This just popped up a few hours from where I live (I live rural so it's not crazy that I might need to drive a few hours to look at cars) at a dealership. I spoke with them and all they know is that it has only had one owner up in Canada since it was purchased new in 2013, and that it lived it's whole life on paper in Vancouver BC. Due to Washington state privacy laws they can't share any info with me about the owner which is fine but, sort of frustrating that I can't get any insight as to service records.

That being said it checks a lot of boxes for trim level, year, color, and avoiding the timing chain tensioner issues. So before I consider heading over there for a test drive (if it doesn't sell) – Am I crazy for thinking this could be a contender? They're asking $19k but I would likely try and get that lowered a bit but 72k miles just seems so low for LR4s of this year. What might I look for and think about?

Depending on how serious I decide I am, I'll pay to run a carfax and arrange a PPI at a certified LR shop – any tips or tricks of what these do or don't explicitly lay out for me?

Thanks.

DETAILS:
2013 LR4 HSE LUX
72,400 miles.
Black paint, black leather, black rims.
Super clean looking, haven't test driven yet.

 

I would buy that truck immediately. Very rare to see a 13 with that low of mileage and it looks in great shape. And that price is more than fair IMO.

 

That was a little of my initial excitement as well but, also wanted to gut check against you fine folks here in case of some too-good-to-be true suspicions.

After a decade of drooling and reading about the mid-00s to early 10's models of L322's, LR3's, and LR4's this will be my first official foray into Land Rover so trying to do my due diligence to hopefully decrease the "what the **** have I done" quotient of buying something with a ton of red flags lol.

 

So I work in wealth management and there is a big parallel here. A tale as old as time, someone (I.e. a non professional, self-directed investor) has a stock they love and read all the research and reports on the stock. They are on every earnings call. Stock keeps going up. They start to think because they are “doing their research” that is why they are making money. Then, well, the stock does down a lot. They sell other investments to buy more shares because they “know the company” and the stock does down a lot more. Eventually they realize that there was an illusion of control and that their time and efforts reading and researching never really had anything to do with the share price. Maybe due to up front research, they avoided putting money in a clearly bad company but all the research in the world doesn’t guarantee a good outcome. A lot of people ended up on this situation lately with crypto actually and the latest FTX debacle. Also TSLA and AMD are two stocks I have hear sad stories about people buying all the way down, got way over concentrated, are now extremely depressed, marriages falling apart etc.

So, same thing here basically. Don’t buy something that was totaled or in a severe accident. Or in a flood. But beyond that, you don’t actually have much control over how much you will have to spend on keeping her on the road. Everyone says to buy one with a history of 5k oil changes but I have been into these trucks for 2 years (and I now own two) and never came across one that showed that in carfax. You may find a truck to buy from a fellow enthusiast with records like that, but I was too picky about my Spec I wanted (2012-2013 Aintree green HSE Lux with arabica seats and HD package, in excellent cosmetic condition) for that to happen. About 9 months in my 2011 needed tensioners/guides and crossover pipes, oh well. No regrets. Taking that beast who we call Todd through the Alpine Loop with Texas Rovers on an overland trip this summer and spending that time with my 10 year old son was worth it.

I liked the 2011 (my off road toy and our au pair’s daily/kids chariot) so much I sold my pickup and got a 2013 with my dream spec to be MY new daily driver. Maybe it will need timing chains and maybe it won’t. But I won’t be surprised either way. The hard truth is if you can’t stomach an average of $1-2k/year and the possibility of a $6-8k bill for timing chains, if that would be financially catastrophic to you, then you can’t afford to drive one of these.

I do recommend getting a PPI from a specialist. But, I did with my 2013 (bought it remote from a dealer in Billings) and I even gave them a list of all the usual things to check on these trucks. It got a nice report card. When it came off the car carrier and I drove it away I immediately could tell the control arm bushings were totally shot, and just laughed. I put about $3k of non cosmetic work and deferred maintenance into it (and another $3k of cosmetic rehab to get close to like-new condition) before I promoted it to daily driver status. I’m sure it will need more in the future. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

 

You may want to think about it ….where is this located :-)

 

I'm seriously considering it!

Doing a video call with the dealer tomorrow - which I don't think will reveal anything, but will be good to have a kind of face to face with them to ask a few questions. I've talked with them on the phone already, so far it seems like none of them know a lot specifically about LR other than they're luxury cars and expensive to fix. Maybe that's good?

They use AutoCheck instead of CarFax so they sent it to me, although it's way less useful than a CarFax - it basically just confirms that it isn't stolen, rebuilt title, etc, but shows zero information on servicing location or history so I can't check with a dealer or anything. I'll likely run my own CarFax if nothing else, so I can maybe see a service location and give them a ring to ask a few questions.

Been on the sidelines peering in for a decade on Land Rovers so this might be my first foray, which makes a 72k rig with one owner feel like a potential good one - or maybe I'm better off with a 170k mile LR3 that someone has already done all the major upgrades on?

As @DallasLoneStar pointed out, there's a certain point where you can "research" all you want but it won't necessarily do you any good and you just gotta pull the trigger. That said, I also don't want to just bumble my way into an unnecessary $5k expense on a $20k rig that could've been avoided if I'd have known to check for an obvious symptom - alas, I am not in wealth management though so while I do have the funds to take care of an LR, I don't want to just light $5k on fire because I did zero research on it either lol.

Anyone do long distance video calls with a dealer before? Any pro tips of things to have him show me that make sense over a video chat?

As always, thanks everyone - ya'll are great on this forum.

 

I hear ya. There's analyzing and there's ANALyzing - at a certain point you just start chasing your own tail. I'm still trying to do my due diligence though, especially if there are any easily identifiable symptoms of a major catastrophe in waiting - I'd rather not get hit with a $5k surprise simply because I didn't know to check for blue smoke or a ticking sound. That, or I want to be able to negotiate the price it if I decide to move forward in spite of one of those symptoms.

I will 100% be getting a PPI from a specialist if I move forward after my video chat with them tomorrow. I will also pay for a CarFax - not necessarily for the hard maintenance info but more so for the dealer and mechanic info of where it has been serviced so I can at least checkif it's had any major issues leading it to end up at a used car dealership who got it from an auction.

How did the long distance part work for you, any special insight for me? At least I'm close enough to drive and test it out but, curious if you learned anything from that process that's helpful?

 

what I learned is I can do everything right, look at carfax, call prior mechanics, have PPI from a place knowledgeable with LRs, and still have a $3k bill from my local trusted specialist to get it road worthy. LOL. And also find obvious hail damage on the roof that no one mentioned. Do I regret, absolutely not because I found the EXACT colorway and spec I always wanted. I put a total of about 6k into the truck and now I have a 2013 that looks NEW and is my dream LR4. I had rear flares resprayed, PDR on hail dings, touched up a few spots, replaced A pillar trim and faded cowl, and had seat stitching repaired. The way I look at it is that I would have spent way more than 26k total for a newer, boring daily driver. Possibly 3x that. And yeah maybe it would be under warranty but depreciation on like a new Disco 5 or RRS or whatever will be WAY worse than an average of $1-2k/year in maintenance.