Saab 9-5 Aero wagon in/near SoCal wanted.

[HorribleHarry]

Hello I am looking for a 00-02 9-5 Aero wagon/estate within 500 miles or so to the Los Angeles area. I came up with the funds for one JUST after the two I was watching were sold. I will be a first time Saab owner.
Thank you for looking and any help you can offer.
Harry

[wombatsauce]

I'll be putting my silver 2002 9-5 Aero 5spd estate up for sale when I get back from a work trip in a couple days. It's not perfect looks-wise, but I have spent more than I paid for the car in maintenance over the last year with receipts to show. Has new Bilstein sport struts, new brake rotors/pads, subframe bushings, PCV-6, engine mounts, etc etc etc. 109k miles, bought it with 96k in June of 2011. This car has been great, and served it's purpose well for me, but now it's time to let it go. I will make a complete ad for it in a few days. In the SF-Bay area.

[00AeroWag]

How much are you planning to spend?

[HorribleHarry]

We were hoping to keep it under 4k. I know that's pushing it, but there were two within a couple hundred miles going for $3,600 2 weeks ago & we missed them both by a couple of days.

Again we thank you for looking.
Harry

[wombatsauce]

Originally Posted by HorribleHarry

We were hoping to keep it under 4k. I know that's pushing it, but there were two within a couple hundred miles going for $3,600 2 weeks ago & we missed them both by a couple of days.

Again we thank you for looking.
Harry

I have not put up my ad as my car popped a power steering pressure line last night, so it's got to go back to the shop. But, I will be donating it if it comes to trying to sell it for anywhere near $4k. My first repair bill for the car, couple weeks after buying it for $6300, was $6,028.18. My wife's car on the other hand - a 2003 Aero wagon automatic, was fine for the first 10k miles after buying it, at which point it popped a fuel pump. We paid $8400 for that car after seeing several others for more money, and talking them down from $9200. The major difference between the cars is that my wife's was well maintained, and mine was not. I made up the difference by paying my mechanic to correct ALL of the issues and catch up on missed maintenance. I learned a lot in the process of buying/owning both of these cars for a little over a year.

One huge thing is that if you can do the work on them yourself, you will save a lot of money! Unfortunately for me, I just moved to a place where I am not allowed to work on a car.

Good luck with your search!

[HorribleHarry]

Well, we found something that works for us... the Saab 9-5's evil cousin... A Volvo 850 T5. Thank you all for helping out. We'll be back looking for a Saab soon as I'm going to be selling my daily driver 300D.
Harry

[wombatsauce]

Originally Posted by HorribleHarry

Well, we found something that works for us... the Saab 9-5's evil cousin... A Volvo 850 T5. Thank you all for helping out. We'll be back looking for a Saab soon as I'm going to be selling my daily driver 300D.
Harry

Good deal - I have heard the 850's are not only a lot of fun, but excellent cars overall. I hope I did not come off too negative - the 9-5 is one of the greatest cars I have ever owned.

[wombatsauce]

I've done a bit of poking around and it looks like I was off on my estimate of value for these cars. Not sure what happened, but it looks like they have a little less than 50% of their value from last year. Talk about insult to injury!

So I guess your hope for finding one for $4k was not so far off. Last year I spent a while looking and mine at $6300 was much cheaper than any of the others. I drove an '01 black Aero wagon in SF that was advertised for $8,500 and considered buying it. Now, after spending so much to keep this thing on the road I am going to have to let it go for less than half of what of I have dumped into it to maintain and improve it. Yikes! Considering just dumping them at a dealership at this point as it's too depressing to even talk to anyone about it. SAAB story indeed!