mauromora

Good afternoon. I have the opportunity of buying a 2009 GL550 with 129.000 miles on it. According to Carfax all the maintenance has been done at dealers and the last one was at 117K miles. The car has been in Texas and Florida so I don't think there will be rust problems but I'm afraid about engine longevity and about electronics after so much mileage not year. I would appreciate your advise on whether or not buying this car that seems to be in very good cosmetic condition at least and with new suspension work. Thanks in advance.

BlownV8

Depends on the price but I wouldn't be scared of the mileage. It's not even broken in yet.

mauromora

Thanks for your reply. I think I can get it for around $19k and it's has a lot of factory options.

BlownV8

I haven't priced them so I have no idea if that's a good deal or not. Check autotrader.com and see if that's what they are going for and use it to negotiate a good deal.

EWT

I've got an 08 GL550 closing in on 160K miles. It has actually been more reliable after 100K miles than it was before. It is using some oil now (qt. per ~3K miles), but it otherwise runs pretty much like it did when it was new and the interior has held up amazingly well for a vehicle of that age/mileage. It isn't a cheap car to own with the cost of air suspension parts that wear out and oddball size tires that are expensive to replace. Ordinary consumables like filters and brake pads are reasonable though, and the misc. parts I've had to replace weren't bad either. I recently somehow damaged a wheel speed sensor while replacing a shock, and an exact match of the OEM part replacement was $75 from Amazon. We've thought about replacing it with something newer, but have hung onto it since we still like it quite a bit, and $0 monthly payment is hard to beat.

mauromora

Thanks for your encouraging response. Yes I think that these cars become more reliable after 100K maybe by that time everything prone to failure has been replaced. Is hard to get a car with such amenities and capacity for the current selling price. I guess with good maintenance the engine will last maybe 250K. May I ask at what mileage did you start noticing the extra oil consumption? Does it produce blue smoke or is just oil lowering but no smoke? Thanks again. God bless you.

BlownV8

The engine should last to over 400k miles with proper maintenance.

alx

I see zero problems owning said vehicle. They have some child ilnesses that when addressed reliability goes up significantly despite higher mileage.

mauromora

Thanks to all for your support and advice. I will decide this week. God bless you all.