Will buying a demo ruin my life?

[Sapphireho]

Originally Posted by Tcoat

This ^
This forum can go right off the deep end in worrying about piss ass little stuff like a few test drives but then the very same people will have 2,000 page conversations on what the highest boost the car can take, how wide the tires need to be for the best grip, how to tune the engine to within a hair of blowing up and all sorts of other weird and wonderful things.

Guy worried about test drives. Buys car, takes to drift school.

[OfficeWorker]

It's conceivable that a car with 10 miles on it could have been severely damaged by grossly negligent/improper usage. But is it likely? IMO, no - before a new car gets to an owner, it commonly passes through a lot of people who have limited-to-virtually-zero stake in caring for that car, many of whom are assholes who have zero regard for something that isn't 'their's'. If cars were not designed to withstand the less-than-loving care they often see at this stage in their life, then this issue would be well established and IMO there would likely be far greater constraints on test drives and far greater emphasis on zero-mile cars.

I've never purchased a new car with 0 miles, and IIRC the lowest was like 10. My BRZ had IIRC 28 (half of which were from me test driving it) - I had a Jeep that had 200 miles on it as it was a demo model. I've never had any issues. And based on everything I have read here, all signs suggest that the BRZ was designed with the intent of being driven hard, and it holds up well when subjected to this purpose (frankly, people track the shit out of these cars on Saturday, and then commute to work business-as-usual come Monday, rinse and repeat.)

Two downsides I can think of are, A) the car may have some cosmetic wear/damage (the paint on these cars is insanely delicate), and B) the warranty will be shorter (plus, this model lacks the additions of the 2017- versions). Accordingly, the price reduction should offset all of this.

One thing you always can do is, periodically, have a UOA performed?

[Dadhawk]

Originally Posted by OfficeWorker

I've never purchased a new car with 0 miles, and IIRC the lowest was like 10.

It's impossible to buy a car with 0 miles on it unless you pick it up at the point in the assembly process between when the odometer is installed and the wheels first roll (not even under their own power, just roll).

Cars get mileage leaving the assembly line, being driven to assembly storage, getting loaded/offloaded on trucks, ships, and getting moved around the dealership for prep.

The lowest two cars I've had were my '85 MR2 which I bought right off the back of the car carrier (I drove it from the carrier to the prep area), and it had 5 miles on it at that point. The 86 had 7 miles on it and did not leave the dealership lot between delivery and pickup.

[Tcoat]

Originally Posted by Dadhawk

It's impossible to buy a car with 0 miles on it unless you pick it up at the point in the assembly process between when the odometer is installed and the wheels first roll (not even under their own power, just roll).

Cars get mileage leaving the assembly line, being driven to assembly storage, getting loaded/offloaded on trucks, ships, and getting moved around the dealership for prep.

The lowest two cars I've had were my '85 MR2 which I bought right off the back of the car carrier (I drove it from the carrier to the prep area), and it had 5 miles on it at that point. The 86 had 7 miles on it and did not leave the dealership lot between delivery and pickup.

Yep. Depending where the car ends up on the lots during each stage of transport you can get maybe as little as 5 miles and as many as 50. The further reaches of the staging areas at some plants can be as far as 5 miles from the end of the assembly line. The same distance can applies at both the departure and arrival ports.
It can be hard to comprehend the sheer size of some of these lots unless you actually experience it in person. If you get a car with less than 10 miles on it then you just lucked out that it ended up at the front of each stage of shipment.