S2000 Purchase
Discussion
Tekno said:
Hi,
Looked at a few ‘04 plate cars at the 14/15k mark and they’ve been dogs. Rust on sills, rust on arches. Paint crazing, leather bolsters buggered.
Am I in dreamland to find a half decent example at that price point?
Ta
I'd say not, though pricing very much seems to depend on mileage, with low 20-30k mile cars going for new car money. Try looking though the owners club... Looked at a few ‘04 plate cars at the 14/15k mark and they’ve been dogs. Rust on sills, rust on arches. Paint crazing, leather bolsters buggered.
Am I in dreamland to find a half decent example at that price point?
Ta
If mine was on the market - its not and will never be - no rust, but bolster a little worn, a 56 car with 82k miles. Stock, with no hard top. Suspension refresh a few years ago and paint pretty much as expected in a 15 year old car. I'd be very pleased with that.
Of course prices will soften in the coming few months as winter approaches - it's ever been thus. I bought mine in January the dealer had stocked it in October.. Prices will then rise back up in the spring.
If you’ve narrowed your search to pre 2006 facelift cars on the basis of commonly repeated advice, you’ll be reducing the pool of cars available and fishing in the same pond as 90% of other buyers. These cars are (unjustifiably in my opinion) the most sought after and the least good value.
Whilst these cars do have advantages, particularly for a daily driver with running costs in mind, if you also consider earlier and later cars you’ll have more options.
To answer your question, no you should be able to get an excellent car for £14/15k. I went with a friend to buy a 125k mile 05 a few weeks ago and he got a great car for a little over £10k. At that price he had to accept a patchy service history (but with a recent full main dealer service) and a couple of cosmetic jobs to do, but it was a very good buy.
Don’t accept any visible rust on paintwork, or any engine problems and you can get a good car for £10k+. Rust and engines make S2000s expensive. High mileage needn’t be a problem if it’s been looked after.
Whilst these cars do have advantages, particularly for a daily driver with running costs in mind, if you also consider earlier and later cars you’ll have more options.
To answer your question, no you should be able to get an excellent car for £14/15k. I went with a friend to buy a 125k mile 05 a few weeks ago and he got a great car for a little over £10k. At that price he had to accept a patchy service history (but with a recent full main dealer service) and a couple of cosmetic jobs to do, but it was a very good buy.
Don’t accept any visible rust on paintwork, or any engine problems and you can get a good car for £10k+. Rust and engines make S2000s expensive. High mileage needn’t be a problem if it’s been looked after.
I have a friend who is going to be selling one very soon. He has just finished restoring the brakes, tyres etc. He bought the car as a weekend car to eventually sell once he had done the work needed. Car is Silver and in great order.
If you are interested let me know and I can get his details over to you. He frequently travels between England and Scotland.
If you are interested let me know and I can get his details over to you. He frequently travels between England and Scotland.
Prices of these seem to be going mad, I have just paid £20K for late model GT with hardtop etc. and 34K on the clock. It's pretty much as good as I've seen and I've looked at a fair few. Some of the prices being asked for are off the scale - looked at several at £24 - £25K that were nowhere near as good as the one I've bought.
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/265280193871?hash=item3...
the above looks and sounds a lovely example for 15k..
the above looks and sounds a lovely example for 15k..
emmetb said:
Prices of these seem to be going mad, I have just paid £20K for late model GT with hardtop etc. and 34K on the clock. It's pretty much as good as I've seen and I've looked at a fair few. Some of the prices being asked for are off the scale - looked at several at £24 - £25K that were nowhere near as good as the one I've bought.
The top end of the market seems to have moved for sure. I’m not so sure about the bottom end. When I was buying 2 years ago it was £10k for a nice, needs nothing prefacelift, £8k if you were lucky. Plenty for less but all in need of attention. There still seems to be nice, early cars cropping up around £10k. Agree low miles and late stuff seems to have increased by 50-100% though!Tekno said:
Hi,
Looked at a few ‘04 plate cars at the 14/15k mark and they’ve been dogs. Rust on sills, rust on arches. Paint crazing, leather bolsters buggered.
Am I in dreamland to find a half decent example at that price point?
Ta
You'll almost certainly need a new soft top fitted, so get the upholstery shop to do the bolsters at the same time Looked at a few ‘04 plate cars at the 14/15k mark and they’ve been dogs. Rust on sills, rust on arches. Paint crazing, leather bolsters buggered.
Am I in dreamland to find a half decent example at that price point?
Ta
Unfortunately S2000s are at an age where decent examples will either cost plenty up front, or you'll need to buy one that's less decent and put in work and money to get them up to snuff.
Personally, I prefer the latter approach as if you assume there's issues and there are issues, you're not disappointed. If you pay top money for a minter that turns out to be hiding problems, that's quite upsetting.
R5_BOY said:
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/265280193871?hash=item3...
the above looks and sounds a lovely example for 15k..
Lolthe above looks and sounds a lovely example for 15k..
Says "if you know your S2000s........"
and puts AP2!
pfft
I had an 03 until 4 years ago (an 07 since) and had rusty arches, not bad, just coming through, it went to a paint shop for a dent on the front wing which they did a good job of, as a result of differing colour from new paint to old I decided to have the arches done by them and a full respray, it came back worse than it went in, a month later arches were worse, went in again, 1 month on back in etc car now had varying paint colour so I sold it, gutted actually as despite it having just reached 100k it drove fantastic and I did like the nurb blue colour better.
My 07 with 18k on drives exactly the same albeit maybe a slight difference in smoothness (best I can put it and was barely noticeable).
If you're going to have work done, put a few quid behind a good repair shop, cost me £3300 (£2k came from those who dented it) I sold the car for 4750 incl sale of the hard top
Edited by Lee-S2K on Thursday 9th September 18:41
I think you should be able to get something reasonable for £14-£15k, mileage won’t be super low, but you shouldn’t accept visible rust for that budget.
Eventually, after looking for 6 months or so, I joined the owners club and put up a wanted ad for the spec I was looking for on the website.
A lovely chap got in touch a couple of weeks later, he had exactly the car I was after which hadn’t been for sale until he read my post. As mentioned above, I would encourage this approach.
I’m glad I bought mine when I did (3 1/2 years ago now), the prices have escalated dramatically since then, but they had been climbing for a few years before I started looking.
Not sure what a 23k mile, 55 plate Moonrock GT would fetch today.
Eventually, after looking for 6 months or so, I joined the owners club and put up a wanted ad for the spec I was looking for on the website.
A lovely chap got in touch a couple of weeks later, he had exactly the car I was after which hadn’t been for sale until he read my post. As mentioned above, I would encourage this approach.
I’m glad I bought mine when I did (3 1/2 years ago now), the prices have escalated dramatically since then, but they had been climbing for a few years before I started looking.
Not sure what a 23k mile, 55 plate Moonrock GT would fetch today.
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