whoops, my daily driver is a project car

[fuck-it-ghost-credit]

It's actually a 2005.

It actually has 198,000 miles on it.

It actually has the 3.0 6 cylinder engine. (EZ30D mk II)

"Excellent condition" was a lie.

"Fully functional" - this thing needs every CV axle replaced.

ETA: Clean title was a lie too.

It is, however, fun to drive.

Running list of repairs and costs:

$2500 - initial purchase

$130 - second transponder key

$21 - Engine Air filter

$62 - Haynes manual, 6 quarts of high mileage oil, cabin air filter, oil filter

$68 - Smog check

$799 - Registration (2yrs because of non-registration prior to auction plus sales tax and title fee)

$102 - Battery

Upcoming Costs:

$200 - Alternator

$300-400 - Front Axles

$100 - plugs and wires

Other work to do:

Diff fluid ($30-50)

Brake flush & bleed ($20)

Transmission fluid flush ($20-30)

Power steering pump ($300)

Isolate coolant leak

Isolate oil leak

Check vacuum system hoses

Shocks

Check wheel bearings

[ms-demeanor]

hi i lost your car blog and i wanna go look at it again, what was the url?

@fuck-it-ghost-credit

Most recent update: I don't have time to work on it now but i'm saving up for an alternator. If I charge it, it turns on and drives but the axles are getting dire so I'm saving up for those too. It's currently sitting in my yard with the battery disconnected. After axles and alternator, I'm doing plugs and wires and then planning on replacing the power steering pump some time in the spring.

[ms-demeanor]

hey do you have any advice about rekeying a 2008 saturn astra thats like 4th hand and you dont have the pin-code

if you have a fob where the transmitter is working and unlocks the vehicle try this:

This is how to program your 2008, and 2009 Saturn Vue replacement remote keyless entry fob alarm by yourself at home without going to the de

or this:

Saturn is among the variety of vehicles manufactured around the world that features the popular keyless entry system technology. This capabi

If you don't have a working fob or key and you need to actually re-key the vehicle, this thread is a good place to get started:

Replacing Ignition Lock Cylinder w/ Stuck Key

There's a bunch of threads and info on replacing the lock cylinder and they all say you need to put the car in ACC mode to remove the cylind

The Saturn Forums are an *excellent* resource and you should totally mine them for info.

[ms-demeanor]

what the fuck do you write for the first text to someone whose car you wanna buy

"Hi there, I'm interested in the [VEHICLE], is it still on the market? I'm available to meet up to check it out at [time/date] if you're available, let me know if another time is better. Do you accept [method of payment like zelle/venmo/cash]?"

This lets the seller know what you're talking about, that you're ready to pay for it, and gives them some idea on scheduling because they're probably getting a hundred texts about this and needing to go back and forth - it's so much easier to just get one text that you can reply to instead of having to have a conversation with ten random phone numbers that all want the same info.

For the record, given my recent scam bullshit, I would recommend *only* paying through zelle/venmo/cashapp, or some other electronic payment system that keeps a record of the transaction (zelle requires a functional phone number and a connected bank account, so it's the best in my opinion if you're going to need to visit unholy vengeance on someone)

[ms-demeanor]

Hello Ms Demeaner! May I ask you about old cars? I have a 26-year old suv (i know, not that old), that I love dearly but it is the smelliest car on the block. I've been told the entire engine bay is coated in oil which I guess is a fire hazard? But I've also been told that doing those engine (steam cleanings? Degreasings?) on old cars could strip the engine bay of everything holding it together, and I can't really afford to buy a new engine/everything since I need that car to get to work.

Was I told correctly about the engine cleanings? Is that even a concern for cars just under 30? Do you have any advice on how to help cars not have so many toxic fumes? Thank you 💚

Okay so a basic engine cleaning shouldn't hurt your car in any way if you take proper precautions like covering up fuseboxes and stuff, and this is something that most cars should actually have done fairly frequently even if they're quite new, so I would tentatively recommend either trying to clean out the engine compartment yourself or seeing if there is a trustworthy local company that does this (this is not something I'd hire out to someone with no experience, look for the people in your life who work on their own cars or look for a reliable mechanic who offers this service or a car detailer who specifically works on engine compartments).

Here is a very detailed step-by-step guide to cleaning your engine compartment. If you want to try it yourself make sure that you can identify all of the parts of your engine that should be covered in your particular vehicle - you may want to invest in getting a used Chilton's or Hayne's Manual from ebay - and if you are very new to working on cars I'd say ask a friend who is good with cars to supervise (though I recommend doing this yourself! Learning how to work on cars is good even if it's as simple as cleaning out the engine compartment!)

HOWEVER

Because I don't know your car and can't kick the tires and investigate I'm not sure what the type of smell you're dealing with is or what could be causing it. Are you running rich? Is there a leak? Is there something slowly burning? There are lots of things that can make a car smelly and they are varying levels of problems.

If you haven't had your car in for a tune-up lately it may be time to save up for a full service at a trusted mechanic to see if they can identify any problems that are causing the smell. Someone should check on the life of your belts, the age of the filters, and do the general 100k mile maintenance if you haven't done that yourself and your car has that many miles on it. You should do that regardless of whether or not you clean the engine compartment (and so should everyone; if you own an older car search "my car model + 100k/150k maintenance" and see what parts need to be inspected that don't get checked at every oil change).

Good luck!

[ms-demeanor]

Now, hindsight is 20/20 and all that, but I have to say: you would have simply had an easier time if you had just bought a 2026 Subaru Crosstrek with extended warranty

Assuming low tax, a low interest rate, a five year loan term and the smallest amount of car insurance you can get away with while financing a vehicle, a 2026 Crosstrek would cost me $782 a month.

I don't know how to explain that accepting a five year obligation to spend $800 a month on a car would not actually make my life easier.

We could definitely argue that if I'd chosen to finance a $5k 2012 honda fit my life would be easier, but not a $27k subaru.

The idea of having to find eight hundred dollars a month in my budget is giving my hives. This is why I'm perfectly willing to find a cheap piece of shit and put in the effort to make it less of a piece of shit.

Eight hundred dollars a month. Eight HUNDRED dollars a month. That is more than Large Bastard pays for his meds before the deductible is consumed. That is, like, at least twice my grocery budget for the month.

If I made a monthly contribution of $400 into an index fund with a 4% yield I'd end with almost the full cost of the car saved in the same amount of time.

So I could, in theory, pay $300 a month ($150 in payment and $150 in insurance) for a much shittier car with less coverage, get a $9k used car, and put $400 a month into an investment fund and I'd come out in five years with a $9k car and $26k in my pocket for the same price as a 2026 Subaru Crosstrek (plus $4920 of walking around money, because that's the extra $82 over 5 years). If I had $782 a month to spend on these sorts of things.

It is bugfuck insane to me that people buy new cars.

If I had to figure out what I was going to cut out of my life to afford $800 a month first I'd have to start going back to the plasma center and then I'd have a heart attack. That's Tiny Bastard's insurance, her insulin, her diabetic dog food, and all of MY medications for two months.

I think $800 may be literally more than I spend on eating out in a year. ADDING $800 a month to my household income would be life-changing; removing it would be life-destroying.

It is *terrifying* to me that people are so glib about the cost of a new car. Like, not only would that not be easier, it would be crushingly difficult.

Eight hundred dollars.

Am I just poor? Last year I was for sure poor but I've paid down some debt and gotten a raise and feel less poor. Is it normal to have that much money to flex around in your budget and I just don't realize it because I've spent so long with absolutely no disposable income that a spare hundred or two dollars a month and no longer selling blood feels luxurious?

I mean I'm below the median income for California but it's California, I'm above the median for most of the US I don't think I'm poor I think that possibly it's nuts to spend seven hundred and eighty two U S American dollars a month on car ownership.

[allfinehere]

There's got to be a happy medium between buying a brand new vehicle and a dodgy p2p sale. Used car dealerships have a bad rep, but you can find good ones with vehicles that are in good working order and are fairly priced.

[ms-demeanor]

I've written about this in other posts but yes, there are reputable used car dealerships (Carfax is generally reliable if you've got about 10k to spend), you can buy used at a brand dealership and find good deals, and if you get preapproved for a loan through your banking institution you can often get a much better interest rate than you'd get with other finance offerings.

I'm comfortable with the risk associated with dodgy P2P sales (obviously, otherwise I wouldn't have done it and I'd be a lot more devistated than I am by the fuckery occurring; if I *had to* I could go get a loan on a car from a used car lot, I just would really prefer not to because of the insurance cost of financing a car) but used car dealerships, loans through your banking institution, and an inspection by YOUR trusted mechanic are the way to go for people who are NOT comfortable with dodgy P2P sales.

I've been kicking myself for getting the subaru (a car I wanted) for $2500 in a private sale instead of getting the purple PT cruiser (a car I did not want) for $2900 from a dealer because the car from the dealer would have been in better shape (though probably still would have been pretty dodgy), but what I have *not* been doing is wishing that I spent over $7k on a car (which was the absolute top of my budget, I was never going to spend more than that). But I'm also not kicking myself for not buying the $2900 subaru with the visible smoking oil leak from a small dealer in san gabriel. If you're buying used and you don't know cars very well and don't know your tolerance for dealing with car bullshit, you REALLY need an inspection from a mechanic before you buy.

(And I'll say it again: I would have bought a car in this mechanical condition, but I would not have paid the same amount if I knew I had to pay two years of registration on an impounded vehicle - the mechanical stuff is frustrating but it's only frustrating because the money that I'd budgeted for fixing it went to registration because the seller scammed me. If this had been a $1700 car, I would not be this frustrated)

[spangelbanger]

I'm going to ask how old anyone who things an old car is the answer is, because I have learned something. You're going to pay the same amount for an old car as you will for a new one and probably then some. You might not have payments, but a car older than 10 years is going to start falling apart. they are not manufactured to last, they are manufactored for obselence. So you spent 1000 on a car to avoid a 400 a month payment.

but month one, you have to buy tires. $400. Month two you have to buy breaks $800

Month three you have to get the oil changed $80, and while they're there, "hey you've got a pretty serious oil leak" Mechanic checks it out for free, but $500 fix.

Month four the transmission starts slipping $1500 repair.

Month five the water pump goes out $150 part $300 labor and fees.

Month six you have to get that oil change again $80.

Month seven, your check engine light comes on. They can't find a the exact problem but the most likely thing is a $50 sensor. You but it. It doesn't fix it. the next cheapest "probably" cause is $250.

By month 8, you could have bought a $3000 car and have had it paid for by now. So you figure, "f* this." and you trade in.

and now the process starts over again.

[ms-demeanor]

TEN YEARS. YOU THINK CARS START TO FALL APART AT TEN YEARS?

TEN YEARS?

For the average driver, that's like, between 100-150k miles on an engine, that's at best half to three quarters the lifespan you should expect on one engine.

There are regular maintenance recommendations for every type of car. You do the fuel filter at 100k and the water filter at 150k and the oil every (whatever your manufacturer recommends) and the tires when the wear hits a certain point.

One of the bigger risks with buying a used car is that you don't know the maintenance history, so you don't know if these things were done or if it was well maintained, which is why it's important to ask about that as part of the purchase of a used car (something I did, that the seller lied about, that is going into the lawsuit). However, if you do have a car where you keep up with the maintenance, you should - generally, barring the occasional freak thing or damage done by peculiarities of your area - be able to predict what your maintenance costs will be as the car ages.

It shouldn't be a surprise to you that you needed to do your fan belt just a few weeks after you had to get the brakes done which was just a few weeks after you had to replace the thermostat which was just a few weeks after you did a transmission fluid flush - you should be doing that stuff on a regular schedule or at a specific mileage and you should be *planning for those expenses* because when you replace your thermostat at the correct part of the maintenance cycle it means you aren't going to throw a rod when your engine overheats which you didn't realize because the thermostat hadn't been replaced. "A stitch in time saves nine" but it's "maintenance on the dot saves you a lot" or some shit.

I know that people don't know much about cars but you can't just be out there waiting for shit to break.

Anyway. I'm 39. At this point I'd say that pre 2010 is solidly in "senior" territory for cars the way that a 9 year old dog is a senior dog. Not a puppy anymore, you have to be cautious about diet and exercise, but still with a lot of good life left to live. Pre 2005 is DEFINITELY in old territory. That's a 20 year old car, that's getting close to its lifespan. On the flip side, I think that anything built after 2015 is new, or should be treated as new. Post-2015 cars are so new that I don't even want them there are too many computers in that shit.

The most reliable car that I currently drive is a 2009 GMC Sierra. The second most reliable car is a 2001 Saturn wagon. I have never owned a new car (and this subaru is not the oldest car I've bought, though my Jeep was intentionally purchased as a project car whereas this was an accidental project car). The last car that I owned was a 2010 Toyota Yaris with 168k miles on it and literally genuinely no mechanical problems; I bought it in 2020 - when it was ten years old - with 120k miles on it.

I bought that car for six thousand dollars and it cost between 200-400 a year on maintenance (getting the brakes done in 2025, replacing the battery in 2020, oil changes about three times a year etc), so a max of $2k in maintenance over the 5 years I had the car, bringing the total up to $8k, which is certainly not twenty five to thirty thousand dollars or eight hundred dollars a month. And those maintenance costs are like paying for gas. That's part of owning a car. Because you still have to pay for maintenance on a new car. You're still going to wear down tires and brakes on your new car. You're still going to have to have oil changes and fluid flushes done on your new car.

New car ownership has actually gotten CRAZY expensive in the last ten years, and genuinely the build quality seems to have fallen off a cliff. (Look up information on right to repair; car manufacturers are a fucking nightmare and new cars are fucking awful in terms of what you can do to keep your car functional; I *will* agree that there's a degree of planned obsolescence in cars, however I'd argue that it's MUCH more prevalent in newer cars, and that older cars actually WERE built to last)

If your brakes, water pump, transmission, some sensor, and a serious oil leak all need to be handled within six months of each other, what this tells me is that you're not following recommended maintenance schedules. If you have to have your mechanic tell you about a serious oil leak during an oil change, that tells me you're driving a car with a serious oil leak and not recognizing the symptoms (and, since you're doing those oil changes on a regular 3 month schedule - which you probably shouldn't be, you should probably be going based on mileage, which in modern cars is 5k-7k more often than the 3 months 3k miles jiffy lube used to harp on - that oil leak sprang up in the last three months WAIT ARE YOU CHECKING YOUR OIL).

ARE YOU ALL CHECKING YOUR OIL? YOU'RE ALL CHECKING YOUR OIL REGULARLY, RIGHT? YOU KNOW YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO CHECK THE LEVEL WHILE THE ENGINE IS WARM AT A MINIMUM ONCE A MONTH AND NO THE OIL LIFE SENSOR IS NOT ENOUGH THAT'S WHY IT'S INSANE TO ME THAT SOME NEW CARS DON'T COME WITH DIPSTICKS YOU GUYS ARE CHECKING THE OIL SO YOU NOTICE IF THERE'S A SUDDEN DROP AND ARE AWARE OF LEAKS, RIGHT? YOU'RE NOT JUST RAWDOGGING WHATEVER THE OIL AND LUBE PLACE PLONKED IN YOUR ENGINE UNTIL THE NUMBER ON THE STICKER POPS UP, RIGHT?

Also nobody in the world is buying a thousand dollar car and putting $1500 into the transmission (or paying eighty bucks for an oil change). A transmission problem in a thousand dollar car is your signal to buy a different car OR to buy a transmission for four hundred bucks and put it in yourself. I think you may be underestimating exactly how shitty a thousand dollar car is in 2025.

This is a thousand dollar car:

This is a thousand dollar car:

(bud, you don't get to list a car without a functional engine as in 'fair' condition what are you doing?)

This is a thousand dollar car:

(note the transmission problem - that car is worth six hundred dollars for scrap and the owner is seeing if they can get a couple hundred more for it from someone who will take on the burden of repairs themselves or just needs something to run for a couple weeks, but you can't buy a car that's missing "reverse" and think it's going to do anything but fall apart; nobody who is buying a thousand dollar car is going to put two thousand dollars into it unless they are buying a car to restore)

But one way or another, no, a well-maintained ten-year-old car that you buy at $7k (or hell, even $10k) is not going to end up costing you more than a $400-a-month loan on a new car ($14400 for a 3yr term, $24k for a five year term). If you spent a thousand dollars a year on maintenance on a seven year old car you would have seven years of owning that car before you caught up to the $14k car, except that you wouldn't catch up because the $14k car would have its own maintenance costs to catch up on. Plus, again, you would be required to carry full coverage insurance while financing versus having the option to carry liability only for a car you buy outright, which for me is a difference of $150 a month at a minimum, or $5400 for a three year loan or $9k on a five year loan. That's just the difference, not the total cost of the insurance. The difference in cost from carrying liability only versus full coverage on a five year loan is more than I have ever spent on a car.

So, no, buying a used car is not going to cost you more money in the long run than buying a new car, especially if you can pay out of pocket, ESPECIALLY especially if you can do work on it yourself, and assuming you follow the manufacturer recommended maintenance schedule.

Also if you are paying eight hundred dollars for brakes you are either getting fucked by your mechanic or fucked by the fact that you've got a new car with proprietary brakes that can only be replaced at the dealership. Nobody in the world is paying a thousand dollars for a car and then paying eight hundred dollars to get the brakes done.

Fuck, actually, I bought my car for $2500; from the dealership, an engine replacement is $7k, new axles are $3k, a new transmission is $5k, and various and sundry fluid changes and maintenance things are about $2k, which would basically get the thing back to new. So It would actually cost me less to have my 2005 subaru totally rebuilt *BY SUBARU* with a new engine with zero miles on it than it would cost me to pay a $400 loan for five years ($19.5k vs $24k). So even if I went with the most maintenance I could physically have done on my car, done by the most expensive possible place to have it done, it would cost less than the $400-a-month loan AND I wouldn't have to carry $5-9k of extra insurance. Hell, it would cost me less than the three year option and the insurance difference ($19.5k vs $19.8k).

That is, of course, absurd, and not anything that anyone should do, but that's about how insane it sounds to me to agree to a $400 monthly loan (let alone an $800 commitment).

Also, wait, hi, I'm suddenly realizing that this is a really, really easy argument to make with basic math.

If you buy a thousand dollar car and spend two thousand dollars on it in the course of a eight months before replacing the car, you are spending $375 a month on car ownership, including the cost of maintenance. And that is making some VERY expensive assumptions about maintenance (eight hundred dollars for brakes is extortionate).

If you're spending $400 a month on a car loan, you're spending $400 a month *before* the cost of maintenance and the difference in insurance cost, and even if you ignore that $400 is more than $375.

I can't believe I wrote all of this out only to realize that you're saying that $375 a month is more than $400 a month right before I hit the reblog button.

Anyway.

Go check your oil.

[andmaybegayer]

In general I find "automotive grade" a much more reassuring spec on a component over "military" or "aeronautical grade" because "automotive grade" often means "designed to last years with zero maintenance in the hands of the dumbest motherfucker on the planet"

[andmaybegayer]

military grade clutch: must be permanently bathed in an oil harvested from one plant in central Montana and kissed daily by a ranking vehicle technician

automotive grade clutch: will probably still run acceptably for a while if a pigeon lives in the transmission tunnel and shits directly on the friction plates

[ms-demeanor]

god for my own sake i wish youd been having the car conversation last year when i bought a 2020 forester for probably too much money. sadly i just dont have the time or physical space to do my own car maintenance, and its just not a hobby i want to get into. any advice for determining a reliable mechanic when you dont Know A Guy?

Subaru owners are bugfuck nuts, so because you specifically have a Subaru, you might want to check out subieshops.com, which is a listing of auto shops with proven expertise working on Subarus.

You'll still want to vet the shop by the same metrics you'd use to vet any local vendor - check reviews, ask anyone you know locally who might have used their service, call up and ask them questions. Shops should be willing to provide estimates for you - it's best if it's work you're actually looking to get done, but you can also just call a couple of local places and ask what their hourly rate is, and request a ballpark estimate on a standard repair (maybe one maintenance estimate like recharging the AC and one repair estimate like replacing the power steering pump) and compare prices across shops.

For mechanics, you're looking for someone who is patient, knowledgeable, and transparent. It is going to be easier to find a good mechanic if you know something about cars because if you know something about cars you know more about how a skeevy mechanic might be fucking you over. Figure out at least a *little* bit about your car and the issues it might have before calling around to different shops.

A good mechanic will generally have a tidy shop with lots of customers coming through on a regular basis, will have someone available to answer the phone or will return calls quickly, will be willing to provide an estimate, will be willing to explain processes to you, will be willing to return parts to you if you, and will be willing to tell you what kind of parts they order for repairs.

Here's a Car Talk article with tips on looking for a mechanic that might be helpful, but basically it all boils down to seeing who is charging fair rates and making sure the mechanic is trustworthy, which is largely based on word of mouth.

Again, Subaru people being nuts works in your favor here - I'm certain that every mechanic on the Subieshops list has been examined under a microscope by redditors and car forums, so that may be a great jumping off point.

Good luck!

[fuck-it-ghost-credit]

It started, so that's a something.

[fuck-it-ghost-credit]

*tries to start car*

*engine won't turn over*

thatsnotgood.png

"Maybe the cheap battery i bought is just *really* shitty and died after a few days of sitting"

*tries jump box*

*no dice*

*unearths voltmeter*

Okay kids, so the next part I have to buy for my son who has every disease is an alternator.

The alternator uses some of the power generated by your engine to charge your battery when the motor is running. If your alternator isn't working, your electrical system is running off battery only, which will kill your battery the same way that leaving your lights on overnight would.

This is an alternator:

At least I can get 20% back on the core.

[ms-demeanor]

This is the kind of thing that would be a genuinely relaxing hobby, like working on a puzzle, if my spouse hadn't been out of town with our most reliable car for four of the last eight weeks and if I didn't need to go to the laundromat.

And if it had been intentional.

And if it wasn't actually very expensive. $300(axles) + $200(alternator) + $100(plugs and wires) *minimum* to get it drivable and safe at this point. Plus also diff fluid change, transmission flush, brake flush and bleed, oil change, and figuring out what happened to the coolant.

[fuck-it-ghost-credit]

I forgot the power steering pump. ($300)

[fuck-it-ghost-credit]

It started, so that's a something.

[fuck-it-ghost-credit]

*tries to start car*

*engine won't turn over*

thatsnotgood.png

"Maybe the cheap battery i bought is just *really* shitty and died after a few days of sitting"

*tries jump box*

*no dice*

*unearths voltmeter*

Okay kids, so the next part I have to buy for my son who has every disease is an alternator.

The alternator uses some of the power generated by your engine to charge your battery when the motor is running. If your alternator isn't working, your electrical system is running off battery only, which will kill your battery the same way that leaving your lights on overnight would.

This is an alternator:

At least I can get 20% back on the core.

[fuck-it-ghost-credit]

It started, so that's a something.

[fuck-it-ghost-credit]

Shit. The only 6 cylinder vehicle I've owned in the past was a Jeep, and that took platinum plugs no problem but this whiny little baby is supposed to have iridium.

Translating for folks who don't speak car:

In my Toyota changing the spark plugs was about $30 to do all of them. In my Subaru it is going to be about $90 (plus wires) because there are more plugs AND the parts themselves cost a lot more because they're iridium ($$$$$!) as opposed to platinum ($$) or copper ($).

BUT

I'm not replacing the spark plugs until I replace the battery. The battery died. Like. Hard. REALLY hard. When I was trying to get the car started to take it to the DMV.

I got the cheapest battery I could because I don't want the money pit to be a money chasm, so I'm going to try to pick up my econobrick and replace it at lunch.

However, in good news, I do actually have a license plate and current registration! It did cost literally eight hundred dollars to get it. But I've got it! And apparently the title is in the mail! But I didn't realize they didn't give me back some of the paperwork that I brought in so I have to go back to the DMV and be like "hey can I get copies of the papers I gave you because I need to sue the guy who gave them to me?"

Also I have talked to an attorney friend and my friend who has done a million car flips (who happens to be a PI) and they are convincing me that if I'm going to sue it should be for the whole cost of the car because I made the purchase in good faith and the seller lied about everything (one important point they brought up is that the seller isn't obligated to give you a warning about the things that you didn't ask about, so if I didn't ask about where he got the car then he doesn't have to tell me it came from an auction, but since I did ask and he lied pretty extensively there's a strong argument for a higher judgement).

[fuck-it-ghost-credit]

Since this is an old car with a ton of miles on it, I'm not going to be protected by lemon laws.

What I've got here is evidence of fraud, but fraud is relatively unlikely to be prosecuted and also fuck the police. So that puts me solidly in the realm of a lawsuit and the numbers involved are small enough that we're talking small claims court.

And it's not like I can sue him for the cost of a $7k car, I bought a $2500 car with the awareness that it was a $2500 car, to be made whole in this situation I either need him to refund the sale and take back the car, or to pay for the costs that I reasonably expected to be covered by that $2500 that weren't.

I also can't dump $7k into it and sue him for that, now that I know what's up with the car I can choose to ask him to refund it and take it back, or keep it and ask him to refund the difference between what the car is worth and what I paid. And if I ask nicely and he doesn't do that I can sue. (I think technically I don't have to ask but personally I think it might be easier to ask and threaten suit and see what happens than it would be to have to actually go to court and collect)

For anyone who isn't familiar, the Craigslist listing for this car is screenshotted in my pinned post, but I'm going to go over the things he lied about in the listing point by point.

2006 Subaru Outback

189,000 miles

2.5L engine

Excellent condition

Clean title

Registered until May 2026

He said that the car had belonged to a family member, and that he had owned it for the last four years, that it was well maintained, that he knew the creaking sound was shocks and he decided to sell the car instead of having them done, and that the car had a dealer plate because he had his personalized plates transferred, which is also why he didn't have the title but that he would give me the dealer paperwork.

I drove the car for about a mile, large bastard and I did a brief visual inspection, I filled out the bill of sale while large bastard zelled the money and the seller didn't give us the 'dealer' paperwork to look over until after the money was transferred.

That is where I screwed up, taking it at face value that there was an uncomplicated reason for the paperwork being weird and not insisting on looking at it first.

Now, let's go over the issues with the car and the things I'm going to have to pay for to make it kind-of match the listing and his description in person:

Front axles need to be replaced

Oil leak

Power steering pump leak

Car was not registered and fees mean that it will cost about $500 to get legal

It was also purchased from an impound auction (meaning it didn't come from his uncle and he didn't know the maintenence history) and it's a 2005 with 200k on the odometer and a 3.0L engine.

But here's the thing - some of that is stuff that I can't sue for (the 9k extra miles on the clock, I saw that, accepted that, and verified that as part of the sale) or wouldn't be unreasonable as part of buying a $2500 car.

The way I'm looking at this is "what are the things that an average car-literate person would miss if they owned a car for four years?" versus "What are things that were lied about?"

The oil leaks are pretty minor, the power steering pump isn't something that most people notice until it goes out, and a ton of car owners have no idea what size their engine is. Those are all things that are pretty easy for the average car owner to get wrong or not notice (ditto the differential oil and the brake fluid I've discussed elsewhere - most people have no idea what the service schedules are like for those). Even though the leaks and the power steering pump may be the most expensive potential fixes, they're also the kind of risk you assume when you buy an old car and are the kind of things you see on well maintained older cars that run well. That kind of fix is what I anticipated when I saw the listing.

The things that are surprising, were directly lied about, and were *not* factored into my decision to buy the car are:

Two year's worth of registration fees and a smog check (listing said that registration was good until 2026)

The pain in the ass with the title, for which I'm going to miss a day of work (listing said clean title, seller lied about the paperwork he was giving us)

Axles need replacing (when we asked about the audible creaking, he said he knew it was shocks - if he had said 'i don't know what that is' or 'yeah the front axles are bad' I wouldn't have bought the car, but since he claimed he'd been driving it for four years and knew it was shocks, I accepted that as reasonable maintenance on an old car)

Prior ownership status (the unknown history of an impound auction car makes it a no-go compared to a 2-owner car that was held by one family for 20 years)

I could honestly even see the axles as a "pay your money take your chances, people don't know cars" thing when buying an older car except he said that his mechanic had said it was shocks.

I would like everyone to note that at least 2 of these issues (title status and history) could have *theoretically* been avoided if I had run a carfax report or similar on the vin, though I'm actually impressed with his lie about the license plates. The vehicle history report DOES show only one owner until July of this year, which makes sense both as an uncle selling a car to a nephew without bothering to do a title transfer until replacement plates were requested, and as a car from a single owner that got impounded and auctioned and resold by a liar.

I'm currently torn. I've spent a couple hundred dollars on the car (aside from what I paid the seller) but there's no sense in throwing good money after bad, so it's possible that I'd be better off trying to revert the sale. On the other hand, this seems recoverable with some work that I'm capable of doing and I don't dislike the car but I wouldn't have bought it if I knew the history.

I guess I'll know more when I figure out what code the engine is throwing.

I'm also searching this guy and his girlfriend's number on Craigslist twice a day because if they did this to me, they're doing this to other people who probably can't afford to take this hit as much as i can and who might not be able to fix the fraudulent vehicles at costs as low as I can.

So at the moment I'm considering texting something like "hey so you're a piece of shit but if you send me back $1200 to fix this hunk of junk and get it registered I won't sue you" but before I do that I need to verify his address, employer, and mom's house.

I think $1200 is a reasonable ask ($300 for axles, $500 in fees and smog check, $400 for the fact that this was an impound a year older than he sold it as) but if I actually have to file paperwork he can have the car and I want my money.

The lesson here is, once again, never buy a car from someone who does not have the title physically in their hand and passes it to you signed before you transfer funds.

Also do a vin search. There are free services out there. If I had even asked about a vin search this guy would have ghosted me.

[ms-demeanor]

Here's the thing: I spend so much time trying not to be aggro. I'm so chill. No worries. It's okay. Go with the flow.

That is the result of years of brutal discipline. My first instinct is always to be *SO* mean, and to hold grudges forever, and to escalate.

And most of the time I *should* clamp down on that instinct. It's awful to react to every perceived slight with disproportionate cruelty and aggression.

So sometimes it's nice when someone is shitty to me and I get to stop being chill.

Anyway. Turns out the guy has a realtor's license and is a notary public.

For now.

[fuck-it-ghost-credit]

Have sent the scammer the text message equivalent of the first wrench.

[fuck-it-ghost-credit]

I have to do the dmv transfer of this vehicle within 10 days of purchase to avoid fines and my brain is bad so I'm now recruiting the followers of this blog to bully me in the replies until tuesday august 19th.

Step 1: figure out what paperwork I actually got from the seller.

[fuck-it-ghost-credit]

Hmmmmm.

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

Yeah that's not good.

[fuck-it-ghost-credit]

Okay.

The car had a dealer plate because the owner said he had custom plates that he transferred, which is legitimately a thing that happens and can screw up title stuff.

He gave me a CA form 262 (Vehicle Transfer and Reassignment Form), which would make sense for that situation, but that was stapled to a bill of sale that he and I filled out and ALSO a certification of lien sale that shows this was picked up at an impound auction that I admittedly did not look at when I was filling out the bill of sale.

And this, kids, is why you always, always, always, always ONLY buy a car from someone who has a title in hand, because if they don't have a title in hand they are a LYING MOTHERFUCKER.

[fuck-it-ghost-credit]

The good news is that if it can pass smog, I can get it registered at AAA today because the VIN has no lienholder or registered owner listed.

The bad news is I'm pretty sure there's a 0% chance it's going to pass smog.

[fuck-it-ghost-credit]

I think if I pay for the carfax it'll at least verify the last owner of record for me to take this guy to small claims court and reclaim the costs of getting the car into the condition that the listing described.

[fuck-it-ghost-credit]

Shockingly, it passed smog.

However, AAA wasn't able to register it because it came into my hands via a cascade of bullshit.

On the bright side: this removes time pressure because it's not a normal transfer and I have to pay 2 years of registration anyway so 10 days isn't the deadline. On the other hand: driving this is soooooooo illegal.

This is also why I do say that private sales are high risk and you shouldn't do private sales unless you know cars. Outside of this specific title fuckery, I knew the level of bullshit I was signing up for when buying a $2500 car.

[fuck-it-ghost-credit]

It passed smog at the perfect time, I went to the dealership to pick up the key that I ordered after the smog check and on the way home from the dealership the check engine light came on. (Check engine is an automatic fail for a smog check)

Gonna check the oil and dig around for my obd reader later.

I've already paid for oil change stuff, but after this I can't spend any more money on the car until it is legally in my name. Though at this point I have to pay about $450 to put it in my name, and also miss work to go to the DMV.

[fuck-it-ghost-credit]

Code was a cylinder misfire, which means it's time for plugs and wires too.

[tiktoks-for-dead-pope]

[fuck-it-ghost-credit]

Since this is an old car with a ton of miles on it, I'm not going to be protected by lemon laws.

What I've got here is evidence of fraud, but fraud is relatively unlikely to be prosecuted and also fuck the police. So that puts me solidly in the realm of a lawsuit and the numbers involved are small enough that we're talking small claims court.

And it's not like I can sue him for the cost of a $7k car, I bought a $2500 car with the awareness that it was a $2500 car, to be made whole in this situation I either need him to refund the sale and take back the car, or to pay for the costs that I reasonably expected to be covered by that $2500 that weren't.

I also can't dump $7k into it and sue him for that, now that I know what's up with the car I can choose to ask him to refund it and take it back, or keep it and ask him to refund the difference between what the car is worth and what I paid. And if I ask nicely and he doesn't do that I can sue. (I think technically I don't have to ask but personally I think it might be easier to ask and threaten suit and see what happens than it would be to have to actually go to court and collect)

For anyone who isn't familiar, the Craigslist listing for this car is screenshotted in my pinned post, but I'm going to go over the things he lied about in the listing point by point.

2006 Subaru Outback

189,000 miles

2.5L engine

Excellent condition

Clean title

Registered until May 2026

He said that the car had belonged to a family member, and that he had owned it for the last four years, that it was well maintained, that he knew the creaking sound was shocks and he decided to sell the car instead of having them done, and that the car had a dealer plate because he had his personalized plates transferred, which is also why he didn't have the title but that he would give me the dealer paperwork.

I drove the car for about a mile, large bastard and I did a brief visual inspection, I filled out the bill of sale while large bastard zelled the money and the seller didn't give us the 'dealer' paperwork to look over until after the money was transferred.

That is where I screwed up, taking it at face value that there was an uncomplicated reason for the paperwork being weird and not insisting on looking at it first.

Now, let's go over the issues with the car and the things I'm going to have to pay for to make it kind-of match the listing and his description in person:

Front axles need to be replaced

Oil leak

Power steering pump leak

Car was not registered and fees mean that it will cost about $500 to get legal

It was also purchased from an impound auction (meaning it didn't come from his uncle and he didn't know the maintenence history) and it's a 2005 with 200k on the odometer and a 3.0L engine.

But here's the thing - some of that is stuff that I can't sue for (the 9k extra miles on the clock, I saw that, accepted that, and verified that as part of the sale) or wouldn't be unreasonable as part of buying a $2500 car.

The way I'm looking at this is "what are the things that an average car-literate person would miss if they owned a car for four years?" versus "What are things that were lied about?"

The oil leaks are pretty minor, the power steering pump isn't something that most people notice until it goes out, and a ton of car owners have no idea what size their engine is. Those are all things that are pretty easy for the average car owner to get wrong or not notice (ditto the differential oil and the brake fluid I've discussed elsewhere - most people have no idea what the service schedules are like for those). Even though the leaks and the power steering pump may be the most expensive potential fixes, they're also the kind of risk you assume when you buy an old car and are the kind of things you see on well maintained older cars that run well. That kind of fix is what I anticipated when I saw the listing.

The things that are surprising, were directly lied about, and were *not* factored into my decision to buy the car are:

Two year's worth of registration fees and a smog check (listing said that registration was good until 2026)

The pain in the ass with the title, for which I'm going to miss a day of work (listing said clean title, seller lied about the paperwork he was giving us)

Axles need replacing (when we asked about the audible creaking, he said he knew it was shocks - if he had said 'i don't know what that is' or 'yeah the front axles are bad' I wouldn't have bought the car, but since he claimed he'd been driving it for four years and knew it was shocks, I accepted that as reasonable maintenance on an old car)

Prior ownership status (the unknown history of an impound auction car makes it a no-go compared to a 2-owner car that was held by one family for 20 years)

I could honestly even see the axles as a "pay your money take your chances, people don't know cars" thing when buying an older car except he said that his mechanic had said it was shocks.

I would like everyone to note that at least 2 of these issues (title status and history) could have *theoretically* been avoided if I had run a carfax report or similar on the vin, though I'm actually impressed with his lie about the license plates. The vehicle history report DOES show only one owner until July of this year, which makes sense both as an uncle selling a car to a nephew without bothering to do a title transfer until replacement plates were requested, and as a car from a single owner that got impounded and auctioned and resold by a liar.

I'm currently torn. I've spent a couple hundred dollars on the car (aside from what I paid the seller) but there's no sense in throwing good money after bad, so it's possible that I'd be better off trying to revert the sale. On the other hand, this seems recoverable with some work that I'm capable of doing and I don't dislike the car but I wouldn't have bought it if I knew the history.

I guess I'll know more when I figure out what code the engine is throwing.

I'm also searching this guy and his girlfriend's number on Craigslist twice a day because if they did this to me, they're doing this to other people who probably can't afford to take this hit as much as i can and who might not be able to fix the fraudulent vehicles at costs as low as I can.

So at the moment I'm considering texting something like "hey so you're a piece of shit but if you send me back $1200 to fix this hunk of junk and get it registered I won't sue you" but before I do that I need to verify his address, employer, and mom's house.

I think $1200 is a reasonable ask ($300 for axles, $500 in fees and smog check, $400 for the fact that this was an impound a year older than he sold it as) but if I actually have to file paperwork he can have the car and I want my money.

The lesson here is, once again, never buy a car from someone who does not have the title physically in their hand and passes it to you signed before you transfer funds.

Also do a vin search. There are free services out there. If I had even asked about a vin search this guy would have ghosted me.

[ms-demeanor]

Here's the thing: I spend so much time trying not to be aggro. I'm so chill. No worries. It's okay. Go with the flow.

That is the result of years of brutal discipline. My first instinct is always to be *SO* mean, and to hold grudges forever, and to escalate.

And most of the time I *should* clamp down on that instinct. It's awful to react to every perceived slight with disproportionate cruelty and aggression.

So sometimes it's nice when someone is shitty to me and I get to stop being chill.

Anyway. Turns out the guy has a realtor's license and is a notary public.

For now.

[ms-demeanor]

Oh man, you're right dude, it is so smart to meet at the park so that you don't have to have the buyers come to your house.

You should probably be switching up the dates and fill-up costs on those listings though.

I can also prove that the address he provided on the auction paperwork doesn't exist, which means he's filed fraudulent paperwork with the state.

Eeeeeeeeat shit, fuckhead!

[ms-demeanor]

asks are off there so asking here: is the car stolen?

Legally no.

Ethically: there are many frustrating things about being an anarchist and one of them is that yes i consider this car stolen and it's why I wouldn't ever intentionally buy a car at an impound auction.

(It could have been abandoned, it could have been released by the family of someone who died, it could have been parked and towed and sold after the owner was arrested, it could have been parked illegally and towed and the owner couldn't afford the impound fees or decided that the fees weren't worth the cost of the car - some of those are things I wouldn't feel bad about participating in, most of those make me feel pretty bad because I'm benefiting from the state taking someone's property and fuck if he couldn't pay the impound fees how is he going to get another car?)