[Mr. Green]

I your typical Joe average with a small business. I have always wanted a
F-car. I can afford to make payments on a used Ferrari. My problem is I
can't afford the maintenance. Please don't tell me to work on the car myself, I am not mechanically Inclined.

 

[4kids3fish]

Mr G,

I guess maintenance is a bit of a lottery. Cars with higher mileage will generally have more things go wrong, while all cars need the regular servicing. Skip on that and you might get around OK but you will experience problems when re-selling - either you will take a big $$ hit or you will have to get it serviced anyway for the sale (or both!).

My advice is to find out from reputable service organisation (not necessarily the main dealer - Fclubs in your area could recommend good alternatives) how much the REGULAR services cost and how often they come up for each car you are considering. If you can't cover those costs then pls don't buy.

Low mileage cars may not need much else if you are sensible with the car (and a little lucky). Older vehicles will always need other things doing to them.

 

[Bazil]

Some would say that Joe Average is not meant to be able to afford a Ferrari, but I think that's both unfair and wrong.

In my humble opinion - they need not be prohibitively expensive.

If you bought the best 308 GT4 you could find - you're not going to spend a fortune on the purchase, and it should be very reliable.

But - don't go for anything without a scrupulous service history, and don't ruin it's service history. Also don't even consider a 12 cylinder - e.g. 400i - irrespective of how cheap it is to buy.

A good ferrari specialist will usually be cheaper than an offical dealer for servicing/maintenance, and shouldn't be looked upon unfavourably at resale time.

Also - bear the following in mind (even though everyone else will think I'm mad!!) the only thing that is recorded against the service history is the services themselves, which must, therefore, be done by the right place. Any other maintenance work you can theoretically get done somewhere else. Of course you always want to make sure that you've got a top notch mechanic working on the car. But there are a lot of very good mechanics out there who usually work on other models, and who as a result will be cheaper to use. They're also often the people who will give your car the most careful attention - largely because it's a Ferrari, and they enjoy working on them as much as you enjoy owning them.

Finally - the thing that'll probably worry you more than anything is the engine going bang one day - as if it happens, it's going to cost you BIG TIME! But if you're prone to worrying about that sort of thing, I'd suggest you stay in bed!!

Bazil

 

[Pristine]

Hey Green,

OT: What kind of business do you own?

Jason W-

 

[Mr. Green]

Jason,

I am in the coin laundry business. It takes alot of quarters to pay for a
30k service on a Ferrari.

 

[Stradale]

Make sure the car you buy has got the cam belt, clutch and clutch bearing changed. Those are the worse cost items for an old model Ferrari. The cam belt is supposed to be changed every 3 years irrespective of the milage, whereas the clutch is subject to use. Some people strentch it to 5 yeras even. But the factory recommend 3 years. Why the cam belt change cost so much is because the emgine has to be "dropped" before the change can be done. The parts may not cost so much but the workmanship is expensive as you can imagine. Once the engine is down, you might as well change the clutch, clutch bearing and all the belts.

Otherwise the maintainance on the old models are very low. Current models have too many electronics and when these malfunction you have to take the car to the official dealer because only they have the computer to check, repair and reset to normal. Dealer prices are quite different !!