So it started with the idea of bought the jeep for $3500 put $500 into it, list it for $9500 and hope that someone on the east coast goes “oh my god beautiful California rust free low mileage jeep with 1 owner that’s expensive for a YJ but because it looks cool I’ll wire money now” and it almost happened I had a lot of interest at that price from Midwest dudes.
But I thought might be easier to trade it let’s see what’s out there. So what’s a cool looking vehicle with A/C , 4 doors, 80-90s astetic, extremely reliable with a body on a frame. Easy Land Cruiser so I had a AI bot sort through marketplace while I worked and it sent out a bunch of offers and one dudes like yeah I’m down. The Ad Said 175k miles, runs good, sanding for paint interior is decent and clean title, looked through pictures no rust I could see looked ugly but what ever it checks all the boxes. I ask him is there any issues with it he says “None that i can think of, it's just old, it's a capable rig”, “The land cruiser was my daily, ! live in the hills and I can transition from asphalt to really rough terrain seamlessly. It loves rough terrain”, and “ I daily drive it to San Diego everyday for work”. These are all direct quotes from our messages. So I go cool when can we meet he says come by tomorrow at noon perfect work for my schedule.
Morning of prep the jeep check fluids put gas in it etc take my pelican case out that got tools, grab all my spare parts ,my hanes manual , took nothing from the Joop only added. 95 degrees and cruising on the freeway it’s empty the jeeps holding 72 mph in 5th at 2100 rpms basically a cesna dead nuts reliable didn’t even get over 200 just awesome.
Drive for an hour get to the dudes place and here’s where the red flags started, he’s pulling lights off the front the things full of trash and super dirty. Whatever a detail is $100, I do my inspection look for rust and leaks basically everything a YouTube video tells you to look for
On these things it’s kinda a shit box but I can fix thoese. Get inside to start it and it’s got 300k on the dash and I say hey what’s up with this “ oh I pulled the engine from the red one and put it in this one because the other one got
Wrecked” cool not the first person in history to do that. Go to Do a test drive key dosent fire the starter whatever jeep has done the same thing before, Offroad cruise at 15 mph it’s fine no oil pressure gauge everything else worked cool, I get excited and think il going to take my 4k “investments” put 2k into this and flip it to some guy in LA I’m the winter for 10-14k. Hand over the paperwork but didn’t sign anything yet. Then he’s like while I have a $3,000 sound system in this I need to get it out can you go to my buddies shop down the road and have him pull it out also we need to switch batteries because I just bought this yellow top optima . Sure whatever I’ll be nice, drive it 20 miles down the road to the buddies shop notice 2nd slips a little on the up shift and there’s a driveline clunk getting on and off the gas proably just u joints and it only
Goes like 60 before another vibration could be driveline could be tires easy ish fixes get to the buddies shop drop it off at 2:30 and walk across the street to orileys to get fluids, oil water , funnel, easy enough to get home. The shop takes 4 hours to pull everything I’m stuck in the waiting room watching CNN on repeat next to a fat chick playing reels at full blast. Nothing interesting happens until I hear the hood slam and then they try to start it and it cranks for more than 2 seconds which a efi toyota dosent do. And it cranks and it cranks and they wait 5 mins and it cranks again hoods opening and closing and my heart sinks up until this point I was fine but now I’m like fuck this guys a piece of shit whatever try and make it home , get it from the guys check oil , nothing on the dip stick, add a quart , at 1/2 mark cool go get a full tank of 91 a mile down the road. Turn around get up to 40 mph shifts up from 2-3 slips revs bogs dies instantly it’s an automatic so I coast into a parking lot, fuck me right. Pop the hood start wigggling everything doing general checks and it cranks again and fires, crisis averted but on high alert now. I have 22 miles on it reset the trip gauge and watch it do 5 mile loop on the street below 2k rpms does fine. Time to go on the freeway again. Cruise on the 60 at 60 mph in the slow lane behind semi trucks trying to not watch the gauges and focus on what it’s doing get to central ave and dies no waring just straight cut pull I’m the shoulder and coast as far as I can. If It was my first rodeo I probably would have panicked that my runs great vehicle died and I’m 3 lanes over and had the freeway shut down or been rear ended. As I’m coasting I put it in neutral and try and refire nothing not even cranking roll to a stop key isn’t doing
Shit I’m at 24 miles on the trip ODO. Go through basic check list is it fuel air or spark. Fuel first listen for a relay use chatgbt says they can heat soak and trip, can hear a click but not
Sure It’s in the right spot for the relay. Check spark distributor and coils check all wires check conections find a spare wire that’s loose and lots vaccum ports blocked with RTV, I have no tools everyone’s out drinking for saint Patrick’s day and I’m kinda fucked so I wait 10 mins to see if cooling down the relay will work I’m on the shoulder of the freeway getting buzzed by semis about 1/2 feet away not fun. Key would only engage the starter every 1 in 30 attempts and just crank. Then it fires thank god I’m going to make it home I’m going to go get a beer with my wife everything’s going to be cool. I put .01 lbs of force on the gas pedal dies instantly. At that point I say fuck it call AAA give them the dudes adress and say come get me shout out Juan he was a cool driver funny guy. I call the dude when I’m 30 mins away not cool it died I’m bringing it back and getting my jeep didn’t really give him a choice he gives me attitude. Whatever get back to his place.
First thing he says idk man what you did to it
But I’m going to file a police report, cool I just agree with him until I get the title and keys in hand he points out the massive oil puddle from the rear main and says what you do to it
It leaks oil but never that much, that’s when I confirmed he was a piece of shit because it did in fact leak that much every single place it stopped, his driveway when I got there, the front parking lot of the stero shop, in the stero shop, at the gas station, on the side of the freeway and on the tow truck. He starts saying while who’s going to pay for this blah blah blah stuff along that line and I was like oh this isn’t his first time being a piece of garbage, I’m going to have to take it to Yota masters and have them fix it because now I can’t sell it and you where way out there when it broke you messed up the rear main seal and the front main seal, I’m having the sheriff come out, I said cool have them come out I don’t care. Calls someone and says oh they won’t come out because it’s civil. At this time he’s calling the “sheriff” I’m pulling MY BATTERY OUT OF THE LAND CRUISER AND SWAPPING HIS-BATTERY FROM THE JEEP. I have my keys , my title , and all the shit I came with I go to start the jeep my battery is dead his shit box killed my battery my starter didn’t even click and it’s 9:30 at night I had been dealing with this for over 9 hours. He gets the most ghetto jump box I’ve ever seen we start the jeep and I’m gone driving home on only 35 year old alternator in the red with an hour and a half drive home at this point I will push it home just to get 1 lukewarm beer after this shit show. Get on the 60 from the 215 traffic stopped as far as I can see ended up being like 1-2 lanes all the way to the 91 for no reason, my foot’s cramping from the clutch I’m dehydrated and can’t get food because I can’t turn the jeep off because battery is still in the red because I need to run lights. It takes 2.5 hours to go 60 miles back home and I get in at 11:30 at night. Got all my stuff back, got 1 cold bud light and smoked a joint and cigarette at the same time to take the edge of and blocked him on everything because I’ve delt with these people before, we had a similar thing selling a house, epoxy on a bathtub got messed up we offered to fix it from 4 different people even though it was still under warranty through the original guy and even offered them 10k as a sorry and then they tried to sue us for 75,000 for pain and suffering because his fat fucking wife couldn’t take a bath, even though there was 2 other bath tubs and a jacuzzi. Long story short they couldn’t sue us and tried to sue our realtor and take his license and it came up they had a history of doing it with the last 4 houses they bought. Relator had a small team of Jewish lawyers and they had no chance.
Lessons learned
- it’s cheaper to keep her and just keep making slow progress on your build
-buy vehicles from friends you know
-the jeep burns a quart of oil every 180 miles
-never trust people who’s names you can’t pronounce
- carry a old ID with you from another state so when the guy takes a picture of your ID for the “police report” it’s useless
my wife was not impressed hahahahaha
