Thread: NEED opinion / advice from LOTUS Elise owners.

MR. CHASE, I thank you for taking the time to sit & write up a personal review for me. I greatly appreciate it. You've been helpful also LARRY ! Thanks to all for your inputs as well !

Well I emailed the dealer about the said ELISE local & this is what he told me:

Just several questions about this ELISE before I decided to further pursue.

Does it have the "TOURING" package ? ( a/c, radio, & power windows)

Is it a clean title vehicle ?

Has the maintenance records up to date ?

How many owners & has the car been tracked ?

Also can I get pictures of the car ? Thanks BLEX

-Duy

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Yes, it does have the Touring Package. The car has a clean title. Yes, all maintenance was done at a Lamborghini Dealership in Atlanta. It has been a one owner, Baton Rouge car and has never been raced or abused. This was an older gentleman that liked the look of the car, and nothing else. He used it to commute from Alabama to Baton Rouge. I don't have any further pictures at this time but can get it if you're seriously interested.

Current flaws:

Front starshield has been removed, and peeled some paint of the front clam so it has to be repainted.

Wheels have scuffs.

Other than that, we are replacing the passenger side window regulator because it recently went out.

Let me know.

Thanks,
Alex

Sounds like a solid 94xxx car to me. What about you guys ? Anything else I should be asking ?

Honestly man i'd say pass.

Figure at least 1000 bucks for a front clam repaint (and then will it REALLY match the factory paint?).

That brings you to 20k to get a car with near as makes no difference 100k miles on it. For 5k more, you can get a car with 30k miles on it. The resale difference 5 years down the line makes it a no brainer to get a lower mileage car. On one side you can sell your elise you bought with 30k miles on it (and now has 100k miles on it) for a lot more than the 100k mile elise you bought and are trying to get out of with 160k miles on it.

You make (or at least limit) your overall cost to own a car (from purchase to sale) when you BUY IT. Pay a little more now, and you'll get it all back on the other end of your ownership. Not to mention you'll have a much nicer car with much less ware. Well worth an additional 5k.

HAHHA! What a coincidence! I'm actually the seller of this Lotus. Yes, it does have it's share of mileage, but I can say that if you were to get a readout of the computer, then it wouldn't show much "action." It wasn't really for sale but he saw it on one of my other ads posted for another car that I was selling. Considering the mileage, there are no other Elise's I could find for under $20k. Good to see you're a part of L4P...Great community!

I DD'd a Lotus Elise for about 8 months. I absolutely loved the car. Like Larry and Mr. Chase have stated, they can be costly and you HAVE to stay on top of the maintaince. Lotus Elise/Exige are great cars to drive around town and I had a blast with mine. My only regret is that I was unable to keep it. I always keep my eyes peeled out for good deals on them and older Ferrari 360's.

Just a heads up, you won't find a DECENT Lotus for under 25K. Just saying...

Visit the Lotus booth at the Los Angeles Auto Show coming up in mid-November.

See the new cars and get the straight scoop.

The new cars are all under warranty and Lotus takes great care of its customers!

And, come over to Specialty Car Craft on La Cienega Blvd. and we'll take you for a spin in an Elise or Exige!

SCC loves Lotus!

you can always check on the ECU dump and in any case the engine goes bad....its a toyota engine you can get em pretty much anywhere and for cheap too

Come over to SCC here on La Cienega Blvd. right near Beverly Hills.

You can drive a Lotus and we'll tell you everything about owning one.

We can even find you the best Lotus at the best price!