Welcome back! It’s been a while since we really scraped the bottom of the used car market barrel, so today we’re doing just that. I found two really sketchy cars for sale in Cincinnati that both just say “Runs and drives.” That’s all you need, right?
I thought that old Ford truck yesterday would give some of you the warm fuzzies. It’s a friendly truck, from a good era for Ford trucks. The Chevy isn’t as nostalgic, but it’s anvil-reliable and has a lot fewer miles. The stage was set for a close vote, and that’s what we got, with the big beige Ford taking a narrow victory.
Personally, I’m not sure which way I would go. If I were shopping for a cheap truck, it would mean that some terrible fate had befallen my beloved Forest Service truck, and there’s no replacing that thing. We already have a GMT800 Yukon, so I could go Chevy and only have to remember one oil filter number, but that Ford just seems like a more affable companion.
All right, let’s look at some garbage. As someone who has more than once had to buy whatever cheap piece of crap car I could find, and then wait for my next paycheck to go to the DMV and register it, I’ve gotten good at separating the wheat from the chaff when it comes to the low end of the market. Back when I was doing it, the ads were printed in the Tradin’ Times, and the descriptions were terse. I had to figure out which cars were worth a phone call and a trip across town to look at from a few lines of text and often no photos.
These two have a few bad photos, but just about as little text description as those days. And neither one is a particularly desirable used car. Is that what makes them cheap? Or is there some other reason not to pick up the phone? That’s what we’re going to try to find out.
2003 Volkswagen Jetta – $1,450
Engine/drivetrain: 2.0-liter overhead cam inline 4, four-speed automatic, FWD
Location: Blanchester, OH
Odometer reading: 235,000 miles
Operational status: Runs and drives
You probably saw Thomas’s article yesterday about Volkswagen charging sixty grand and up for its new electric ID Buzz van. He didn’t seem to think it was unreasonable; many commenters, including me, disagreed. Volkswagen has always been good at cheap mass-market cars; it’s literally right there in the name: “People’s Car.” When the brand’s overseers remember this, you get the Beetle, and the Golf, and a cute little car sold in Europe called the Up! (yes, with the exclamation point). When they get too big for their britches, you get the Phaeton. The fourth-generation Jetta could have been a car of the people, but VW tried to get fancy and went all Phaeton on it.
This era of Jetta was available with a few different engines, but the default option was a 2.0 liter four, an updated version of the same basic engine VW had been stuffing into Rabbits and Jettas and Sciroccos since the ’70s. It’s not powerful – its nickname among the VW tuner crowd is the “two-point-slow” – but it is reliable and durable, and that might be this car’s saving grace as a beater. The seller does mention the engine just had a timing belt change, and has a new water pump. I’d rather see it attached to a five-speed manual, as VW’s automatics have never been great, but if it made it to 235,000 miles, someone must have taken care of it.
It’s the interior of the fourth-generation Jettas that really lets them down. It’s supposed to feel upscale, but instead it’s just a mishmash of soft-touch plastics that wear like shit, complicated electric and electronic crap that fails constantly, and a pervasive waxy smell on hot days. This one looks OK in the couple of photos that we get, but I’m sure it has its issues.
Outside, it’s green, which is a good thing. A disturbing number of these Jettas were painted silver, and black ones were so common someone even wrote a song about them. The green is a welcome sight. Less welcome is that rust hole in the front fender; I’d poke around with a screwdriver under the edge of the rocker panels and make sure they’re still there.
2013 Dodge Avenger – $1,695
Engine/drivetrain: 2.4-liter dual overhead cam inline 4, four-speed automatic, FWD
Location: Hamilton, OH
Odometer reading: 231,000 miles
Operational status: Runs and drives
Volkswagen lost the plot when it came to affordable cars in the 2000s; Chrysler just couldn’t seem to write a decent sequel. It followed up the lovable Neon with a watered-down second generation and then replaced it altogether with the unforgivable Caliber. Its midsized cars after the first-generation cloud cars were a game of musical nameplates that left buyers, and parts-counter clerks, trying to figure out which ones were actually Mitsubishis.
The Avenger sedan replaced the Stratus in 2008, with styling that aped the popular LX-platform Charger sedan. The styling came across as a caricature of the Charger rather than a smaller sibling. This is the basic SE model, as far as I can tell, powered by a 2.4 liter four-cylinder engine and Chrysler’s minivan-tastic Ultradrive four-speed automatic. You’ve probably rented one at some point, though you may not have noticed. It runs and drives, but that’s all we know.
The interior is decidedly low-rent on these, with lots of hard plastic and cheap fabric. It has held up well, though, from the looks of it. One photo shows the instrument panel with the car running; the check engine light isn’t on, but the ABS, traction control, and low-tire warning lights are. It may be nothing but a bad sensor or two, or it could be more serious. Either way, you’re not likely to see paradise by those dashboard lights.
It looks all right outside, too, at least for this price. I don’t know how prone to rust these cars are, but it is in Ohio, so it’s worth a peek underneath.
You don’t generally look at cars like these unless you really need a car. But if you need a car in this price range, you need it to be something decent. Both of these have sort of shaky reputations, but the sheer number of miles on both of them speaks in their favor. Somebody kept them up, or they wouldn’t have lasted this long. Which one of them seems worth a look?
(Image credits: Craigslist sellers)
The Chrysler 2.4 World Engine is known to go 300K Miles. And, the Avenger was super under-rated. I would buy one with low miles, just not this one. On the VW; I finally pulled a Vietnam on my long VW experience. I just declared victory, and left. My last Jetta, I used the rear axle assembly for a sweet utility trailer, and junked the rest. I vote Avenger by a thread.
I haven’t sent the letter of resignation from the obnoxious business of living yet, so Jetta was my choise before even reading anything.
A cute girl that worked in my office building backed her Avenger into my car and left her phone# under my windshield wiper -for insurance purposes, of course! That’s good enough for me to go Dodge today.
I trust an early 2000s VW about as much as I do 1970s Italian engineering. Avenger.
But…Avenger. This is truly the lesser of two evils but I’m not sure there is one.
I voted Avenger just because it looks like a Charger left in the dryer too long.
I trust the Avenger over a VW
It’s the ultra bland Dodge for me. Assuming this car is a stopgap, while I save $$ for something I actually want to drive, I think the Avenger is the choice that does everything I need.
I’ve known car people who praised these cars as DD that were very cost efficient. And they don’t draw any attention to themselves. Ugly and practical. That’s how I roll.
People can crap all over VW reliability as much as they want, but I can definitely say that where I live I see a lot more MkIV Jettas and Golfs on the road than I do Avengers. And having spent 7 years driving a used 2.slow, I’d much rather deal with that engine than the ‘World Gasoline Engine’. Unlike some other VWs I’ve lived with, that 2.0 was dead reliable and mechanically simple enough that I felt comfortable tackling all the minor repairs it ever required.
an 11 & 21 year old rust belt car, unless you have no choice I’d keep walking
That’s how sh*t Dodge products are in the 21st century. They have to be compared to a car 10 years older for it to be a fair fight.
Also no running 2003 Dodge sedans could be found.
Life has gone quite poorly if I’m buying either one of these shitheaps, but I’ll begrudgingly chose the Dodge because at least the parts will be cheaper and it’s not likely to drop its windows into its doors at alarmingly frequent intervals. Seriously, when is the last time you saw a Mark IV Jetta that didn’t have at least one window held up by tape or shims?
Oh, that actually brings a smile to my face. I bought one of these used, way back when, and got rid of it after the third window fell into the door in about 6 months. Otherwise I really liked the car though.
Yeah, they’re nice when they work. That’s how they lure you in and hurt you.
I assume these have the same window mountings as my car, a 1997 (1st gen) Audi A3. I’ve had to replace the mountings to the drivers side once. The replacement parts I got from Audi dealer for a few euros were a tougher model than the original ones (VAG clearly knows the issue and has taken action). Changing the bits took overall under two hours and they have been working just fine three years now. Yes, they are a problem but not a huge one and the replacement actually fixes the original problem with stronger parts.
I dislike the Avenger so much that I’m choosing a fairly terrible VW over it.
Same here. They have both always been garbage vehicles, but the VW is 1% more interesting by virtue of being German.
The Avenger was a sub 550 credit score indicator when it rolled off the lot in 2013. Now it just signifies you’ve slid down to just one step from a bus pass
I actually really liked this era of Jetta when it came out, however history has shown this generation of VAG products were not built to last. But this one is less than the Dodge, and not being sold by a dealer, so I’m picking it.
I’d have to think before taking the Avenger if it were offered for free. If you’re telling me a used car lot is SELLING it (i.e. I have to pay for it)….I’m taking whatever lurks behind door number two…if it is a nearly antique VW, so be it. It can’t (well, most likely won’t) be worse.
HA! He said, “Pick up the phone…” lmfao
MK4 Golfettas tend to look pretty good above the water line, but I shudder to look at the undercarriage. Especially in the rust belt. The Avenger looks like crap above the water line and may also down below.
Can we have a third option to vote for, like say a bus pass?
Avenger for me. I can see the VW has a rust hole on the rocker and I’ll take Chrysler quality over VAG quality any day unless the VAG product is a 1.9L TDI vehicle with the manual transmission or the 2.slow with the manual.
That 1.9 TDI was a tough engine till it wasn’t. it let me down by having the crankshaft physically snap/ break between journals 1 and 2.
1:30 AM in January,12 below zero,between Superior WI and PortWing Wi. Headed home from a very late flight having been away for 17 days.
193,000 miles at that point relatively trouble free.
No cell phone service ,no other traffic of course,luckily a deputy sheriff on his way home saw my flashers on ,stopped and I used his phone to call my wife who immediately jumped in her car and drove to meet us .
I bought another engine ,I put it in ,got it all sorted out and sold the car to a guy that worked for Amsoil.
Moral of this story……be rich enough not to have to work so you’re not driving home from the airport at 01:30.
Actually, the moral of the story is keep an eye on the timing belt change interval and replace it when it’s due. If you buy it used and have no records of it, assume it hasn’t been changed and go ahead and do it. If you can operate a screwdriver without taking you eye out, you can easily replace a timing belt in an afternoon.
I of course changed the timing belt .
What the timing belt which I changed twice in the 195000 miles had to do with the crank physically breaking is beyond me.
Please enlighten me .
I had a 2003 VW Jetta GLI. It put my mechanic’s son through college.
10 years less of midwest salt and the fact that I know the car is supposed to be crappy rather than dealing with the frustrating and unfulfilled pretensions of quality in the Volkswagen push me toward the Avenger.
“pervasive waxy smell on hot days”
This hits close to home. Had a 2002 S4, never got over that smell.
Congratulations, good sir…you have truly nailed the premise of the title “Shitbox Showdown” today. Wow…calling these beaters gives beaters a bad name. Both have basically been to the moon, but, of course have not returned. Rust hole in the VW, which means (if my British YouTube obsession would be accurate) these would not pass MOD. Also, because VW. If there’s rust you see, there’s way more you don’t. That’s just fact. The Dogde thing also has better part availability. Although these were horrid cars, there’s LOTS of them…many sitting in Pick-‘n-Pulls just ready for all those parts I would have to replace. Gimme the Dodge and a new hobby…keeping a rolling pile of poo running for another mile…JUST GET ME HOME, BABY…
I actually don’t mind the Avenger’s looks that much. It’s not a good looking car, but it’s got some intent, and I appreciate that. The vote pretty much came down to how cheap will it be to repair and keep running, so the Dodge took my vote.
Mk4 all day every day. I’ve had 2 Mk4 Jettas, and put 195k on one (was totalled when an idiot ran into me) and 181k on the other (traded in on my currect car) and both, especially the first, were rock solid. They were both this engine but with the 5 speed, which was probably the most reliable engine on offer from VW at the time, and if this thing was a stick I would probably buy it to restore. I admittedly have an irrational love of the Mk4, but honestly it still looks modern, they feel super solid, and with the right amount of love they can last. The is the last generation of VW that could, with slightly spotty accuracy, be called reliable.
Plus, the interior when you flip on the headlights is pretty much better than anything going.
VW for the win as I couldn’t bother reading past the first few lines of the dodge whatever it was. 2 vw’s in my fleet of 13 beater crapshacks. Hey, settle down, I whittled it down from 22 and 4 are actually registered. The vw is not 1 of them currently. 07 rabbit. Bought for 500, no rockers left at all(buffalo) leaks oil from everywhere, iffy auto trans, 1 power window that only works from the switch on the passenger side, manual on the left(pulled the motor, place hands on both sides, adjust accordingly, don’t let it drop in the door, screaming exhaust leak, and a $300 passat that I saved from the scrapper that used to run, now doesn’t, I’ll get to it one day. Peich era shite. Still going vw