cheap a 4L60 which should be the trans is another common item. 1500 bucks for a trans if its dying. what worries me about older cars and trucks of any brand is wires i once bought a used car with a rats nest of a wire a harness. does the have any dash lights on?
