Well guys, I have something to share finally - I bought a new vehicle!
It's a 1995 Dodge Dakota Sport 4x4 with 5.2 Magnum and 5-speed manual! We purchased it from a great guy in Gillette, Wyoming. It's got 176,600 miles. We are the third owners, with the previous owner buying it from the original owner in 2017. It had been sitting in a field for 14 years prior to his purchase because the transmission went out. The new owner put a lot of work into it, and he is a talented hobby mechanic. He gutted the interior, put in new carpet and cleaned up all the mice nests. Most notably he replaced the transmission, clutch, pressure plate, fuel pump, water pump. radiator hoses, intake gaskets, A/C evaporator, battery, and tires and then proceeded to put 35,000 miles on the truck during his ownership.
I feel privileged to own the truck, and it's truly in pretty remarkable condition for the area with very little rust (rear wheel arches under the trim) and of course it's plagued by the common '90s paint/primer issue. It's really fun to drive and the wife and kids really love it. I plan on slowly taking care of some of the cosmetic issues and using it as a mostly commuter vehicle for my business. It will maybe see a few thousand miles a year.
My phone call timing in response to the Craigslist ad he posted was quite lucky, I called him shortly after he posted it. He had it listed for a very fair price at $3,850. I asked him a litany of questions on the phone and he had a great response to all of them. We arranged to meet the next day and I told him I was comfortable with his asking price if the truck was as described. The truck was even better than I had thought in person, and after a look over and test drive, we handed him his cash asking price. He told us he had received many calls after I had called him, and even had an offer of $400 over his asking price, but he proved his integrity by sticking with his original asking price and honoring our meeting time of the next day.
I'm really grateful and feel fortunate to have experienced this whole transaction and to have such a great truck sitting in my driveway. Unfortunately I think men like the seller and trucks like this are falling into obscurity, and I feel a duty to keep them alive on both fronts.
