Is a 944 Porsche a good car?

Hey I told you. You won't be able to do it, I'm sorry its bottom line paint costs more than 100 bucks! I told you the only way it'd be possible...

...anyways, I had an '83. Most of the problems I ran into were someone else's fault. If you keep up on maintenance it should be alright. If something seems wrong, it IS. don't try to ride it out, get it fixed immediately.

ps. the hatch always leaks, don't bother trying to fix it :-\ too much money. and the reason I knew is cuz its the only porsche they sell that cheap... you'll see why. I bought one (of two) sensor for more than that price.

An '84 944 is a good car, maybe even a very good car. It's a car with a lot of plusses, but a few negitives that may be huge. First off, while it does excel in some areas of performance, power is not one of them. If you are looking for a car with alot of power or anything more than moderate/adequate power, you'll be disappointed.

In terms of reliability, Porsche are very well engineered and built and the 944 is no exception. However you are talking about a car that is more than 25 years old. How reliable it is will depend more on how it's been cared for than how it was originally built. A well maintained example can be a very reliable car. When it was introduced this was an expensive car, and parts costs will be reflective of that original premium price (in 2010 prices terms, this was about a $45-55k car). As these cars have become cheaper and cheaper over time, you will now find many that have been owned by people that have not been abloe to afford their upkeep and repair; these cars will not be reliable and will have a very high cost of ownership before they can begin to approach any kind of reliability.

As for the $100 DIY paint - in terms of DIY? It's a major job, and will depend on the quality of the paint job you want and the skills you have in using the equipment. But if you are skilled with the gun and have access to an environment suitable for repainting the car yourself, you will most likely still run into cost problems as far as your quoted $100.

Porsches of this era used Glasuit paint, which in terms of paint material alone will be far over $100 ($3000 would be a better estimate for just the paint for most Porsche paint jobs... about 50-65% of that if you are doing a single stage non-metallic). Other brands of paint will be less, but it's unlikely that you will get it down to anything close to $100. Additionally, as the key to a decent paint job will be the prep work, you should reasonably expect that you will need to replace some trim when you strip the car down for painting.

If your paint question is related to the purchase of a 944, don't buy such a car. I can already tell you that you can't afford to maintain it. Yes, the Porsche 944, like any other older car will brake down and it will cost some serious money to repair it.