I am interested in an RS being sold by a dealer which they purchased at auction (they are not a Sube dealer). The auction thing scares me right there. But I did a carfax on it, and it was clean, and was only registered once. It was sold at auction as a fleet vehicle. It has a little over 8000 miles (2001), and is priced reasonably. Should I be worried about anything in particular (i.e. that it was abused)? Is there any way to hide it being wrecked that carfax would not find? I plan on taking it to the nearest Subaru dealership to look at it before I buy it (if it is good - I'm driving it tomorrow), so I'm not so much worried that it was in any major accident - the dealer should be able to spot that.

Any particular caveats on buying a fleet car?

Thanks!

Never heard of an RS being fleeted before.. ^^

anyway, fleets can be pretty well beat on. Be careful, and get it checked out fully before you get it.

I drive fleeters for the government. The ones with the g-plates. We do not call them G JETS for nothing. We beat the hell out of these cars. Redline every shift (Auto's) and cruise in xsess of 85 everywhere we go. I am a navy recruiter, so we are Xtremely hard on vehicles (We have a quota to make).

My advice to you...Pass it us!!!
ANDY

"Fleet" vehicles are also sometimes used to describe lease returns as well. It could have been a leased vehcle so youve got a fifty-fifty shot on the abused meter.

Find out if it was leased, or driven by a different abuser every day. Yes, I said abuser. Do a search of past posts and see what some people on this board do to rentals. It's brutal. I've had my fair share of rentals, and can say I don't quite have the respect for them as I would my own car. Jerry Sienfeld comes to mind here. "Only $7 for insurance? Sure, I'll take it. I plan on beating the hell out of this car." Only the truth is funny. I have a friend who actually dropped an entire dash from a rental car into his lap after hitting the railroad tracks on too many times. Yeah, I'm from Indiana.

As far as the auction, that shouldn't scare you. There are some fine cars at auctions for whatever reason. I used to buy repos from an aution that were great rides. I'll tell you one thing though. If it's only "reasonably" priced the dealer has got quite a bit of room to deal. Walk away in the middle of the negotiations. Really, walk away, say goodbye, get into your car. Drive off if you need to. They should flinch. You can always come back and agree to whatever price they wanted. I've been to a lot of dealer auctions, and the prices are unreal. Figure they're going to try to make at least 30% off the car. That's $13,000 they'd charge for a car they paid $10,000 for. They'd rather make get $12,000 and have a done deal. Keep in mind, also, they have that cash out of pocket, as a new car dealer most usually has only cars on credit on their lot. Remember, they're taking a huge risk in not knowing the history too. I'm sure they bought it cheap. CHEAP!!!