Price for a 2001 Nissan Xterra with a blown head gasket

Maintenance/Repairs
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1

i have a 2001 nissan xterra xe with a blown head gasket it has 150000 miles on it.is it worth buying for 400 dollars?

2

Do you know the history? Was it just one overheat that blew gasket or was the problem ignored until it finally let go? Is there water in the oil, was it run for any length of time with water in oil?

If the latter happened, don’t buy it, too many internal parts damaged (rod and main bearings) from water oil sludge.

If it was a simple one time overheat that popped the head gasket, then for 400 yes buy it and fix, you stand to make a decent Penney on it.

If there is any doubt in its history or your ability to repair, save your 400 and walk away.

I’ve bought $1000 “beaters” fixed them and sold them for good money but on occasion I’ve lost money.

Unless you know it’s full history or the people that owned it, then it’s always a crap shoot if you can fix easy or hard.

Just learned my lesson on a $1500 xterra for my youngest, up north truck, everything underneath eat up by salt, fixed it all from junk yards for around $500 and 3 weeks of staying greasy with bloody knuckles trying to get salt rusted bolts to let loose

3

Are you selling it? I ask because you said you “have” one. A dealer would ask $4-6k in good running condition, which means you’d get less than that in a best case scenario, let’s say $3k, and deduct the cost of a used engine. You might get $400 but you might not sell it soon.

4

19 year old car with a non-running engine and 150K on the rest of it.

It is worth whatever scrap value a junkyard will offer you.

5

Gimme $100 and I’ll haul it away for you. :wink:

1 Like
6

If it were me I would assume the entire engine is garbage. Sounds like a Craigslist special and any claim of head gasket only should be taken with a grain of salt.

If the vehicle has a straight body, clean interior, pretty much rust free, and you can do all of the work yourself; maybe, but 250 would be my limit assuming it met all of the criteria I listed.

7

It’s just a bad battery…or it’s out of gas…

I agree 100%…The engine is junk. If it is just a head gasket, then why isn’t it fixed. Sell for $400, or put $400 on new gasket and sell for $4,000.