After spending several months watching/participating in car auctions and searching Craigslist ads I finally won a bid on an 04 WRX with 168K miles (located in NJ). I think I would have preferred to have picked up an 06 WRX but found that I was routinely being outbid (<$4K) and I found it frustrating that wrecked cars were going for so much. It still amazes me what these cars go for.

Anyway, the 04 looked to be in pretty good shape from the photos with minimal rust and no apparent body damage. The auction did list it as able to start but had the comment of “turbo won’t go into gear.” I had assumed what they meant was the car won’t go into gear thus implying that the transmission was probably shot. This would have explained why it was at auction with no visible body damage. The comment about the turbo (and higher mileage) didn’t deter me that much as I planned to rebuild both the engine and transmission (more future learning).

When the car arrived I was must say I was fairly concerned. There was a whole lot more rust on the body than what was visible in the auction photos. After thoroughly inspecting the car once it arrived, I get the impression that it sat for several months (maybe close to a year) before I was able to pick it up. Aside from the rust I was happy to find that the car started right up after charging the battery and it even went into 1st, 2nd, and reverse with no issues. I couldn’t take it on the street to get it up to speed as one of the tires was completely flat. At this point I am not sure what condition the turbo (TD04) is actually in but regardless I am planning on replacing it with something larger.

Photos:
https://goo.gl/photos/v4NSFxogQVbQQFRk6

Let me know if there are any issues with the link. I see that most people upload their photo directly to the forum. I am going to try to keep my collection on the Google Photos platform. Also, this is the first forum I have participated so I know I will have some learning there as well.