Basic used cars are out there for cheap. I think this has become more of a thing again for older cars from the 2000âs or so. One of my buddies had a neighbor move away. She couldnât take an extra 2005 Jeep Liberty with her so he kept it there and sold it for her. She wanted $3500 at first. He got no responses. He FINALLY got her to drop it to $2500 and there were some responses. Then he dropped to $2200 or so and got interest. He had to tell her that the only way to let it go was to sell for $1800 and that did it. This car had close to 250,000 miles and a check engine light on. He never read the codes but it ran fine. Also, the 3.7L isnât known for being a great engine past 250,000 miles so I am sure that helped kill the value. Also, it is a Chrysler.
Another guy wanted a cheap work car when gas prices went up so bad and he wanted to keep the miles off his relatively new truck as well. He ended up getting a Suzuki SX4 that runs fine with no check engine lights, had pretty new tires on it, and came with a roof rack, cross bars, and a set of snow tires on rims. He got that all for $2200. The paint looks pretty bad but this is a beater to drive to work. If it breaks down he can always use the full size pickup that guzzles fuel in the meantime.
These cars would have been worth gold a few years back during the pandemic. For example, a guy I know put a rusted out Cavalier with some bad part like a water pump for $3000 and someone was happy to come with a trailer and buy it. Of course it had been sitting so the battery was dead and it wouldnât start at all from stale fuel. This would be a car you get $200 in scrap these days and that is if you haul it to the scrapyard yourself. Otherwise you are lucky to have them come get it for free.
The Dodge Stealth was quite a car, especially in the Mitsubishi GT3000 VR4 variant which had all the complexity of the Subaru SVX (AWD & Adjustable Ride Height) PLUS 4 Wheel Steering and Turbos.
Aside from the âTrailer Babiesâ (30 years old and less than 100K miles) you donât see many of either for sale. And the price of both seems to float around $10,000 so to me the reason is for such a low price is obvious. "Hey Dave (my phenomenal mechanic), Could you take a look at the rear steering on my GT3000 and my wifeâs SVX Adjustable Ride Height? â.
Still waiting for âDaveâ to stop laughingâ
But BTW, for a fun exercise can anybody name all the vehicles sold under the MOPAR name that were actually made by another company?
No points for Jeep brands but Renault is fair game.
Several vehicles marketed under the Mopar name or as part of the Chrysler/Mopar lineup were actually manufactured by other companies, either through licensing, joint ventures, or acquisitions. These were rebranded for sale in the U.S. and other markets.
Wikipedia