Hello to all,
been browsing for a little while now,
I have found a little 90 civic hatchback,
233000 km,
needs a new bumper, some body work if i wanted to be really picky, marker light and windshield, brake pads for the front and ball joints all around,

I have priced out all but the body work and it looks like it will come in at just under 600 bucks worth of repairs,

the car is an automatic, and priced at 1500,
I haggled down to 1200,
but does this seem like a good deal?

I am going to be selling my other car, just too many head aches
its a 1978 King Cobra Mustang,

little bit of a change over for me,

Is this a good car to work on, I want to replace a couple body panels in a while due to some rust around the wheel wells and in a few places where i can tell they have bondo-ed it up..

I guess im pretty much just asking is it a good first import car, easy to work on and find parts for?

Thanks to all who reply!

 

easy to find parts? yes
Good car to work? yes
hidden potential? well of course


1200 for a car that is 17 years old and has that many miles on it, and also has rust on it that you say has been poorly fixed. hmmmmmm you might want to try and knock that price down a bit

 

ya, wont budge much more, plus it is only 1200 bukcks, still a sharp lookin car thou.. but im told dx's go kinda slow..

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by brad262 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">ya, wont budge much more, plus it is only 1200 bukcks, still a sharp lookin car thou.. but im told dx's go kinda slow..</TD></TR></TABLE>

yeah not to mention that auto is gonna SUCK! any real potential would realized SOOOO much easier w/a 5spd. that rust is not fun to fix either, I found my'89 CRX DX w/ 323,000 miles on it but had no rust at all and I paid $1,200 for it, original owner too so the motor was still in good running condition and I've already put about 15k or hard driving on it w/ no problems.

I say hold out for a better none rusted 5spd or don't pay more than $800 for it because your gonna need to put alot of work into it that you otherwise would not need to do. you can check out my DX on my build thread I just started and remember that I only paid $1200 too so that DX better not be too much worse off than mine started. https://honda-tech.com/zerothread/2021995

 

In Alberta? thats not a bad deal...But ive seen better. May want to look around a bit more.

 

I just found a 1991 Civic SI for 1500 obo,
gonna call on it/check it out before work tomorrow,
if this ones in better shape I'll wave 1150 cash infront of him and hope he needs it bad enough lol
only one problem..
I dont know how to drive a standard yet
lol
But from what I've read, this would be a muuuch better car

 

Driving stick isnt that hard.

I bought my car after not having driven stick for 6 years (and i was terrible at it then...) and drove it home over 100km. You'll start to get the hang of it real quick. If the guys got his car in his driveway or something, just have him back it out for you thats what i did, reverse is the hardest part, for me anyway.

Just remember, start it in neutral, clutch in, shift to first, ease off the clutch and ease onto the gas. If it stalls, put it back into neutral and try again. Once youre moving, its almost impossible to stall, so just clutch in, shift to the next gear, clutch out and at the same time get back on the gas. You'll get the hang of it. Bring someone along who knows how to drive stick if youre really worried, or atleast have someone show you after you get the car back home.

But yeah, id definately go for that hatch over the crx. 1200 is high to pay for a car that needs lots of work. I bought my crx for 1000 flat (Haggled down from 1500) and all it needs is a new coat of paint and a hole in the passenger footwell patched up (really small, can use fiberglass on it).

You might want to keep waiting though, even better deals come up all the time. 2 weeks after i bought mine, some guy was selling a crx for 1500 bucks, came with an obd1 B16A swap, fresh black paint, cert and etested. I was kind of sad i didnt wait a few more weeks and ****** that up instead.

 

the other civic is a dx, both are just hatch backs,
but the SI is manual, located closer to me,
a year newer, and hopefully in better condition..
I dont really care a whole lot about the engine,
I am at the point where im fed up with project cars,
hopefully selling my classic mustang soon,
I just want something good on gas,
a little zippy
and pretty to look at lol

 

really thankful for the tips on driving stick thou!!

 

I paid $1050 for my 4 speed manual 89 Hatch that just needed new brake pads up front. The body/paint/interior/motor were flawless. It actually looked like a brand new car.

Keep looking, IMO.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by brad262 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">the other civic is a dx, both are just hatch backs,
but the SI is manual, located closer to me,
a year newer, and hopefully in better condition..
I dont really care a whole lot about the engine,
I am at the point where im fed up with project cars,
hopefully selling my classic mustang soon,
I just want something good on gas,
a little zippy
and pretty to look at lol</TD></TR></TABLE>


from that point of view an Si would be better but just hold out for one w/o rust, the DX would take a good bit of work to make zippy or even pretty to look at for that matter (IMO). The Si is at least a little zippy were as the DX is so slow you gotta make reservations just to change lanes or get out in traffic! my DX CRX was the slowest thing I ever had in my possesion and it SUCKED!! I swapped my B16 in now so that's no longer a problem