Yearly cost of owning a 996?

I see this question a lot on other forums, but the answers are always along the lines of "If you have to ask, you can't afford it". I'm looking at buying a 996 (havn't found the exact one yet), but the cost of owning one keeps coming to mind. I've got the insurence part figured out, so excluding that- What do you all spend yearly on your car? How many miles a year do you do? This would be my first Porsche, but I'm happily ready to do any of the work that can be done in a weekend, and have backup transportation _just in case_, but would be daily driving it. Been putting about 8-9k miles a year on my current car (2010 mini cooper). Thanks for reading, and I'll be here happy to have a discussion with anybody willing to share their experiences with their 996!

$1,000 to $2,000 per year on average assuming no major problems

Thanks for the quick reply. I appreciate the estimate. It looks like the dream will live on. Short of an IMS failure, are bad years usually I'm the 6-8k range?

Some years will be just the cost of oil change(s). Some years will include tires and all the other stuff that needs to be replaced with age. If you're fortunate and space everything out, KC's numbers work. If everything comes due at once, or you pick up a new car with deferred maintenance, you're going to spend much more. Tires alone are $1K a set, +/- 20%. Depending on how you drive, you may get half the life out of the rears as the fronts, so you may be replacing the rear tires twice for every set of new front tires. You can do the lion's share of work as a casual DIYer and save a lot; I leave hard stuff (clutch, all internal engine stuff) to the mechanic. Brakes, for example, are a cinch, and DIY will lower the bill from ~$1K to a few hundred bucks. You can do most/all of the scheduled maintenance (the stuff the owner's manual says to do) on your own as well, for a drastic savings over dealership rates. If you buy a car that has been updated (new water pump, new coolant expansion tank, IMSB upgrade already done, suspension is in good shape, etc.), the car isn't any more expensive to maintain than any other 15-year-old sports car. If you buy one with no service history or one with a lot of deferred maintenance...well, don't. There are too many 996's on the market to settle for one that needs a ton of work unless you're looking for a project. A solid car won't sell for so much more than a fixer to make the fixing worthwhile...unless you buy a serious project. Which you don't want to do. Some of us around here may be a-holes, but we're not the "if you have to ask, you can't afford it" kind of a-holes.

I agree with 5CHN3LL. I had some years with my 996 C4S that were in the $1,000 - $2,000 range. I had some years that were in the $5,000+ range. Your annual cost will depend heavily on the car, your driving style and frequency, and your tolerance for maintenance and repairs. I always followed the recommended service intervals at a minimum and I fixed anything that broke. My car was a daily driver.

Just buy a well-sorted 996 and you shouldn't have any surprises. BTW, I'm selling mine. See the link below. https://rennlist.com/forums/vehicle-...85k-miles.html

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For a pure street car that seems a bit high to me, although admittedly I haven't had the car long enough to know. $1-2K is more than my Ferrari 360 costs me annually. However, my 996 being a dual purpose street/track car will increase the annual costs. Cheers.

1. All sorts of money on cleaning stuff. You will end up buying Mcguire's detailer, hand wax, wheel cleaner, tire shine, leather wipes, plastic treatment, cleaning clothes (not just rags, but the soft ones that are as soft as a new born lamb), glass cleaner (not the regular stuff , but the expensive stuff in the blue bottle that costs three times what windex does) a special bucket (you can skimp a bit there) soft cleaning sponge, a chomise that cost as much as your old car's tire) and of course, a tooth brush for the details (that you can use an old one). Yeah, you will do this because you just won't be able to watch some teenager drive your car to the beginning of the wash and stall it because they don't know how to use a clutch. Alternatively, you can hire somebody to do it or if the sickeness sets in, you will do it yourself. OBTW, you will probably buy a power washer as well, you can get them for a couple hundred dollars. 2. Cost of B&B's. Face it, if you have a lady friednd or whatever, you will start going on these little trips out to the wine country and she/he will just want to get very familiar and you will end up in a B&B. Trust me, you don't want to be doing any funny stuff in the car because you could get a ticket or have an incident or something worse. So you might as well put the cash away for a good B&B along your route. Figure about 3-4 hours max before your significant other is going to be a problem. Sometimes much less. 3. Cost of expensive Dog Sitter Services. If you have the sickness, you will be thinking any excuse to do errands. You probably will take hound along with you (and you have the cleaning stuff so you don't care if they stick their head out the window and slobber). The expensive dog service cost, comes when he/she who must be obeyed wants you to drive the P-car to the wine country and your hound best friend looks at you with those eyes when you try to leave them behind at the house with a friend to look in and change the water. They will cry and howl and you will have to have Ceasar Millan come and give you and the hound therapy. That will be even more expensive. So you take hound to expensive doggie retreat where he has a girlfriend name Fi-Fi, who is a biggie frenchie poodle that thinks that hound is the bomb because he rides in a P-car. 4. Cost of theapy. This is seperate from Ceasar Millon, this is for you. You will find yourself cleaning and treating the car at 0230 in the morning and you will get discovered by your significant other. They will insist you get help. This can be in the form of some head doctor having you lay on a couch (cheapest) or the Rennlist therapy (also known as Track Therapy). This will cost you another boatload of cash as you end up doing track days, souping up the car, even towing extra tires. In the worse case, you buy another P-car, a special trailer, an RV to tow it and you spend you weekends at Willow Springs driving to the limit. Then of course, your significant other is only about 30 min away from tearing you clothes off so you need to add the cost of another B&B that is close to the track. All in all, it can be very expensive to own a P-car. It's very easy to catchg the P-car sickness and tough to get over it. - Fast Frank

My total costs of ownership, excluding gas over last 2 1/2 years; 2013--$1838 2014--$1398 2015--$2441 (so far)

Lol, you guys are awesome. It looks like I'll definitely stay on the market then, as owning one of these has been a long time dream and 2k a year with the occasional 5 is going to be just fine. It'll be street use only, hopefully. Trying to avoid getting into tracking / autocross, as I know that'll start getting pricey fast. Falvidre's write up is beautiful, and I'll try to avoid getting toooo caught up in it. Edit* Rubik, your car is beautiful. It's a sad day to be in Virginia and across the country from you. Planning to do a roadtrip when the right car is found, but I gotta finilize the sale of my mini first. :> I might be messaging you in a week if the mini goes through to see If yours is still up.

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Sure. Let me know and we can arrange a PPI and BTW, my brother has a transport service if you end up buying it. Also about maintenance, it all depends on you. Some people use the factory recommended Mobil 1 0-40 from Walmart for $50 per 10 quarts and some use Joe Gibbs DT 40 oil (designed for these engines) at more than double that. Hence the commonly known forum terminology "buying unicorn semen" for our cars. Me, I'm a Joe Gibbs DT40 kind'a guy. For routine maintenance, it's not bad but if you're an OCD kind'a fellow, the sky is the limit. And that's true with any car.

It was actually a thread like this that caused me to look at my records, add up my receipts and ultimately sell my 996. Don't get me wrong, I loved the car and it was my daily driver for a long time. I drove it over 10,000 miles per year in almost all conditions. Here is the breakdown of my annual cost from 2007 - 2014, including disposables like brakes and tires: 2007: $2,394.45 2008: $2,133.28 2009: $3,034.86 2010: $1,758.27 2011: $5,585.66 2012: $6,815.43 2013: $8,323.11 2014: $4,442.05 There are some mods in these numbers too, but nothing dramatic. There is also some preventative maintenance, like the LNE ceramic IMSB that was installed in 2013 when the clutch was done. My car was a C4S, and one of my larger expenses was rebuilding the front differential. My experience may not be representative of all 996 ownership experiences, but it's one data set to consider. FWIW - I've spent less than $500 on my turbo in the last year.

One of the other awesome things about the 996 is the variety of different "looks" - cabriolet or coupe, from a bone-stock 996 (i.e. "classic" 911), the aero kit look (the "taco wing"), the GT3-look like mine, the C4S Turbo look, and even (*cough*) the Targa. Enjoy the hunt...

On average $1,500 - $2,000 a year. Some years you might only spend $500, others may cost you $3,000. Is it an auto? Changing the ATF will cost $600 or more. Spark plugs only $250, need coils add $400. Need a water pump? $600. Need a new exhaust system, $5,000. IMSB $1,500 Your mileage may vary a lot on the actual cost depending if it's dealer, indy, or DIY.

The longer and more frequently you are on here is directly proportional to how much you will spend(whether it's on repairs, PM's, Fear Induced PM's, Mod's, stupid things). That is the one certain thing.

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You nailed it! And Targa is the way to go

But seriously, some of the PM stuff will be a one time deal. I mean, how many times you're going to change a water pump for instance?

I have owned, and currently own, both Mercedes and a Porsche 911. I do not track my current 911 nor have I tracked my previous two 991s. My cost of maintenance was about $2k or less annually. Labor costs are the big part of car maintenance ... but that is not unique to the premium brands. My formula has been to put away 10% of the purchase price in "rainy day" fund for car maintenance and I have never blown that budget. I do a fair amount of DIY stuff too ... and that helps the budget while providing me with some fun. It helps to think of maintenance as fun because the maintenance will support the constant smile on your face as you run around in such an awesome car as is the Porsche 911s.

I'm in year 2 of ownership. So far this year about $3k on maintenance items of which one was the AOS, IMS inspection and RMS replacement. Year 1 was about $4500 of which $1500 was to replace a leaking fuel line and sender. Some of the first year maintenance costs were buying parts that I did not actually install until this year (coolant tank, water pump, thermostat, rotors and parking brake). Excluding those big big ticket items, the others were mostly parts that went out (headlight switch, driver door latch, frunk latch, etc.), and items covered by periodic maintenance that was either due or unknown.

I have other vehicles so this is not my primary, though 5k one year, 1500 the next. (avg 3500 miles per year for 6 years) without any real hard numbers, I haven't spent anywhere near what i'm reading...

If my 996 ate as much $$$ as DennisC's 996, I would dump a gallon of gas on the seats and toss a road flare in through an open window. Well, maybe not quite that drastic, but I would be very, very displeased. My 996, excluding stupid impulse buys, has definitely not cost that much. Maybe 25% that much?

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I get stuff from the family for Christmas and my birthday - I seldom have to buy anything other than a new bag of microfiber towels... I have a P21S kit I haven't even opened yet - and I have to say that I prefer the Griot's products to Meguiar's. The Griot's speed detailer cleans the paint up beautifully without leaving a hardcore static charge. Some of the detailer sprays leave the paint very attractive to new contaminants - and a dusty car 3 hours after you finished detailing the damn thing is maddening. Black car owners: Can I get an amen? Stay at the Ritz once, and when the valet parks YOUR CAR in front between a Lambo and a Bentley, you will realize that this is worth it. Like a Visa commercial: Priceless. The wife will feel like royalty. This may result in activities that are simply not possible inside the vehicle. (Note: Some acts, such as The JFK, must be done in the car to be considered properly executed). Get a cat. They crap in a box. Pay someone $50 to show up a few times a week to de-crap the box. Bonus: Cats hate you, so you being gone is an upgrade in their opinion. Compare this to dogs, who will ponder what they did to make you forsake them...as they sadly chew your furniture. Driving the 996 IS therapy!

Well if we include the purchase price, ours is in the $9k range per year for the last 15 years. If you just look at maintenance, even with our big bill a few weeks ago the average is probably in the 1-1.5k range. I would say that when we have to do maintenance, it's always in the 2-3k range, but we typically go a few years with nothing but oil.

LOL. Funniest post I've seen in a while...T

I think all Porsches for that matter are very reliable....This was my first Porsche, a 2001 911 C2. Put in about $3,500 right after purchase to bring it up to speed maintenance wise. Other than that, it's been spending money on microfiber towels, wax and detailing stuff My dad had a 1999 C2.....not a single issue, a 2001 C2 Cab......required nothing but a water pump and brakes, now has a 2007 Targa 4s......only thing that happened was the brake booster was replaced under warranty. Other than that, just general maintenance such as oil and filters,etc. Deferred maintenance is a killer when it comes to these cars, can get $$$$ quickly! Just keep on top of everything and you will be fine. I am unfortunately a tad OCD when it comes to these cars Better than alchohol or drugs

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I tend to try to keep my cars as close to perfect as I can, but I'll admit that I might have gone overboard on a few things. That being said, many of the repairs were just repairs, and nothing special. I paid cash for the C4S when I bought it, so I didn't have a car payment. Maybe that made me hold on too long. It seemed like every year required at least one set of tires and one major repair. Throw in the occasional brake job and small repair, and it really adds up quickly. I think that part of the reason that the maintenance is lower on my turbo is that I drive it less than 5,000 miles per year.

Once you start dumping money into a car, you run up against the whole "Well, I just spent $--- on it, I might as well keep it for another 6 months." That's not typically a winning strategy, but everyone is guilty at least once. Mine was my '88 Fiero. I loved that car, even though it wanted to kill me in many different ways.

I've spent about $19K so far...purchase price, tax and registration, etc.

I know I'm on the extreme end of the spectrum - spent about $40K on maintenance (including my 997 replacement engine) in the 2 1/2 years that I've owned my 996. I guess the Porsche God is making up for the 3 years of Boxster ownership when I spent next to nothing.

Yeah...when you get boned, you get boned MIGHTILY.

I save all my receipts in a binder, but I refuse to tally them. I'd have a heart attack otherwise. Some were optional expenses, like the headers-back Fabspeed exhaust system and double-DIN nav/entertainment/phone system. Some were unavoidable due to track use, including four sets of rather expensive tires in two years. Some were just $#!@ bad luck, like replacing the blown engine. Coulda' bought a 991 for what I've shelled out so far. Ah well, been enjoying the trip! If you can afford a grand or two per year average on misc. stuff, and a 5K repair tab now and then without going homeless, you will be fine. Do all (or most of) your own mechanics, and it will be significantly less than that.

Read your quote to the Dog and he was not impressed at all. The cat on the other hand thought it was spot on, but she simply walked away.

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"...and puked in my shoe."

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We should compare Fiero stories sometime. I had two of them. My first was an 86 SE that I eventually rolled (and walked away from). My second was an 88 Formula which was an outstanding car for the price. Engine was in the right spot, it was easy to work on, and fun on the track. It was my baby. Just needed a bigger engine. A decade ago you could upgrade the engine to a supercharged 3.8 or an LS1 for easily less than $5K. Crazy. I didn't think I would own another car that I would be quite as enchanted with. But then I bought my 996 and haven't looked back. Back on subject. While the 996 clearly isn't cheap to maintain, I have been pleasantly surprised on how reliable it is. I probably spend about $2-3K/year on maintenance and minor upgrades for the past 5+ years but I'm happy with that considering the age of the car. DIY definitely helps significantly. I just finished replacing and upgrading pads and rotors (DIY) for about $1K. It likely would have cost 50-100% more to do that at the shop. No major repairs so far other than the coolant tank and replacing a worn shock.

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yuck, now you cant use it as the ultimate cup holder anymore

I'm right there with the Fiero - despite the shortcomings (floppy coaxial shifter cables, not nearly enough HP, the tendency to catch fire, the way the tiny buttons buttons popped off the HVAC unit), it was an awesome little car. If I found an identical '88 in good shape, I'd buy it in a heartbeat. Not my Fiero, but this one's exactly like mine was... It cracks me up hearing people complain about the 996's frameless windows...at anything above "top speed" - since the speedo only went to 85, you just kinda had to guess how fast you were going - the vacuum outside would pull the windows away from the window gasket. Scared the hell out of me the first time it happened.

Continuing to hijack thread Here's mine at a track day in 2006. My dad (in the picture) brought his yellow 88 Fiero for the first time as well. With an upgraded engine and the relatively low weight of 2800 pounds I was able to keep up with much nicer cars (including Boxsters at that time). I bought the car for $5K, spent $5K upgrading and maintaining it over the years, and sold it over 10 years later for $2.5K. Yearly cost (excluding gas and insurance) was much less than $1K/year and that included depreciation. I still think it had the highest "fun per dollar" of any other car in history. IF the 996 depreciation slows down it might be able to come close on my "fun/dollar" metric The Fiero engine itself was pretty solid, but it definitely had its gremlins. The ignition module was one of them. I had 2 of them fail. One of them failed as I was idling in line at Canadian customs after returning from the US. I actually got out and pushed the car through customs and proceeded to replace the ignition module myself in the parking lot. The biggest shock of the car though was the fact that the headlights popped up by themselves at about 110 Mph. And rather quickly. The first time that happened to me I felt my heart stop.

To the OP; Look J (bruh). Not to sugar coat anything, the costs can be all over the place depending on several things. What might be only a few thousand can immediately escalate to $20,000 for a CEF caused by a MOF. It also depends on if your the type that can DIY or depends on a dealer to do PM. Huge difference on costs. There are some on here who must flatbed to dealer for everything, ie; John Iremaster and Schnellster. That can quickly add up.