Talk about an addiction! I check craigslist everyday. Always the "autos by owner" section looking for good deals, monstrosities of wasted time, or the infamous barn find. Its all about the chase, and hopefully I can share some of the excitement about the latest club dirty endeavor: Project E30.
So I sold my Jeep Grand Cherokee to look for a more reliable car. I missed the excitement of driving, and I love how the Mazdaspeed3 takes care of that perfectly. The point of getting the cheaper Jeep was to have enough on the side to have a running project car
Out of habit, I check deals daily on Craigslist. On my lunch break, I see a newly posted ad for a BMW. The price looks fishy. The price is in the post headline with no dollar sign attached. For anyone familiar with craigslist classified postings, this was one of these moments where "not sure if deal, or international businessman requesting money wire transfer for their aunt who will be back in the states soon."
"Does it run?"
"Yea"
"What all is wrong with the car besides the dent"
"Could use a tune up."
After some more back and forth via text, I figured it would be worth a look. Low and behold, the guy lives in my neighborhood! He was out of town for the weekend, but assured me I could remove the car cover and take a look, without getting arrested!. So I took a look the next morning, and this is what I saw. These are the pictures from the Craigslist ad:
Looked surprisingly clean! Could definitely use a wash and wax
It was a BMW is model, which on this car this included a sport front valence. Only bummer is the fog lights missing.
Ouch. Couldn't tell if the dent was terrible, or that the rear end on the E30 pre-facelift were ugly to begin with. The previous owner states he slid in the rain, and went backwards into the guard rail. The "diving board" bumper had since been replaced after the incident.
The rust on the corners sucked. That blue cord was a lanyard cut in half, holding in the taillight.
The other side had a custom velcro strip holding in the taillight. Again, the rust kind of sucked. Upon closer inspection, it was just surface rust for now. The sheet metal looked as if the owner intentionally cut the sides to get the taillight to fit after the incident. That is exactly what it was. The hole past the indicator allowed for water to make its way in the trunk. There was a puddle right after the wheel well about 4 inches deep. A floating Coors can and cigarette butts were like boats in a harbor.
The car looked low, and it was. I could see red springs, and in the rear it appeared to have "Koni" rear struts.
Everything else on the exterior looked great, just some minor dings. Since it was just me looking at the car, I spent a long time looking over the car. There was extremely little rust to be found underneath, just some very minor surface rust. This included under the doors and the door jams. Looked like the car had undercoating on it from the factory. In addition, I found that the motor/transmission mounts looked new and made of polyurethane.
I am a sucker for red seats, and although beaten up, they were still comfy. There was 2 extra wheels shoved in there before this picture was taken. Take note of all the crap in the passenger seat. That was brand new parts for a tune up (valve cover gasket, distributor cap, rotor button, spark plugs, air filter, oil filter, fuel filter), and brand new foglights!
Upon this inspection, they only way I would consider buying depended on how it ran and drove. That's exactly what I told the owner, and we arranged to meet up in a couple of days.
He said many days had passed since it was last started. He connected the batter terminals, pressed the clutch down, and turned the ignition. It started almost immediately. The idle was a little bouncy, which was blamed on the old gas in the tank.
I took it for a drive around the neighborhood. The clutch felt great! The BMW shifted into all gears without any issues. The brakes sucked, but they could stop me. The gauges in the dash did not work at all, so there was no clue if she was overheating or a matter of feet before I ran out of gas. Power windows did not work as well. As a matter of fact, the turn signals did not work either. The A/C worked! That for sure I thought was done for. Although the gauges did not work, the odometer showed 161k miles.
I got back to the owners house, and brought up the issues that I discovered.
"What is the lowest you will take?", I asked.
"What are you willing to pay?" he said.
Back to the fishy price. The main reason I took a look at the car. 600 was vaguely mentioned int he title. I thought this may have been $6,000 (no way), $1,600, or some price with $600 in it.
Back to the negotiation.
Because I did not have concrete knowledge on the exact asking price, I decided to play along with the game.
"Would you take 4?" Four thousand, four hundred, four tacos: I essentially did not know what i offered.
"I can get that from a scrapyard"
Sweet baby Jesus. I just offered him $400 for a running car. An E30 that runs and drives for $400. Before I could respond, he went on to say:
"I can meet you in the middle at $500."
I really did not need this car. I was cool with $500, but what was I going to do with the car? I told him I would let him know before 8pm. I told him this at 6pm. He also had a folder with a carfax and other maintenance records. The carfax shows the car has been in Virginia its whole life, and the original owner serviced his car at the BMW dealership for the majority of the E30's life.
I went home, called my buddy Will (who is a BMW tech) about my predicament, made sure that insurance would be cheap, and looked into how the rear could be fixed. Within an hour, I was at the bank getting $500 cash from an ATM. By 7:52pm, I was the proud owner of a 1986 BMW 325es.
Below are some pictures after I brought it home. I will try to document this car to my best ability. The only thing changed with this picture is the tires removed from the interior.
That is a Subaru WRX STI exhaust included in the sale, facelift rear taillights for an 89-91 BMW 3 series, and one of the extra wheels and tires with good tread. This made the deal sweeter, as I can sell these and get close to breaking even for the E30!
I got to keep all the tune up parts! Included was a receipt that was less than a year old for all the items.
Looks like a project! It sucks not having a garage, but excuses are not going to get me anywhere. I am slowly chipping away at the issues, and hope to update this "Build" as we transform the car into something great. The current plans for the BMW are autocross/cruiser/cars and coffee whore, in no particular order. Autocross will be the first goal, since your car does not have to look nice to do well.
Do you have a BMW E30 project or know someone who does? Was $500 too much for this car? Leave a comment!
Don't forget to check out facebook.com/clubdirtyauto for more updates!
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