Hey guys, I just found the forum last night and the amount of info here is amazing for someone like me who doesn’t know about cars.
I am in a rough spot financially and a student of mine is helping arrange a purchase of a 2009 Eclipse GS. It is manual transmission and I drove it for about 10 miles and no red flags were going off, at least obvious ones to someone like me who is interested in but knows very little about cars except for repairs I’ve learned how to do in the past.
Apparently the seller was going to ask around $5000 for it but considering that I’m in a rough spot with an old car that will cost more to fix than it’s worth, he is willing to sell it for $2800 and let me pay installments with half of the price as a down payment. I was wondering first if this is a good price for a GS with about 72k miles on it, since googling around I am seeing prices all over the place. My initial concern was that the car hasn’t been driven for a while since the owner got a new car and then went to Italy, where he is now, for a fairly long time for work. What follows will also affect the asking price and if it’s a good deal, which is regarding the timing belt.
I didn’t even know what a timing belt was 24 hours ago but after reading a whole lot here, I am now seeing this as a potential issue given the age of the car. I wrote to ask and he never had replaced it, and he asked the previous owner who is a friend and she didn’t either. We don’t know about the owner before that, the original owner, so before 2013 it is a mystery but considering the age of the car then and the mileage I’m guessing nothing was done with it that early on (and I’m assuming there’s no way to check either)
After reading the posts here I am concerned. The mileage seems ok but the age doesn’t, since I read that it should have been replaced in 2016 or 2017. My questions are these. 1) is the car safe to drive for a short time until it gets replaced. I have been without a car for three weeks and am a single dad. I’ve made it work somehow with random rides to the store and Uber but I really need to get back on the road. 2) how long should I expect to not have the car while the work is being done (relating to 1, is it ok to drive while waiting for whoever I find to do the work to order parts) and 3) how much should I expect this to cost. I am good at following directions but I don’t know if that’s enough to do such important work myself so I’d be paying for the labor.
And after all of that, is the asking price still ok after factoring in the timing belt (assuming it needs it here). I am thinking, if the asking price is low, to just ask if I can take money out of the first payment to apply to the belt replacement. I was going to pay half up front and I can’t afford that and hundreds of dollars of work because money is absolutely critical right now, the worst I’ve ever had it.
Last, if you have any other suggestions dealing with a car in this situation or advice, I’d appreciate that too. I know that the GS doesn’t seem to be regarded as well as the GT and all that but it will be a commute car for me, the nicest car I’ve had and seemingly the nicest car I could get for 2800 bucks. I just need a reliable ride because I’m a musician and need to get to gigs and teaching, as well as get my daughter around.
Thanks for any advice and your time.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro
I am in a rough spot financially and a student of mine is helping arrange a purchase of a 2009 Eclipse GS. It is manual transmission and I drove it for about 10 miles and no red flags were going off, at least obvious ones to someone like me who is interested in but knows very little about cars except for repairs I’ve learned how to do in the past.
Apparently the seller was going to ask around $5000 for it but considering that I’m in a rough spot with an old car that will cost more to fix than it’s worth, he is willing to sell it for $2800 and let me pay installments with half of the price as a down payment. I was wondering first if this is a good price for a GS with about 72k miles on it, since googling around I am seeing prices all over the place. My initial concern was that the car hasn’t been driven for a while since the owner got a new car and then went to Italy, where he is now, for a fairly long time for work. What follows will also affect the asking price and if it’s a good deal, which is regarding the timing belt.
I didn’t even know what a timing belt was 24 hours ago but after reading a whole lot here, I am now seeing this as a potential issue given the age of the car. I wrote to ask and he never had replaced it, and he asked the previous owner who is a friend and she didn’t either. We don’t know about the owner before that, the original owner, so before 2013 it is a mystery but considering the age of the car then and the mileage I’m guessing nothing was done with it that early on (and I’m assuming there’s no way to check either)
After reading the posts here I am concerned. The mileage seems ok but the age doesn’t, since I read that it should have been replaced in 2016 or 2017. My questions are these. 1) is the car safe to drive for a short time until it gets replaced. I have been without a car for three weeks and am a single dad. I’ve made it work somehow with random rides to the store and Uber but I really need to get back on the road. 2) how long should I expect to not have the car while the work is being done (relating to 1, is it ok to drive while waiting for whoever I find to do the work to order parts) and 3) how much should I expect this to cost. I am good at following directions but I don’t know if that’s enough to do such important work myself so I’d be paying for the labor.
And after all of that, is the asking price still ok after factoring in the timing belt (assuming it needs it here). I am thinking, if the asking price is low, to just ask if I can take money out of the first payment to apply to the belt replacement. I was going to pay half up front and I can’t afford that and hundreds of dollars of work because money is absolutely critical right now, the worst I’ve ever had it.
Last, if you have any other suggestions dealing with a car in this situation or advice, I’d appreciate that too. I know that the GS doesn’t seem to be regarded as well as the GT and all that but it will be a commute car for me, the nicest car I’ve had and seemingly the nicest car I could get for 2800 bucks. I just need a reliable ride because I’m a musician and need to get to gigs and teaching, as well as get my daughter around.
Thanks for any advice and your time.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro