just wanted to get the forums opinion about salvage titled fd's...since resale's for fd are not the greatest... is it worth just to buy a salvage fd instead...salvage as in a front/rear collision car? in japan we end up junking all major accident cars but it seems like after we modified the hell out our rotary's, the general consumer tends to stay away from high priced rx7's...

 

I personally will never knowingly buy any car that I know has been in a major wreck. Only exception would be a car that has been rebuilt by turbojeff or someone else with his skill and "replace all the broken parts" style.

-s-

 

The resale on FD is incredibly good, far better than most used vehicles I can think of and better than any new car.

You can buy an FD with 70k miles for, say, $14k, drive it for a few years putting another 20k on it, and probably sell for $12k or so.

Or you could spend $14k on a new Ford Focus, drive it for two years, and sell it for $8k.

I'm not sure what you are getting at? You will probably not lose more than $1k a year on an FD to depreciation. You could lose that per month for a new Ford Explorer.

 

Because the FD is 10+ years old and major depreciation takes place in the first few years...

Thanks for saving the thread, Captain Obvious.

 

Given that he is going to buy an FD and can't possibly buy a new one, I don't see how a hypothetical depreciation loss on a new one he could have bought were it available could possibly be relevant in any universe. But thanks for bringing up this alternative option - I would never have though of it.

The fact is, if you are thinking of buying an FD, depreciation should be the least of your worries.

 

I actually do have to second the FD having really amazing resale. Of course with my luck the one car to have great resale in the long term is the only one I'll never sell : ). I'd love to see a list of cars in the last 20 years that have held near 50% of value after 10 years. The 95's and even the 94's had a pretty unjustified MSRP price hike during the collapse of the sports car industry. With that kind of savvy I'm amazed sports didn't have a miraculous recovery. : P

A good example of the norm is my 5 year old $42k Audi now being worth all of about $12,000 in very good condition.

As for the buying it and driving it a couple years, then selling it again without much loss. The problem there is the number of owners. People get nervous about buying cars that have had numerous owners. They assume it's a lemon.

As for salvage title RX7's, I'd bet if the person knows it the value is 50% of an equal car without it that flag.

Kevin T. Wyum

 

My FD Is a Salvage Car. The Car drives perfectly fine and runs beautifully. The Car only has 36k Original miles on it. It needed some small issues fixed when i bought it. Like a Secondary Boost Issue, Cracked Windshield, Radio and some other small Issues. The main thing it needs is paint...

Being that the car Drives Perfectly and Runs perfectly, I would price it just slightly lower than a clear title car that needed paint. In my opinion, a Salvage Title is just a piece of paper.....As long as the car was fixed properly, drives straight, and runs good, I dont care what type of title it has....tho, my opinion is slightly Biased..

Just my $.02

 

Just a little biased .

And irrelevant when it comes the market value of your car. The problem is that pretty much all buyers (and a significant number of finance and insurance companies) will not share your opinion that a salvage title is 'just a piece of paper'. Hence, salvage title cars sell for 30-50% less than clean titled cars.

 

You might price it there, but no one who knew better would pay that much for a car that had enough damage at one time to warrant being totaled by an insurance company. There may be difficulties in financing, licensing, or insuring the car, and who knows if it was actually repaired correctly.

It's like picking up an ice cream cone that was dropped in dog **** and then telling your pals that it's "as good as new" after wiping the **** off. The fact is that the majority of cars with salvage titles are NOT repaired correctly and are NOT "as good as new".

If you want to see almost as good as new, look at one of Jeff Hoskinson's CYM restoration threads. The car still has a salvage title, but at least it was repaired correctly. The downside is that it costs so much to fix a salvage FD with chassis damage correctly that you can't make any profit off it, which is why Jeff is keeping his CYM.

Obviously.

 

What it comes down to is that insurance company's decide what cars to salvage. any car that is wrecked needs to be repaired correctly. Salvage varies from state to state and insurance co. to ins. co.
If you read Sport Compact Car, their project rx7 would have been salvaged in alot of states due to the front rails being bent by the oil chang place kid....
Any used car should be examined all the way. Salvage is just a piece of paper, any car can be beat or any car can be cherry. i've wrecked cars and had no salvage title given to them, insurance co. repaired and the car was crap after...
Basically insurance company's play the number game, it's not about the car. Insurance co's have more money than brains...(no personal offense to anyone working in the insurance industry)

 

My car is a rebuilt title. I hate the damn thing.

With rebuilt cars, there is very little chance of know what exactly has happened to it. I have had more problems fixing the "****" that was left over than fixing actual problems with the rest of the car. I even bought the car with a new motor, wiring harness, transmission and clutch. As it turns out, it was supposed to just look pretty in the driveway. Now that it has been sitting, the **** Mazda paintjob has faded and the parts of the car that have newer paint make it look very bad.

If I were you, I would only buy a pristine example from a trusted seller(Fritz Flynn, Turbojeff, and if Jim ever sells his )

BTW Jim, I want first dibs.

 

There is a major diffrence in being salvaged in its first few years compared to now.

and while the depreciation might not be much the replacing motors all the time is expensive.

 

If you mean that based on market value, a newer FD would have required considerably more damage to total than an older FD does now, especially considering the high cost of replacement parts, then sure... but you can't really make a valid generalization where salvage titles are concerned.

Each car has to be assessed based on its own damage. While it's certainly possible to total a 10+ year old FD with relatively little structural damage because of the insane cost of replacement parts (hood, glass, door panels, etc.), you can still righteously **** up an older car just as easily as you can a new one and both end up with salvage titles. Just the fact that it is an FD typically means that crash speeds are going to be higher than the average car anyway. In other words, there's no such thing as a "good" or "bad" salvage title. They're all bad.

BTW, the next person who says a salvage title is "just a piece of paper" gets kicked in the nuts for sheer ignorance...

 

.

 

You tell me. You're the one with a wrecked FD, aren't you?

 

wow i wasn't expecting a smart *** comment. I guess i should have

 

I was looking for a car to throw a ls1 in for under 10k and was amazed when two people told me their cars had minor accident back in 93 and 94. Now days a minor accident can to total one of these cars. A car that was recently in a bad accident is more likely to be scraped than fixed because there isnt as much profit in fixing it. I guess some people could do it but is much more unlikely.

 

How was that a smart *** comment? You do have a wrecked FD, don't you? Weren't you trying to sell it in the last couple months?

 

Yes i do, but im looking for information about the rebuilt title, just because i have one doesnt mean i know everything about it :P

i knew i shouldn't have sold my 94.....

 

Is your car bent?

 

anyone for swords?

 

"but you can't really make a valid generalization where salvage titles are concerned."

Why not? If a car was totaled by a ins co. last year then it could have sever damage but why would anyone fix it? In 95 a car with 20k in damages would be repaired and sold for a reasonable profit. Today that same car would have a net loss after the repair because it can only be sold for 10-12k. If one of these cars was severely dameged in the last few years you would have to be an dumb *** to repair it. Then again this world is filled with dumb asses.

 

I already explained "why not". Read my post again.

 

I bought a FD that had such a small engine fire it STILL RAN. It had a salvage title, now is the car really ruined? With proper photos and documentation of repairs you can buy a good salvage titled car.

Unfortunately many are not "good" cars anymore since many people hack them together.

In ~1997 a hood for a FD listed at about $550-600, currently the same hood costs $955 list price. If you think about it from an insurance point of view, bump the front end, $1300 for the front bumper assy, ~$1000 for the hood, ~$175 for the hood latch, $500 for each headlight assy, +misc parts (airbox is $400, airbags +$800,etc)+2-3K paint and labor the car is totalled. It actually takes SIGNIFICANTLY less damage to total a FD now than it did when it was a newer car due to lower vehicle value and higher parts and labor costs.

Insurance companies don't total a car at it's value, they total it at some percentage of it's value, 70% or so. If the car is "worth" $13K, ~$9K of damage will total it. If you aren't a dumbass you can fix the same car for peanuts. Used hood=$200, Used headlights=$75/ea, front bumper=$200, airbox=$40. Get it?

 

yeah but those quick fix cars are usaly gone in a matter of hours. On the forum everyone post give it to jeff so you atomatically get first dibs, your not even a bodyman. j/k