Should I sell it or keep it?

[technobandit96]

I know that spring is going to be a here and a little crazy. This thread is the option to keep it or should I just sell it and give it another person? I don't have enough money to have fancy cars anyway but if I can make this one last that's fine by me.

About the car is everything that my sig says. It has 170,000+ on it I just changed the transmission and the oil these past two weeks. It has no service history and needs body work, paint work and a whole bunch of stuff that it needs.

 

[rasouth]

The parts to fix these vehicles are not too expensive, easy to get, kinda easy to work on... A lot of these engines last well into the 200,000 mile range. If you don't mind driving around in a car that needs body work and paint (things you can do later), a little maintenance should keep it going for quite a bit longer.
If it is driveable and street legal and you don't mind being seen driving it I say keep it.

 

[94Eddie]

The deal breaker for me keeping it would be if it has rust issues. A lot of things can be fixed but rust isn't one of them that can be done well unless you spend a ton of money.

 

[technobandit96]

The deal breaker for me keeping it would be if it has rust issues. A lot of things can be fixed but rust isn't one of them that can be done well unless you spend a ton of money.

That was one of my ideas to fix on the car if I got around to it.

 

[Mbrooks420]

Unless you can do all the paint work and welding, then the body work would likely cost more than the value of the vehicle. Drive it until the wheels fall off, and then sell or scrap it. Before fixing any major rust, I’d just buy a different/better truck.

 

[J_C]

It depends on what "whole bunch of stuff" is, that cost if you feel compelled to fix these issues, and whether any are safety or reliability problems.

Otherwise, If there are no major mechanical problems, you might as well keep driving it as the odds are that you will get as much value out of using it, as you'd get from selling it. Remember that if it's rusting out, even if only cosmetic, plus some other issues, makes its resale value not that much, probably less than $1K difference between resale value and scrap value. On the other hand, frame rust-through, or severe rocker panel rust, could be safety issues and would make me get rid of it sooner than later.

It doesn't have to last much longer to get that much value out of using it, unless it's an extra/spare vehicle you don't really need. In that case I would sell it, or if your age/health, or availalbe space to work on it, is limited and you need something newer that has less frequent repair expectations. We don't know how many parts you've put on in recent years, in order to know what's looming/due to fail and what's probably good for another dozens of thousands of miles or more.