A well-running Suzuki Swift for $250 and a ride, or for $350

Reply to: sale-zczak-1254554430@craigslist.org
Date: 2009-07-05, 12:16PM PDT

For sale: A 1995 Suzuki Swift with 148,000 miles. Wendy and I are starting an eastward bicycle trip in Bellingham so we plan to drive up from San Diego and sell our beloved Swift just before departure.

The engine runs great, and its recent trip from San Francisco to San Diego and up to Bellingham is testament to its reliability and our faithful trust in it. We'll be sad to say goodbye to it, but doubly excited to start riding!

So why do we want only $350 for a working car? 1) It has some obvious but workable nontraditional inconveniences. 2) I hate to use the term "priced to sell", but once we arrive we'll be eager to get cycling, and we're more concerned with a quick transition to a good home than we are with working it for the maximum dollar. 3) I once bought a car for $350 that served me very well and is still in service, so it seemed like an appropriate number of good fortune.

Let's talk about the awesomest qualities first:

- Look up the Suzuki Swift. It's basically the same car as the more famous Geo Metro, which is my favorite car ever. The Geo Metro was made in the 90s as an economy car with great gas mileage. All the important essential parts are quality Japanese (engine, transmission, etc) and all the nonessential parts are cheapo American (panels, seats, etc.). That means if practicality, efficiency, and reliability are more a concern for you than comfort and aesthetics, this is an awesome value car. I bought one for $350 many years ago, drove it to Maine and back, and it is still flying strong at 42 MPG, commuting daily and driving from San Diego to Joshua Tree almost every weekend.

- Now enter the Swift. The Geo comes with a superefficient 3-cyinder 1.0L engine or a meatier 1.3L 4-cylinder version. The Suzuki Swift was built that 1.3L only. So what it lacks in efficiency (this car for sale gets only 29 MPG) it makes up for in highway and uphill punchiness, for the more dynamically tempered driver. The only other visible difference from the Metro model that I can see is the headlights are a different style (bulb instead of cartridge).

- My Eternal Metro is a 1995 and this is a 1995. Draw your own correlations.

- This particular Swift has a very healthy engine. I believe it had some major rework in its day, and has a Geo engine now that I'm guessing was very youthful, since it performs far better than expected for the 148,000 miles on the odometer that the body has endured.

- The hatchback design makes this car like a little pickup truck. With the back seat folded down, you can fit so much back there. I have hauled two bicycles at a time, a drum kit, lumber, camping gear, etc. with ease. Even if you don't buy this little car, I highly recommend compact hatchbacks as the cheaper alternative to station wagons! It also comes with a bike rack that you should leave on there, as it is always handy, for more than just bikes but mostly for bikes. There is a stout piece of bamboo to help hold the hatch open under the weight of the rack.

- I'm not sure if a similar test is required in your county (I think not for Bellingham), but it passed California's scrutinous smog check just last year.

- And most awesome is the one-of-a-kind work of art painted on the driver door. A heart and a black phoebe catching a flying insect.

Now let's talk about the aforementioned inconveniences that make this a $350 car and not a $1000 car:

- The radio doesn't work. It did recently but now it doesn't and it's not the fuse. Maybe you can work some electrical magic or get a little boom box. The cigarette lighter power socket works fine.

- Some body damage to the hood and driver door, plus quite a conspicuous black blemish on the passenger side. But the hood latches tightly and stays fastly shut.

- The automatic transmission must be controlled manually. This car has an automatic transmission, but the switch that tells the transmission what gear the shifter is in is moody. It kept blowing its fuse, which consequently also serves the turn signals, so I cut it out of the circuit to protect the turn signals. The result is that you have to manually shift through the three gears (L-2-D) as needed. You can think of it as a clutchless transmission with the joy of a stick shift. It really has become more enjoyable to drive. I prefer stick shifts and didn't care for driving this car until The Transmission Transformation. I drive all other automatics like this now, too. It's just so much more satisfying to decide when to shift gears, and I get better gas mileage that way. If you don't drive stick this is a great trainer! You'll learn to feel for when to switch gears without simultaneously stressing about getting the feel of the clutch down. The transmission itself, by the way, seems to be in excellent mechanical shape.

- The push-away-from-you position of the highbeams switch that leaves them on is nonresponsive, so they only work in the pull-toward-you quick flash position. We made a little block of foam that you place there so they stay on just fine and turn signaling isn't inhibited by the block.

Basically, I'm a thrifty mechanical engineer with few luxury requirements so all my caretaking of this car has been focused on keeping the mechanics running well.

So how about it? Is this the car for you? If so, get in touch soon! (We are Simon and Wendy.) We'll need the car until the morning of the 17th or 18th of July. You can take the keys, send us off with our first few weeks of food money, and watch us cycle off over the horizon.

Or, if you want to buy the car for $250:

Our friend Stefan from the Southern Hemisphere is joining us for the jaunt on Highway 20 over the Cascades. We still haven't worked out how he's going to get back to the Seattle-Tacoma airport, since there doesn't appear to be public transportation along that route. If he makes it to Omak, he can get a bus from there.

If you offer to come in your new car (or any car for that matter, or a motorcycle) to pick up Stefan behind the mountains and deliver him to Omak or back to anywhere along the Sound on the 21st or 22nd, you can have her for $250.