It was an opinion the first time he posted .
The second time it became a strong position.
He will have to post it a third time to become fact.

 

thank you, NEMOHM, I like it myself, re-reading it.

I've always aspired to author a stickie-worthy piece.

 

Just trying to build up my post count.

Actually, I'll plea unfamiliarity with the forum's readiness to log me off just because I take my time to craft thoughtful, caring, helpful advice.
I must have refreshed or back-paged or something, because I definitely would not have reposted.

 

I think it's perfectly reasonable to tell someone with an older Audi that it needs 3K worth of work without seeing the car or hearing about the problems. I've had a dozen 100K plus Audis starting with an 87 5KCSTQ and in my experience they always needed at least a couple grand thrown at them to sort them out. Particularly if you can't or won't fix them yourself.