Is it worth buying a 1997 truck with 220K miles ?
 

I've been looking for a truck for next summer to pull my camper around, I don't need nothing too fancy. Just down the street from where I live, someone is selling a beautiful brown 1997 Dodge Laramie 1500 4X4 extended cab with a 318 V8 5.2l engine in it, short box, automatic tranny and other basics like cruise control. The only bad thing is that it has 220,000 miles on it which he claims to be highway miles, but some people like my brother and dad say "miles are miles".

The guy is asking $5600, but I've been thinking about seeing if he'd take $5000 for it. What do you think ?? We don't really need some big fancy truck, it's mainly just a second vehicle to pull our camper in the summer and perhaps put a plow on it eventually. I think that if I could get it for $5000, that'd be a great deal for a newer four wheel drive truck like that, but I surely wouldn't wanna be rebuilding the engine on it next year, ha ha ha.

220k miles a shit load of miles no matter if its city or highway... if you are going to be using it mostly to travel around with I would go with something with lower miles. you dont want your truck to die on you in the middle of nowhere leaving you stranded with just a camper.

If your getting it for less then $3000 and its a Ford or Dodge I would say go for it, they can last a very long time as you have seen with 220K miles already, if its a chevy tell them to junk it, sorry:1orglaugh

I would say no thats a lot of money to pay for that many miles. unless you are planning on rebuilding and fixing it up I would not waste my money.:2 cents:

Those 318s can last forever. Even if the motor failed a new crate motor is around 800 dollars if I am not mistaken.

What you have to worry about is getting nickle and dimed to death with drive train problems etc.

Look it over very good and low ball him. If it runs good and you can get it for 4500 ish you would be in good shape.

If it's got 220,000 miles and you plan on using it for towing and plowing then I would definately look elsewhere.

Plowing would kill an engine with that many miles on it pretty quick.

How many miles on the transmission? I'd be more worried about that. I believe a 5.2 can last that long but it's not exactly a chrysler straight six. There's a lot of shit that'll go wrong on that 8 (plenum gasket) etc that will piss you off. Remember that whole drivetrain has that 220k miles on it... transmission, tcase, axels, etc. I'd pay maybe 2k for that. Tops.

Thanks for all of the input everyone, I appreciate the comments :) I guess that I'll probably pass on the truck then and wait for something better to come along. Unless I can talk him down to $4000, ha ha ha. I won't need anything until summer, so I'll just keep my eyes peeled. I'm sure that for a decent truck, I'll probably have to hit the $8,000 price range, but seeing this one just kinda stood out to me, but with those miles, I'm sure that it'd be a costly vehicle in the future.

Adam, the tranny hasn't been rebuilt, so it's on 220K also, so you're rite, that's probably on track to go.

evildick, yeah, that's another good point there which I guess that I never really thought about.