I'm new to the forum, thanks for letting me in. I'm looking at buying a 2000 model A8, the short wheel base, car has 88,xxx miles and is a real beauty. Garage kept, maintained and everything works. I can drive it away for 4800 which sounds good to me. Is this a decent model year? It'll be a DD for my wife's work commute roughly 45 miles daily. Any help would be appreciated, thanks.

 

I have a 2003 (built 2002 D3 L model) and it has been a great car. It now has 215K miles on it. If you can work on them, you can save a crap ton of money doing maintenance yourself. The cars get great gas mileage (same as my 4 cylinder Porsche 944). A timing belt change will run you a good 1K if have to take it to a shop (NOT a Stealer...er....Dealer). I bought all the special tools (cam and crank lock) to do mine for under $100 on Ebay. The first time I had a shop change the belt. Cost me $1100. I recently had to replace the cam chain tensioners and did all the work myself. A timing belt change will run you about $300-400 in parts (rollers, belt, waterpump).