Hi,

I'm in the market to buy a new car, and currently I'm looking at a 2003 Volvo S60. The car is being sold for $4,500, and has 100k miles on it. It's a 5spd manual, and it's fwd. The lot that is selling it replaced the timing belt. However, the carfax shows that the car was repainted from white to grey.
The only reason why I'm saying "too good to be true" is because for the price/mileage, it seems like a pretty good deal.

Here are just a few questions I have:

Here is the link to the car I'm looking at, let me know if you notice anything fishy that I should be aware about. I do own an '83 240 DL, but I'm coming from a Honda so I really don't know much about what to look for in Volvo's. Thank you.

 

Got mine last year, a 2003 with 100k miles. It's more than easy to swap the cluster in these cars with one showing lower miles. Check carfax to get an idea about how many miles the car had at each check. That's how you know if the miles are real or been rolled back.

Main issues are clutch slave cylinder very prone to fail and transmission must be removed from the car $$$ - look up on Volvo Forums - Powered by vBulletin those guys have mostly manual transmissions and the slave is a major headache.

The PCV system might be clogged (around $500 repair), the control arm bushings should be busted at these miles - poor handling and costly repair.

The instrument cluster with the messages display is prone to failure sooner or later on this model year. Fixable at a small electronics shop or $1500 at the Volvo dealer.


Side note, the reviews of the place are not all that positive http://www.cars.com/dealers/188551/e...otors/reviews/

 

The mileage is stored in the CEM not the cluster. Plus once it is installed onto one car it cannot be installed onto another car.

 

That's right, but the cluster will display the donor miles. However a used cluster can be installed and will work on any other car that has the same numbers on the side of the cluster. No programming needed.

 

No great bargain IMO considering the repaint and manual trans. Yes, I know that is the preferred trans for some and harder to find, but it commands a lower price.