<p>You: college student with a budget of $1000 for a car.</p>
<p>Car: 1996 Pontiac Bonneville, 197,000 miles. New radiator. Needs tires. Leaking rear main seal. Clogged catalytic converter. No mention of a working air conditioner. Asking $650 and negotiable.</p>
<p>Say you negotiate a selling price of $500. The Bonneville uses 225/60/16 tires. A new set of cheap radials will run you around $350. Just a set of tires will cost you more than 50% of the selling price of the car. Unless you drive the car for at least a couple of years, you will never recover the cost of the tires alone. </p>
<p>A leaking rear main seal means that the engine is losing oil. Not a cheap repair. Depending on how badly the leak is, a cheap fix will run under $1000. A clogged catalytic converter? When the converter fails, it’s usually because the engine is burning oil. Using a universal fit converter will set you back $200 or so… A clogged converter will prevent the car from accelerating well because the converter is causing exhaust gases to build. Just replacing the converter does not fix any underlying engine problems which passes oil into the exhaust system. More money.</p>
<p>Can these problems be fixed? Sure, just throw money at it. </p>
<p>My advice: Keep looking… </p>
<p>Remember, any car selling for $1000 or less needs repairs which exceed the valuse of the car to the seller.</p>