96 Avalon XL 204k Collision Damage

[IVIatticus]

My buddy just crashed his Avalon and went out and purchased a Camry instead of dealing with the Avalon. I was dumbfounded when he told me. It has 204k on he's had it for 16 months. This car took him to boston and back and everywhere in between and I was surprised when he gave up on it.

According to the estimate the body shop gave him it needs:
Front Bumper Cover Front Bumper Seal Front Bumper Fastner R Bumper Filler to Bumper R Bumper Mounting Bracket L Bumper Mounting Bracket Front Bumper Impact Cushion Front Bumper Reinforment Bar Front Upr Bumper Reinforcement Grille R Headlamp Assembly L Headlamp Assembly (Possibly) R Park Lamp Assembly R Signal Lamp Assembly R Fender (Possible)

I priced parts out and $896 and that's all new parts from Rockauto and ebay. I tried looking at car-part.com, but they want the same price as new. There are a few upullit's but I hate dealing with them.

He's got brand new tires on it and he wants to charge me the $400 for the tires which I balked at (because I work for Bridgestone), but the $400 doesn't seem too bad. He's taken good care of it. It's got a TON of highway miles and he's drove it 30k in those 16 months he's owned.

I wondered what some of your thoughts were?

[Jigg007]

Is the rest of the car in good shape? If you can get the car all fixed up for 1500, you got a pretty good deal!

My 96 has nearly 220K on it, and it runs great!, and thats comming from another northwest chicago suburb.

[IVIatticus]

He's put new brakes on (twice) Pads, rotors, rear caliper. The abs light comes and goes. All options work. The paint is shiny, could use about 4 hours of polishing. The leather has 204k, the driver seat is cached. the carper is dirty nothing an extractor and scrub brush couldn't take care of though.

Sludge worries me. But the person before claimed to always use mobil 1 and my friend has used amsoil since he bought it. The timing belt was changed previously, it's coming time again. He had the trans flushed when he got it.

I would get in the car (as-is/smashed) and drive it anywhere with confidence.

[IVIatticus]

Alright, I was able to negotiate with them. The car has brand new tires and a decent head unit and a hitch. I told him I would take all the old stuff off and put it on the new car and they said they would just give me the car! They wanted the speakers too, but I'm not crawling in the trunk, i'll buy him a set of speakers.

The car is an hour away, so I went out tonight and I went to take the radio out but the previous owner, cut the factory harness off and spliced the radio directly in.

I told them I wasn't screwing with that, luckily he had an extra head unit from a previous car he smashed. Off to wall mart I go. I purchase the Wire Harness, Dash Kit, wire strippers (didn't think I would need them so i left them home) and some connectors. I put the head unit in his new car, great thing is he had a single din so I didn't have to worry about the dash kit and I was able to put the wire strippers in the pack! I gotta return those tomorrow. $7 for the harness and $3 for the connectors!

Since I work for a tire company, a new set of tires is going to be $200. I think, they said $300, but I think that was with the road hazard (don't need that on a $55 tire) And the hitch is just going to suck, I'm sure it's rusted on there like nothing else. I may have to endup getting a hitch if I can't get his off.

The car has been sitting for 2 weeks and one turn of the key it fired right up! I tried to look at the front of the car, but I wasn't able to look closely. Both headlights still work, the bumper cover is pretty well destroyed. I'm gonna drive it home tomorrow with any luck.