looking at 90' euro - need input

Good Afternoon All !

Looking at a 90 euro for my son. 3.1, auto trans, 159k miles, red 4 door,
buckets, auto on floor, pwr windows, tilt wheel, manual seats, sun roof.
High miles I know, but the body / interior looks very good for a 90 appears a non smoker interior. No tears or dents but the rear headliner is drooping.

I've been looking for a month for one and there are a lot out there but 90 percent are used past their years or just basic grocery getters (good for mom but not a teenager).

If it drives well what would be a good price to offer at the car lot ?

And if successful what would be the first PM's to do on it other than oil/filter ?

*Service transmission
*Flush / refill cooling system
*Recommended coolant type please ?
*Flush / refill power stearing unit ?
* Fuel Filter
* Etc., Etc.

Thanks,
Stan

well, you can look up the value of cars at http://www.kbb.com but from my past experience, I wouldnt go with a 1990. Mine had brake issues. It seemd as though every other year we were putting 300.00+ in the brakes. The motor was good till the end when we had to replace the ecm, and it was never the same, so we sold it. Mine was however the 2.5L 4 cyl, worst motor ever. The 3.1's are good though. I'd say, if you can get that car for maybe 800 bux, go for it.

Ditto. wouldn't give a whole lot for it, no matter how nice. About 1K at tops. The 3.1 is a decent torquer, feels faster than it really is. That's tempting to a teen (and me, almost 40:lol:), so at that mileage and assuming a relatively easy life so far, it wouldn't suprise me if that tranny or motor gets grenaded in short order, if you got an aggressive driver. Not that they aren't a very good driveline, but that is typical for GM cars that find themselves in that situation. At the least, the roll restrictors will get torn off the motor quick, but that's an easy fix.I worked at a service station garage for 15 years. Our biggest client base was retired folks. Gram and Gramps Cutlass, Lumina, Bonneville, would inevitably go to the grandkid, when they got their license, and the result was usually a really nice, older, high mileage domestic sedan with it guts hangin' out on the back of my wrecker whithin a few months. Used to piss the hell outta me. Seen more good cars go down the drain that way. Upshot: Get it cheapo enough to contemplate an engine or tranny catastrophe repair, or consider spending a little more on a Honda accord or Toyota Corrola, something a little more bulletproof. Maybe you got a responsible kid driver, and this won't be an issue, then I say go for it. Otherwise, I can almost predict where this is gonna go. Good luck!

Just realized, you said car lot.

#1 Rule to live by, don't buy high-mile cars from car lots.

Chances are it IS a good car, probably traded to a new car dealer against a new car, then wholesaled out to a second lot because of the miles.

Trick with buying from those lots, even if you are paying cash, work it like you are trying to find out lowest down payment they will take for it. When I worked on car lots, we called that redline. That's what we paid for the car+cleaning and title work. So even if they never see the car again, and never get a payment, they lost nothing. Car like that, they probably gave $250 or less for it. It is amazing the discrepancy between wholesale and retail vehicle prices. Two totally different worlds. I prowl the back lots at the new car dealers when I need a car. I look for the ones that are obviously trade-ins, no plates on them, but unstickered, meaning they are recent, haven't been cleaned or had a auction/sell decision made on them yet. If you catch it right at this point, they will gladly unload the car for near dealer cost, just to not have to deal with the prep and all that goes into dealing with it. I just got the wife a 1998 Ford ZX2, 50K miles, auto, power sunroof CD changer, new tires, very nice, for $2800 that way. Car retails at $5995. Dealer price about $2400. Felt pretty good on that one.

That's exactly how I bought my '90 Lumina, from the back of a dealer lot, hadn't been put out yet, and the dealer was a large one looking to wholesale it out. 6 years ago I only paid $800, with nothing mechanically wrong, and with 100,000 miles. (not even the rear brakes were bad at the time)