Hi there...new to the forum and to the Audi world.
My son, 16, is looking for his first car. We found a 98 A4 1.8T Quatro AWD for $6500 US. It has around 130k miles and is a California car . It's automatic with Tiptronic, and seems to be fairly loaded. Leather, heated seats, side air bags, Bose stereo etc. Recently replaced items include timing belt with update kit, new brakes, oil cooler, ignition, ABS unit, tie rods, all belts.
My questions are is this a fair price considering it has had no accidents but there are some dings. Interior is in great shape. And more importantly is this a good first car? Will we be putting alot of money into it for maintanence? He wants an automatic and the Tiptronic appeals to him but I really don't know how often he would use it.
Anyway... any advise would be greatly appreciated. I'll continue to search this great site to find common problems that may arrise with this model.

Steve

 

a tip/automatic is ideal for the likes of me because im getting on a bit but if you do a search the tip has problems ( though fancy it is ) I would give it a miss and go for the manual less problems and cheaper fixes and worth every penny since your probably going to pay for it

 

Regular maintnence is costly if taken to the dealer. Its not a Honda or Toyota and Audi's do have their issues. Youll find tons of info if you use the search here and type "audi reliability." If you do the work that is needed yourself it wont be costly and youll save a TON. Just be advised that if your son finds out about this site and learns about the modifying potential of the 1.8t, that could rack up some $$$. Its deffinately a very safe and fun car to own. But dont expect reliability to be the same as a Honda simply put. Make sure the oil is fully synthetic and that you keep up on oil changes and routine maint. and it will be great. Its a good thing the timing belt has been done with the updated tensioner, thats the main thing to look out for when purchasing a 1.8t. Just search and youll find a bunch of examples of what i just said and more. I havent read about many problems with the tip tranny other than it cant take the power that some bigger turbo's produce. Audi says its a lifetime fluid inside the tranny but dont believe that. Id have it changed if you bought the car at that mileage. There are a couple members here approaching 200k miles with tip tranny and they have had no problems. Oh I guess that I have read about gear hunting issues with the tip, but thats pretty rare.

 

personally i would suggest a manual tranny. that car seems like its in good shape tho. i dont know bout california prices but in florida that would be a great buy. maybe try and squeeze an extra 500 of the price. its a good first car in the sense that it is very safe. one kid on here ran his audi into a parked car going bout 100 mph and he's fine and dandy. quattro is great and makes a huge dif. in handling. maintainance bills are higher than normal cars and not everyone can work on these cars but it looks like most of the things that go wrong with the car have already been replaced, but i would still leave about 1000 set aside just in case. the main killer with the bills is the labor charges. so if you can do simple repairs yourself or have some automotive connects it helps out greatly.

 

Thanks for the quick replies!! I appreciate it. I keep trying to steer him away from European cars and towards Honda or Toyota but he wants something different. He has enough saved up to buy it but I know I'll be paying the maintenance so I still have alot of say in his decision.
THanks again...I'll continue searching on here.

 

The one thing that is wrong with the car is that the Air Bag light is on. He said that it's on because of high resistance from the driver's seat side airbag and that he has documentation of this. Sounds like an expensive fix right?

We can do small repairs ourselves but it's the big ones I'm concerned with.

 

If you are paying the maintnence bills and he or you dont do work on cars id try to get him to want a Honda more. Or buy him some tools and a repair manual. Most parts for the Audi arent more expensive than any other car, like chaos said its the labor that is killer. Id tell your son if he wants the Audi he will have to learn how to fix it when something breaks and youll buy the parts, or if he gets a Honda tell him youll pay the maint. bills. If you know how to work on cars, buy him the tools and the audi should give you guys a great bonding experience when his control arms fall appart... Just kidding... Sort of...[&:]