hello guys.
im looking to buy my first porsche. i found a 996 turbo i like. it has 68K on the miles. is this too much. i have always heard and read that porsche is a great DD type car. but where does it get to be lots of maintance? thanks for the help
You really haven't provided enough information to give you a specific answer about the car you're looking at. What year is the Turbo? What is the overall condition inside and out? Who is selling the car, a Porsche dealer, private party, or used car lot? Most Porsches accumulate 6-9K mi/yr, and most are not used as commuters. I believe the 996 Turbo was produced from 00/01 through 05/06, so 68K maybe a lot of miles, or not depending on the model year. The Porsche magazine Excellence has a market review of the Turbo Porsches on the news stands now I believe. That would be a place to start your research on pricing. IMHO while the 996 Turbos are selling at attractive prices compared to new 997s these can be expensive cars to maintain out of warranty and with increasing mileage. As a DD your 70K mile Turbo will be hitting the 100K mark within 3 years or less (10-12K mi/yr). As a general rule a thorough PPI (Pre Purchase Inspection) is essential and should be done by a Porsche mechanic who knows the potential areas of trouble on the car you're considering. Good luck!
With an older car, it is not so much the mileage, as how well the car was cared for during those miles. If it has been abused, stay away. If you know the owner babied the car it is better than a dealer who has no idea about the car.
it is an 02. all i was askig what about how many miles are too many miles on a 996tt. we all know 100k for honda is pretty much nothing. what about for a 996. where does it start to get expensive to maintain. is 40K too much for this type of car because i may have to spend tons of money on maint.
Honestly, it's hard to tell just by mileage... how the car was maintained, it's previous service history in terms of problems, and how the car was used/driven are as, or even more important than just the mileage.
I owned an '02 996TT for four years, and even though I had no major problems during the 4 years it was under warranty, what few that happened were expensive for Porsche to fix. These cars use the old split-case motor with water-cooled heads. These old-style motors can be extraordinarily expensive to fix, and with the turbocharging, have a lot of complicated systems. I sold it and got the Cayman S for a number of reasons, but one the biggest was that I didn't want to own the car out of warranty.
The prices on these TTs are quite attractive right now - $50-60k for what really is a supercar is a very good price, but they will be expensive to maintain. I would recommend a very thorough PPI by a
very
knowledgeable shop that includes compression and leakdown testing, and a DME readout for over-revs. On any of these, the more you can find out about the car's history, the better - One could have 13k miles and be ready to explode, or one can have 68k miles and be fine for another 68K miles. It really depends a lot on the past maintenance and driving habits of the previous owner(s).
Off the top of my head, I probably wouldn't buy one with 68k miles on it unless I personally knew the previous owner and had full service documentation since new. There's a lot of very nice low-mileage examples out there... if you're buying one with a lot of miles on it because the price is very low, you probably shouldn't be buying it unless you're keeping back a considerable reserve for maintenance and possible repairs.
brad
Great advice here, just wanted to highlight that seeing this from a previous owner is a bit telling about what kind of bill might land in your lap once the car is out of warranty:
Brad,
Out of curiousity would you say cost to own was higher or lower than cayman S? oil changes, first minor service? first major service (if the mileage got there?).
