Is A Salvage Rebuild Worth It?
 

Hi. I am newer to cars, and have done very few small maintenance for my current car. I was wondering if it would be logical to buy a “salvaged” car that has most likely been in an accident. (probably no problems with the engine) and try and rebuild it to try and save some money. I have a lot of space, tools, and a lot of time. I was just wondering what other problems I would run into, and if it is overall worth the risk.

Rebuilding a salvage car is not nearly as straight forward as it may seem even if no engine damage.

Bent structure, cut harnesses, airbag modules, etc all take more than "I can change oil" levels of skill and specialized equipment to deal with.

The guys with that equipment and skills make it look really easy. It ISN'T!

In the long run you will find that you will probably not save much money and the probability of the project ending up as a tarp covered lawn ornament and animal condo is high.

If you want to learn buy an older beat up but functioning one and practice the basics.

I wouldn't. I did basically this with my FR-S that I totalled on the track in 2020. It was worth it to me because the sentimental value tied to the car, but I would have been really stupid to invest all of this money otherwise. Unless you're a professional and your time is "free" rebuilding a salvage title car isn't going to pay off unless you cut corners.

If you have the skills and time, absolutely.

But be aware, there are a bunch of partially finished salvage rebuilds that go up for sale frequently because the person didn't really know what they were getting into...me & @Dave-ROR make it look easy. But there are hurdles on some rebuilds that many can't overcome due to knowledge, skills, equipment, etc.

Would you have any suggestions when looking for a salvaged car. I have heard airbags can be difficult and costly. I have also seen that some cars that seem to just have damage to the body ended up having frame damage aswell which does not sound fun.

Airbags are cheap. Myairbags.com can reset the computer. Clockspring can be fixed but can fail again... seatbelt pre tensioners are like 50 each to fix.

Rear end repairs suck, front end arent terrible. Avoid anything with lower front end damage (likely frame rail and apron damage) or abs module damage (thats out of laziness on running new brake lines though).

Totally worth it, I picked up 3 months ago a 1 owner 2015 Scion FRS 1 with 80k on it, won it for $5200, fixed it with $2600 with new and used OEM parts, airbags never deployed, had front end damage, car was totaled for 9k in damages, decided to go with 2017 front end, it was an easy fix, sourcing the used oem parts was the bad part, but's it done.

Go physically look at the car before bidding, know what you are looking at and looking for.

That's just it and sort of the point of my first post. If somebody is asking the question the OP asked then it is very, very, probable they don't know what they are looking at or what to look for.
Threads like yours make rebuilds look really easy, fast, and inexpensive and they certainly can be for those that KNOW what they are doing.
If somebody is "newer" to cars and experience consists of changing some oil then jumping into a rebuild is getting way ahead of themselves. Sure people need to do things to learn but the wrong rebuild for the skill level invaribly leads to a poor or abandoned project.
A far better jumping off point would be to get a reasonably priced high mileage but fully intact car and start replacing worn parts to build it up. This really applies if budget is an issue as it appears to be in this case.

I don't know about DMV laws in NE but in Va, retitling a car as rebuilt or salvage is a PITA.
4 years ago, I got my FRS by making friends with a small local used car guy. He searched auctions for "as is" BRZ/FRS/86's. We found mine in Texas for $6k. It was a repo with an open recall on the valve springs but it actually ran just fine. With shipping, auction fee, and $500 to my guy I had $7500 in it.

That is EXACTLY the sort of scenario I have been saying.
Checking the private sales market is another option. I sold my FRS for a very reasonable price since it was high mileage and had a few small battle scars. The new owner got a decent and fully intact car for far less than they would have if buying retail from even the shadiest used car dealer.
They can be had with some looking.

If only I could find anything near 6k for BRZ/FRS. It seems that the prices have gone even higher recently hence why I want to try and save a couple bucks any way I can.

All used cars are high right now. It is probably the worst time in automotive history to be buying a used car. Unfortunately that also means that salvage cars are selling for more than normal as well.
If you can hold out another year then prices may "normalize".

In this case especially, the saying holds true. "If you have to ask, you're not ready."

The required experience is built incrementally over years. No matter how badly you want it, don't bite off more than you can chew.

@Sam_ they are out there, you just have to be diligent checking for them regularly. There are still several clean title cars that pop up near me with high mileage and some minor issues that I can usually pick up for under 5k

Opie: You live in Florida though. Location kind of matters on this one.

OP: I just want to say that I loved my '08 manual Accent hatch (Rio twin). I see you drive a Rio currently, in case everyone thinks I'm crazier than I really am.

Out of pure curiosity I did a quick surface skim of the larger car sales sites in the US. I found several decent looking cars in the $8K to $10K range at dealerships. Those are actually very, very good prices n this market even at retail.
Didn't have much luck with private sales but those are probably posted more locally and I didn't dig that deep. If there are $8K retail cars out there then there must be less costly private sale ones.

The bigger salvage auction sites have shitloads of them listed. I mean at this rate there won't be any eft in a few more years! Many had no bids listed yet but those that did were not dirt cheap. One had the whole front end wiped off it and the current bid was $2,500. One that didn't look too bad (though they took the picture from the undamaged side) was a $5,500 and still has two days left. Most looked bad enough I doubt that even you guys would be interested and will end up as part outs not rebuild. I also noticed that most of the wrecked ones (with working odometers) were well over 100K miles.

None of them were real close to the OP but I doubt he will find many in his backyard anyway since the big concentrations are on the coasts.

Which reduces his odds of finding a wreck anyplace close just as much as a cheap roadworthy one.

"His" being OP, or Opie?

Op. Opie will have pile’s available around him. Dead centre of the country not so much.

In that case, I agree.

Step one. Don’t live in the middle of nowhere. Story of my life.

That is actually surprising to me. Even when I searched with no location limit ones that didn't have astronomically high mileage were in the $16k range. And I agree that places like copart have gotten to be way higher priced and that’s not even factoring the fees that can be upwards of 40%. After seeing rebuild videos I noticed when people are rebuilding them for around $4000 that was years ago.

Hey, at least you're a real person. That's a plus. Welcome.

Hello


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You jinxed it!

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