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Buying a car off a relative with high mileage...

1694 Views 2 Replies 3 Participants Last post by  mike1967
Hi guys this is my first post. My mum has had a mini sat in the garage since about 2015. The engines been turned over but it's been driven a handful of times since. Passed the MOT, it's due in October but with no service history.

It's an 03 1.6 petrol with 129k on the clock. It's a dark green with the cream stripes

Does anyone know if I should expect and problems with it? Or how much I should offer for it? I'm pretty clueless when it comes to this. I just want a little run around for a bit.

Thanks for any help.
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Hiya, sorry no one has replied to your post,, with a car with that mileage , be expected to replace everything , my daughters mini (millie) has covered 170 ,000 miles now , and I am replacing lots of parts, (as she is a student,, dads bank)clutch , fork arm , drive seals , both window regulators and motors ,altanator, ,, small bits , rear 3brake light , rear wiper blade , front discs and pads, , front part of exhaust ,radiator,+serviceing parts,, so many parts wear out, but she loves driving millie, I am no mechanic , but my time working on millie is for love , not money, as she would have been scrapped many years ago,,at the moment , she is up on the jacks to replace the drive seals ,, which I did not replace , when I did the clutch,, but you live and learn,, hope this helps ,, cheers mark
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trouble with all cars i would say is the difference in opinion between the car buyer and car maker, ie the maker it would seem design the car to last around 6-8 years 80k ish and any thing else os a bonus, i got a 57k diesel vauxhall at moment and already some pretty big parts bills are heading my way, ie flywheel starting to vibrate a tad and dpf filter having the odd wobble when driven for mpg etc, going by many years of repairing all kinds of cars its all cars they sort of have a limit bigger the engine longer the limit to a degree 2 litre and over 150-200k but still need timing chains doing, 1.6 cars 100-150k 1.0 barely 100k it would appear unless a lot of preventive work gets done, i see endless vauxhall 2,0 cdti engines with crankshaft failures end of engine all because a £15 oil seal on oil pump vag stuff also do silly design things as do bmw mini etc that sort of end up taking out the engine when out of warranty.. like the other guy said when these cars get over 10 years old its a mini field, bring back the early 1990s honda's is what i say bullet proof. mileage is key for a good chance so is how much work been done on the car, ie a 200k car with recon engine at 150k and gearbox and clutch etc is a good option so much better than a car with over 120k with nothing done on it, saying that i have had so many people in the past walk away from cars that have had work done on them due to and this is so stupid as folk can be, the AA and RAC and trading standards do guides on how to buy a secondhand car they say any car that shows signs of any repairs should be overlooked or check more and is a bigger risk to buy than a car with nothing done to it,, this fits with what they are talking about a under 4 years old car with 50k tops on it but is stupid to believe the same about a 8 year old car with 100k on it.
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