Purchasing C5 Z
Thread Starter
6th Gear
Joined: Sep 2021
Posts: 6
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Purchasing C5 Z
Thinking of purchasing an 02 C5 Z06. Anything to look out for or check out when seeing the car? And what is a decent price now for a Z06 with under 40k miles all stock? Sorry new to C5's and curious. Thanks in advance.
Last edited by markm44; Sep 29, 2021 at 03:17 PM.
Pro
Joined: May 2021
Posts: 525
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From: Central Ohio
There is a lot of information on this forum, just use the search function and you could spend hours on here. You are going to get advice of get the car inspected before purchasing which I highly recommend. No matter what, I would plan on paying for new tires, all new fluids, etc. unless there is very detailed history on the car. Also, pricing at least in my area has C5 Z's from 28,000 - 30,000+ for low mile examples.
Le Mans Master
Joined: Dec 2017
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From: Virginia
2021 C5 of the Year Finalist - Modified
St. Jude Donor '21-'22
I agree on both the pre-purchase inspection, and on checking out the sticky pots both in the general and in the tech sections. That will give you a ton of info. If the car doesn't already have one, you will want an LMC5 to take care of the column lock problem. The '02 is a solid car that avoids a lot of the issues that the other cars can have. As far as price, the market is crazy right now. If everything passes inspection, I would say $24K -$28K is reasonable. However, I have seen them go as high as $30K. Good luck!
Le Mans Master
Joined: Dec 2017
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From: Virginia
2021 C5 of the Year Finalist - Modified
St. Jude Donor '21-'22
Keep looking, and be patient. The right car at the right price can be found. Definitely wait until you find the right car for you.
Thread Starter
6th Gear
Joined: Sep 2021
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I would follow up with the seller. With the age of these cars, those aren’t necessarily red flags. I’m the original owner of my car and my carfax has mileage inconsistency because a service advisor screwed up and entered another car’s mileage into my repair order. And also I had a minor scrape that was professionally repaired and it shows up as “damage” on my report too. Carfax is a good tool but sometimes I feel it does more harm than good for buyers and sellers.
Le Mans Master
Joined: Dec 2017
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From: Virginia
2021 C5 of the Year Finalist - Modified
St. Jude Donor '21-'22
Also, 74K miles is a really unusual amount to put on a Corvette in just 2 years. I'm not buying what Carfax is selling...
Last edited by MWWarlord; Sep 30, 2021 at 04:49 PM.
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The Stickies mentioned above along with a pre-purchase inspection by a Tech familiar with the C5 will go a long way towards having a positive buying experience. Good luck.
Pro
Joined: May 2014
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From: North Carolina
You didn't state what your budget is but there's more than a few one or two owner, extremely low mileage cars out there that can be bought for much less than what's being asked for them. Dealers are asking astronomical amounts for these cars and a lot of private owners are doing the same, but then soon realize that people aren't buying them. I just bought a like new, two owner 2003 ZO6 with 5100 miles on it and the owner came off of his asking price by $4000.00. There's several nice ones on Facebook Marketplace, below is a link for a nationwide search engine. There's also an extremely nice, one owner Quicksilver with just under 10K miles in the C5 for sale forum right now. I almost bought that car but found a red one I liked more.
http://facebook-marketplace-us-natio...arch.gmoz.biz/
http://facebook-marketplace-us-natio...arch.gmoz.biz/