Automatic choice
It’s hard to find decent 964s these days. In fact, I’ve not seen one for months. This was brought home to me recently when I received a call from a reader with an enviable brace of 911s – a 2.7RS and a GT3. Nice. Sadly, though, he’d broken his foot so couldn’t drive them. Not nice. However, he’d had the bright idea of finding a cheap 964 Tiptronic so he could get his 911 fix while his foot healed. Nice idea.
The first car he’d spotted had mega miles on (about 140,000) and, when he went to look at it, he realised it had been tarted up and not something he could live with, especially as it wasn’t that cheap.
Next came another high mileage example for under £8000 – which is rock-bottom for a 964. It was also well overdue for a service, which could easily absorb £1000 if done properly. I pointed out that, at that price, it wouldn’t be worth spending money on doing the car up, over and above essential maintenance and, if he was prepared to take a gamble, such a car could carry him over. A quick oil change could make do as the service and, in the unlikely event of the engine going pop, he could still recoup some of the money by selling the hapless car for spares. If, on the other hand, it gave him troublefree motoring, he could probably get all his money back when it came time to sell.
However, when he went to see the car, he again realised he couldn’t live with something so scruffy.
My advice on hearing that was to spend a little more and buy a 993 – the Tiptronic system is better and he’d be more likely to find a decent example, and he’d get the money back when it came time to sell. 993 (and 964 for that matter) Tiptronics are not that popular so it’s possible to buy one at rock-bottom prices.
At the time of writing, he’d not made a decision. Still, it’s interesting to hear from someone who has a very real need to have an automatic 911, and it just goes to show that these cars really do serve a real purpose.
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