1990 Nissan 300zx Twin Turbo Thoughts/Questions

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davidcarson48

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I'm in discussion with a guy selling his 1990 Nissan 300zx Twin Turbo. He's about 40 minutes away from me and the second owner of the car. He purchased it from a dealership as a used car and doesn't have any service records prior to him buying it in 2010. It has 33,000 miles, which appears by the Car Fax to be accurate. Clean Car Fax with no accident history. The body is in very good shape with only a few rock chips and swirls. Interior is near mint. All original. No mods whatsoever. Garage kept, at least since he has owned it. It's a really, really nice driver...but not a show car.

Here is the CL link:

http://cnj.craigslist.org/cto/4217580140.html


Questions:

1) The sides of the car have the dealer-installed body side molding in black (visible in the second picture). Quite frankly, it looks like shit and takes away from the clean body lines of the car in my opinion. Best as we can tell, it's been on the car since 1990. Would it be possible to remove the moldings without much of an issue? My biggest worry is pant fade over the years and the paint may be noticeably darker underneath the molding (or faded due to the adhesive?). As silly as it may seem, if they aren't removeable without an issue, I'll keep looking. That's how much I hate the molding.

2) He's asking $14,500. It's hard to find comp sales for these cars. Most are trashed, high mileage, or modded and riced up. NADA classic car guide says $12,800, but doesn't take into account the mileage at all, which doesn't seem fair. He doesn't seem in a rush to sell, but I imagine this is a tough time of year to sell a RWD sports car in NJ.

3) How hard was it to disconnect the odometer on these cars? Probably pretty easy, right?

4) What are the known issues for these cars? Anything I should be looking/listening for during a test drive?

Thanks. I thought this forum would have a good knowledge base on this car.

Dave
 
Honestly man the car fax is not always correct… especially with older cars like this. You can swap dashes, motors, parts, etc. and it won't necessarily come up on car fax. I would bring it to an independent shop to get it looked at (you're in NJ…maybe bring it to a tuner that knows their stuff in the tristate area)
for all you know it can have 180k on the body, 70k on motor, and 33k on the dash…..

Also, I think that price is a little high. nada is @12.8.. what's KBB? blackbook? what are similar cars going for?
 
Looking at the condition of the car, I would believe that the car is low mileage. Paint looks good, seats look good, steering wheel looks good, as well as the shifter. No wear marks indicative of someone having driven the car much. I would definitely go take a look at it if you were interested. Price wise, i think that's up to you what you feel it's worth.
 
Yes, you can always be surprised, but I agree the condition looks like it matches the mileage. I can check further in person and would have a mechanic I trust put the car up on a lift and check it thoroughly.

MSRP was $33,000 in 1990.

Anyone offer any opinion on the moldings? That's my biggest hangup currently...
 
You've got a real collector car opportunity in front of you! Buying and selling rare collectors takes on a whole different set or rules. Standard used car tactics don't really apply in the same manner, but it sounds like you have a real good grasp of what you want and how to get it.
Moldings: Yep, they are ugly and take away from the appearance. From a collector value standpoint, they decrease value as most aftermarket parts will. at least they are skinny ones and not wide ones. I think there is a super slim chance they will come off and remain undetectable. Could be a lot of added work to make right. With this in mind, I would be hesitant to remove them. You don't want to make it worse.
All-in-all, it really just depends on what you want to do with the car when you have it. keep it, drive it, mod it, or whatever
 
The molding is skinny enough that you should be able to pull it off and with some polishing and work get it to a point where you would never notice it was there.

That is my opinion based on knowing the paint which was applied to these cars (I have 3 friends with these 300zx's and I have detailed all of them, in fact two of them are this exact colour), and past experience with moldings and bra's like this. The paint on these cars if cared for, is actually impressive. Compared to the paint job on most 350z models (I think the 370z got better, but I have only detailed a handful), the 300zx has much more durable and resistant paint.

EDIT: Pork and me posted at the same time and have exactly opposite viewpoints, on the moldings at least (our viewpoint on the car itself is identical).

I can only go based off my local market, and these 300's are pretty rare. And none of them are even remotely close to that condition. All I can say is if it was me I would grind the guy down as much as possible then jump on it. and see what happens if I remove the molding after.

Worse comes to worse its not correctable and you can have the moldings painted red while they are off the car and put them back on.
 
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