thoughts on gpw/tan 03 s2000, 27.5k miles. $16000. bone stock always garaged

 

That's a steal! No accidents?

 

Bamafan, I agree completely with your post about the NSX and the S2000 being great cars in their own right. I purchased my 05 NSX first and my 06 S2000 second as well!

 

Hello guys and gals,

Title says it all.

I was originally searching for an AP1 (ideally 2003) in Silverstone Metallic and in original stock form with excellent or near excellent condition with maintenance records, while being under 100k miles.
It's been proving somewhat difficult to find all these qualities (especially SSM color ) in an S2000 for a good price. I'm consistently seeing an average of prices ranging between 15-20 grand for this type of car, even though book value says it should be somewhere around $11,000 for a private sale.

And then I stumbled on this little gem. Car looks pretty great except for a few minor blemishes, though they look quite small. No large dings that I can tell. Seller is the car's second owner and the only thing about this car is that its mileage, which is 128k is above my ideal cutoff. Though after browsing the forums I feel that based on how reliable these cars are, and assuming it truly has been taken care of, I'm led to believe this shouldn't be a problem at all.

I asked the owner to send me pics of all the imperfections on the car:









I don't care much about the floormats or the tires (assuming its safe to drive on), those are easy enough to replace.

The door and bumper concern me the most. Just doing a quick search it seems that respraying a bumper can cost between $800-1000, a door around $500-600 (maybe less for the size of these dings?), and new seats are about $300ish each.

Taking all this into account, it appears to me that this is still a stellar deal, assuming the engine is in good shape.

He's asking $11,000 for it, so adding the costs of the repairs I'm looking at having a very excellent condition S2000 for around $13000 which is much less than anything I've seen.

I'm counting on you guys to correct me if I've gotten anything wrong but this seems like a good deal.

Thank you very much, and I appreciate the help in advance! Can't wait to join this awesome community of enthusiasts! =)

 

By the sounds of all the research you have done, you already know if this is a good deal or not.

Since you didn't state the year, I assume it is a MY03 or has upgraded tails. The car looks to be in great shape for a 13 year old with 128K miles. The seats can be reconditioned instead of being replaced, the bruises on the body can be corrected as you said although color matching will be the most difficult part for SSM.

If you are happy with the car and the engine checks out to be healthy then there is no reason not to consider this car. If you have any doubt, go with your gut.

Good luck on finding the car for you.

 

Yes it is in fact a MY03. I guess to state it more accurately, I was sure that it was a good buy before I saw the points of damage but I just wanted the forums' input as to if its still considered a good buy knowing what it costs to fix stuff. I tend to think it is if my math is correct about the repairs.

Good info though about reconditioning the seats I'll def look into it!

Can someone let me know if I've correctly priced the aforementioned repairs?

 

An AP1 with that many miles will never be worth north of 12-13 grand. Seems like an OK deal.

 

If it's mechanically good so to speak, I'd say it's worth ~$10,000 all day long if still in pretty good shape with a little over 120,000 miles. If the top needs replacement, that costs ~$1,000 minimum for an aftermarket one including the labor. New seats, you could find used ones, but be careful they aren't stolen. The dent on the bumper is too bad, but other than that it might be ok. If the car is mechanically solid, his 11k asking price is about exactly what you'd expect a seller to be asking. You can always offer less than the full asking price, but generally an honest seller isn't going to raise the asking price on you! What matters most is--is the car structurally and mechanically sound, and cosmetically at least ok to good shape. With a clean title preferably.

It generally doesn't hurt to go check out a car and pass, or offer less than the full asking price. Generally the worst that will happen is you've spent however much time it took. Seeing it from the computer, if your budget is around $10,000 or $11,000, it's hard to say yay or nay without checking it out in person. One positive is that the car looks bone stock, so the owner clearly didn't have a bunch of tacky modifications before, not that good modifications can't be a good thing--except the asking price goes up accordingly, say with Volk CE 28's, Ohlin's or KW's, etc., and normally they'd just revert the car back to stock in that case first and part out the goodies.

If you can't live with the cosmetic imperfections, try to get a quote at a body shop for the work to be fixed. And if it ends up being too much you may want to look for one priced a little higher without the imperfections, maybe with lower mileage. Though a good later model AP1 with the glass top and under 65,000 miles or so will have an asking price closer to $15,000 than $10,000. Which is then putting you into the lower range of AP2 territory, though prices are holding firm on good examples, other than the summer-winter difference in pricing, they are not seeming to go down, and of course finding good examples becomes more difficult year to year. There's several people out there willing to pay $20,000 for a clean AP2, so $10,000 for an AP1, and having to sink another few thousand dollars or so into it to get it where you want isn't too bad. I already have $20,000 tied up into my AP2 purchased last fall, and honestly it isn't any more "fun" to drive than my AP1 has been. Especially when I had coilovers and grippy extreme performance tires on it. The ap1 was more fun back then, which is why those will be going onto my ap2 next summer!

 

For the seats I'd get the seat covers from Clazzio for around $300 and call it a day. I love mine! Sorry but this is the best pic I can find at the moment.

 

I find it hard to believe SSM is hard to find. SSM was the most produced color in the US. The car you are looking at is a decent deal at best, definitely not a steal IMHO... Good luck with the purchase, keep us posted.