Should i have any major concerns about buying a new 2011 9-5 Saab (decent price) - no warranty - availability of parts going forward. We have had good luck with a 13 year old Saab that is still running and liked all features of the 2011 - even though it is a dying breed right now.
Let’s see:
Over-priced FWD, 4 cylinder car
Bankrupt company
No warranty
Marginal parts availability
Few independent mechanics
Huge depreciation
Little resale value
Sounds like the perfect automotive purchase to me.
This is a brand new (as in about 10 miles on the ODO) '11 Saab? The decent price should be about 30% of the sticker price or less. Certainly you should have concerns, and parts availability is going to be one of them. If you buy it and want to sell it in 3 years, don’t expect to get much if anything for it - so resale value is another concern.
Things like wiper blades, spark plugs, and filters should be no problem to find. Alternators, water pumps, steering racks, should be OK unless it turns out to be a Saab specific part instead of a GM sourced part. Body panels could be very difficult, so an accident repair could take a long time.
How big a gambler are you? And, how cheap is the selling price? I’d wonder if you could get financing?
What’s the “decent price”? How much off sticker?
@brisco Who is selling this “new” 2011 Saab?
How many miles?
How come no warranty of any kind?
I realize Saab is gone, but a GM dealer should at least warranty the parts that are common to the other cars as well.
If you do buy it, you must realize that you’re going to be “stuck with it” until it’s retired. That could be good or bad.
I don’t think gm warranties them.
I’ll add one more:
A “new” 2011 car that has been sitting on a lot for two years, has not been driven and may need all rubber bits (seals, bushings, hoses, belts, etc.) replaced. Cars deteriorate pretty quick when sitting outside and not driven.
I agree with all of the preceding comments.
Unless the OP is willing to tell us how much this 2 year old, new (orphaned) car costs, we have no way of knowing whether his idea is totally looney or just ill-advised.
You need to make sure that all systems work properly first. Even though it’s a new car, I would take it to a mechanic and have him check everything. Especially the A/C seals. They can dry out if the A/C is not used. Of course, you need a steep discount from the new price. I wouldn’t buy it unless you want to keep it until the wheels fall off. A used 9-5 Aero with no options and 400 miles would be worth $27,600 at a dealer (any dealer). If the price is better than that, maybe you should consider it. BTW, if it has more than 400 miles on it, it is used, not new. Saab hadn’t completely broken away from GM. Some of the parts will be GM, but be aware that Saab never liked the idea of being part of GM and ignored many, if not most, of the corporate directives. This meant that many parts remained Saab parts.
It’d be one of the few times I’d recommend leasing the car instead of buying.
Good suggestion, but no leasing company would touch that car with a ten-foot pole. Or, they would have a ridiculously low residual value making leasing worse than buying.
It’d be one of the few times I’d recommend leasing the car instead of buying.
Why would anyone want to own a SAAB other then to have a SAAB logo. Whether the car is reliable or not is not the issue. Cars are poor investments in general, so why make it worst ? At least with the Asian car myth, you can recoup more during trade in. The SAAB / Volvo car myth is alive and well. The big difference is, your pocket book will pay dearly for the latter. Now, if it were a gift, it’s a totally different story but with @twotones points now coming into effect, regardless.
Buy a Camry, strip the car of logos and affix SAAB ones from the junk yard. It’s little different then GM did with SAAB to cars made by they and Subaru, which may have resulted in their best long term purchase options. My friends 9-7x still gets serviced by GM made parts and the SAAB 9-2x by Subaru made parts.
The last I looked, Toyota seems pretty solvent, so trade in time , you can switch the logos back. What a deal.
IMO, , all the present day SAAB owners, including two good freinds are really S(N)(O)B owners.
Brisco~
Head for ze hills at a run. I wouldn’t touch that over engineered, over-priced, out-on-a limb spaceship with a bargepole, lad! An older model SAAB will serve you better.