First post here, first Land Rover ever.

Heres the long and short of how this came about. Ive had a few Jeep Wranglers and always loved the adventures off-roading. However, I got a promotion and with it came a company car so I sold my last Wrangler Rubicon. Well another reassignment is coming and with it the take home car perk is going away. So I was down in Naples Florida over the holidays and found a guy, also in Florida but on the ocean side, selling a 2005 LR3 V8 SE with 54,000 miles. Why this guy put a car on eBay with a starting date of Christmas eve and an end date of New Years day is beyond me. Who buys a car on New Years day? This guy does.

So I put a bid on the auction, which had an unknown reserve, at the last second. I had contacted the seller prior to and asked quite a few questions. The seller gave all the right answers:

Hes old, fishing is his love in life, hes the original owner, everything works, all maintenance is up to date, its always been garage kept, no accidents/bodywork/paint work, never off-road, no rust, and it only has 54,000 miles. He and I couldnt agree on a price initially otherwise I would have driven over with a cashiers check and driven the damn thing back to Michigan where I live.

So the eBay auction ended with nearly no action on it and the reserve wasnt met. I called the seller after the auction ended and agreed upon....$10,399. This includes the original wheels and tires as well as the pictured, slightly ghetto and janky, wheels. Now unfortunately I was already leaving Florida when we negotiated the price so I was unable to see the car in person. This is where things could get interesting as I purchased a car before without seeing it and it turned out to be a total turd due to the previous owner being slightly retarded and fully drunk. This time will be different I hope. The vehicle is now on a car hauler headed to Michigan so Ill post an update by Wednesday, good or bad, with how this thing looks when it arrives.

So what do you think? Does a 2005 LR3, one owner, with only 54k Florida miles and two sets of wheels/tires for $10399 sound like a deal?





My previous Rubicon, just because I still miss it:

 

When I read your post title I was going to tell you how stupid the idea was.

...but after reading the details, you may be okay. First thing I would do is change the differential fluid, front and rear. The passenger side strut on the rear hatch has a nut that likes to come loose causing the bolt to fall inside the body. Throw some lock-tite on that and fasten it down. Get your sunroof drains taken care of (blown out and "snipped" at the end) and make sure your windshield cowling looks good. There is a mod you can do or get done to mitigate water ingress there as well.

Those are the near-term actionable things. Other than that, look for "early-consumables" like bushings and brakes. The EAS compressor will eventually need to be replaced with the newer AMK. Some will disagree with me on that part as they've remarkably gotten long lives out of their Hitachis by servicing them (changing the dryer, I believe). Not sure how that pencils out cost-wise.

Congrats, look forward to an update. I'm glad you're going to wheel it, too...you'll be happy.

 

1/10 update:

I called the driver of the car hauler to touch base regarding delivery. To quote the driver :
"Exterior looks great, dash is a little rough. It had to be jumped when we had to rearrange the truck "

Sooo....I'm hoping the dash isn't cracked and they just left a light on. Seller said the battery is newer. And so it begins....

 

Ditto on what Houm_wa says.

Change all filters and fluids as soon as you can.
Pull the compressor out and service the dryer unit with a kit.
Do what is suggested in the tech section here.
Take it to Land Rover for an inspection and plan your future work based off of the results of that inspection.


Yeah get rid of those ghetto wheels too ASAP. Find a nice set of 18" ten-spokes if you can. Why people put crap like that on vehicles like these is beyond me...

Congrats. You paid a good price if everything is in moderately good order. Honestly I would expect one or more diffs will be making noise when you check it though.

 

My guess is the dash has cracked over the passenger side air bags, they all do. Mine wasn't cracked last year when I bought it but about 3 weeks later, there it was.
I just bought a dash mat to cover it.

 

They don't ALL do that. Mine is 10 years old and is perfect (knock wood). It has a little to do with how it's maintained and a lot to do with the climate it lives in.

 

1/11 update:

My wife had to accept the vehicle while I'm stuck at work and gave some interesting feedback. The dash is cracked. A lot. All over. It's so badly cracked is comical. I'll have to post a picture and hopefully win an award for worst dash. The fix is on order.

Other than the dash everything appears just peachy. I'll definitely be contacting the seller about his choice of the words/phrases he used in the ad which included "close to perfect" and "nicest"

 

1/18 Update:

Between work and buying a new house I have not had much time to dedicate towards the LR3. I have put a little over 100 miles on it without much of an issue. I have a feeling the ball joints might need replacement or I have a front wheel out of balance. However I went to work on the dash today and removed all of the old material down to the base material. I have a perforated naugahyde material that I am going to use to reskin the dash but I need to get to a warm garage in order for the adhesive to work properly.

Oddly enough the seller turned out to be a bit of a turd, stopped responding to calls, emails, and texts.

Let me know if this is quite possibly the worst sun rot a dashboard has ever had. Heres a picture of how it arrived: