Buying a Nissan, need advice?

Question

I'm thinking about buying a 1997 Nissan Sentra with 95,000 miles . Asking price is $3150. I need reliability more then anything because I will be driving on the highway daily about 26 miles at 70ish.

Also how expensive are repairs/maintenance when some thing does break?

Answer 1

First he is asking to much. Second things to check on a sentra, first and foremost is the oil condition, make sure it has been change regularly, if not you caould be looking at replacing timing chains down the road. Other things to look for are; axle seals (they are know to leak on all cars), crank seal (very common on a sentra with a bad PVC valve), does it smoke? (if so you will probably need a valve cover gasket and grommet, the grommet becomes dry over time and cracks causing the motor to ingest some oil, but no worries it's and easy fix), other than that check the transmission fluid. The sentra is a very reliable car, i should know, I've owned 6 since '86, and all have lasted well over 150,00 miles.

Answer 2

Buy the very best car you can. $3,000 sounds like a good down payment on a new car to me. New Versa sells For $12,000 base model no one else has driven and comes with factory warranty gets over 31 mpg. Sure your insurance will be higher but if wrecked full coverage fixes/replaces your car. Just oil changes and tire rotates for the first 3 to 4 years how could you go wrong? What if you buy a Sentra 12 year old car and the $3.500 transmission gos out?

Answer 3

The repairs are not very expensive because it's a basic economy car. That price is a total ripoff by the way, you should offer him $1800at BEST, if he declines, then run and buy something better.
I've seen 2000 sentra's sell for less then 2500 with less miles and 1999 corolla's sell for under $3000. Don't throw away your money when you don't have to.

Answer 4

I'd suggest having an independant mechanic look it over prior to purchase, you can be opening a can of worms otherwise.

Nissans are generally reliable and require less maintance then most others, but the individual repair costs can be higher. With the mileage you're looking at it would be a solid choice if the prepurchase check is good.

Answer 5

Sounds like a good, low mileage car to me. They are very reliable and aren't that expensive to fix (I would find an independant shop to work on it other than a Nissan dealer as labor rates and parts markup will be much lower.) We sold one for $1500 with 378,000 miles on it earlier in the year.

I would offer them $2000 on the car. For that money, you can't go wrong with 95,000 if the car is mechanically sound.