150,000 miles, which is low miles for the age of the car, but the psychology of buyers means that they generally think of a sub 100k mile car as being young and over 100k miles as being progressively older. Even though, as I have said a thousand times, I have never had to replace a 944 engine due to it wearing out... And to be honest, most of the bits that need changing over the years on 944's tend to need replacing because they passed a 5 to 10 year period (Bushes, hoses, mounts, gaskets, seals due to them being soft items which degrade) or every 40,000 to 80,000 miles for hard items which wear (wheel bearings, shock absorbers, springs, ball joints, electric motors such as wipers, washers, starters motors and alternators) so in theory and my opinion, you are just as likely to get a dog which has done 45,000 miles and only had 4 services every 12k as you will with a better maintained car which has been serviced every year and has had all those parts possibly replaced in the last 20,000 miles and two years. No mention of a head rebuild or head gasket, that could be expensive. Also no mention of a water pump, front engine oil seals, oil filter manifold reseal, driveshafts, shock absorbers.. So this could need a few thousand spending on it.. If someone wants a 944 but does not want to get dirty themselves, this car could cost thousands to make it into a great car. He does admit it needs a wheel refurb (another £300 maybe) and a front fog light (Another £200 to £300 depending if it needs a new backing due to corroded seals, and a washer pump (less than £50 all done), so with just those 3 very small cosmetic jobs which could cost £650, imagine how expensive it might get to start dealing with all the cosmetic niggles he might not mention, it might need tailgate struts, bonnet struts, the centre console might have phone kit holes in it, the glove box hinges might be broken, the seats might have lost their colour and may be about to wear through.. and on and on.. If he has not sorted out his 3 listed bad points, what else might be lurking that he has not bothered with.. which will put off buyers.
or £4250 for one from a dealer with a new clutch..(sold for 4k) [link]http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/1991-Porsche-944-944-S2-3-door-Coupe-/261657307053?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item3cebfda7ad[/link]
Oohhh.. Black with grey interior last of the cars.... Probably my favourite 944 year and colour combination, would love to have a turbo in that combination. 160,000 miles, as I said above, that really does begin to give buyers the willies... what needs doing or is looming to need being done. The people who are paying the top money are not wanting to "keep an eye out on ebay for a good..." this or that, such as the grey steering wheel which has turned brown on the edges, wants one where both the front seats are the same colour, and wants one where they do not need to spend thousands on getting the car cosmetically correct and all the known things on 944's which wear out replaced, and they do not normally want to do all that themselves. One of the 944's having work done here at the moment was not even dropped off by the owner, we are dealing with his agent it seems and may never meet the owner, which is quite normal for collector and very well off owners, and they are the kind of people who pay the top wack, the ones needing work doing are normally bought by the enthusiasts ready to roll their sleeves up, which will continue, but you can't delete the miles. Its not even a very new thing, I think it was Peter Nash who had a couple of cars over the last couple of years, I remember at least one lux and one S2 which were advertised at twenty something thousand pounds.. they did not sell is a week, but they certainly are not still for sale now.. But I do know of a number of cars advertised at a quarter of the price, that have a snagging list, cosmetic issues, are modified or have high mileages which have been for sale for at least a couple of years. There is still room for both those cars, especially now the market is rising, to still become top dollar cars and not through fiddling with the mileage on the dash, but through sorting out their niggles and advertising them at a higher price but faultless (if the numbers work out).. but then that starts some people on forums saying "why is that one £5k and this one £10k for a 150,000 mile car?".. and the answer would be in the paperwork... if its had all the soft mechanical bits done in the last 5 years and the hard mechanicals done in the last 5 to 10 years, then that is the very expensive bit which makes the difference between a car that can be bought with confidence and trouble free motoring and one which needs someone to put in some effort and cash into. Someone touched on the subject of sills... My own opinion is if a car has original sills and photos from inside them show they are perfect, then that adds some value, maybe more than a car which has had sills.. But a car without either has a £2k ticking time bomb waiting to hit the buyer, so one with properly installed sills is worth that extra £2k, one with the original sills with internal photos from a endoscope is worth even more than that. This is all my personal opinion and to be honest that has never changed, even 5 years ago the costs involved in getting a 944 up to scratch were just the same, but it is hopefully now that some cars are being shown to realise their potential value, rareity and public interest will probably push them on even further. The really interesting thing for me is the Lux and S2 market.. that is where currently people are still thinking of their car as a £5k car, no matter if it is a shed or a minter.. the problem is the owner of the minter will look at people on ebay selling them for £5k and just advertise their car at that price.
