sold my 2011 gun metallic 370Z
by Kenny
07/29/2015
It wasn't difficult to say goodbye to my 370Z. I had it posted up on Craigslist for a week and got a few bites. But rather than continue to deal with lowballers, flakes, and Nigerian Princes, I drove my Z to Carmax and sold it to them. After it was finalized, I walked down the street to a bar, ordered a beer, and requested an Uber.
Since the start of 2015, I drove my Z only 2,207 miles. I recently took a job further from my home and the commute is over an hour each way. As fun as the Z was to drive, it didn't get me to work any quicker than say a Prius or Civic would. The Z fast became a money pit in terms of fuel, insurance, and maintenance costs.
I owned my Z for a little over 4 & 1/2 years, 1667 days to be exact. The OTD price I paid for my Z was $34,000; I sold it for $18,000. So to me, $16,000 over 4 & 1/2 years was the cost of ownership. The final odometer reading was 57,795 miles when I signed over the title. My Z had 18 miles when I purchased it, so 57,777 miles were all mine to claim. Most of those miles came from commuting. I went on two long road trips with my Z, once to Phoenix and once to San Francisco. When I bought it, I imagined driving my Z all over the country, but that never happened.
Over the course of ownership, I kept a pretty detailed spreadsheet of fuel costs that I'd like to share. In the 4 & 1/2 years of owning a 370Z in Los Angeles, the average price I paid per gallon of 91 octane gasoline was $4.04. According to my data, since Jan 1, 2011 to July 15, 2015, the price of one gallon of premium gasoline has roughly stayed the same, believe it or not.
The average amount of gasoline per fill-up came out to be 16.8 gallons. So the average total price I paid per fill-up was about $67.82. I was getting about 364 miles out of my Z in between fill-ups. My average self calculated mpg was 21.5 mpg and it was determined by dividing miles driven divided by gallons filled up. The average Z calculated mpg came out to be 21.6 mpg. The best mpg I achieved was 24.5 and I got that last November when I returning from San Francisco, which was also the furtherest I've driven in my Z. The worse was 17.8 mpg. I was averaging 10.3 days of driving in between fill-ups. During the course of ownership, I spent a total of $10,783.28 on fuel alone, give or take. The fuel cost to drive my Z one mile came out to be $0.19 per mile.
The Z was nice and the ladies dug it. Coming from a 240SX, the Z was the ultimate sports car to me. It handled well and left a smile on my face. When I parked it, I always glanced at it as I walked away. The best compliment I ever received was when a valet pulled my Z up to the front of a comedy club and a cute girl walked up to it and said, “oh look, they brought me my car.”
The Z did disappoint me in a few aspects. When I drove it hard in the canyons, I discovered the oil overheating issue. The car went into safe mode and it really killed my confidence in it. After installing a Stillen 25-row oil cooler, that corrected the problem but it still bothered me. The compactness of the Z was nice at first, but after the honeymoon period wore off, I felt cramped in it. Transporting my mountain bike became a laborious chore and the front lip hit everything. Every time I backed the Z up, I said a little prayer and hoped I didn’t run anyone over. Also, that little lag when I got on the throttle bugged me.
With all the factors considered, the Z wasn’t the car for me anymore. I drive a Honda Civic now. When I’m at work and a careless person accidentally dings my door, I don’t get too upset. When that happened to my Z, I would rage for days. The Civic loves 87 octane gasoline and gets over 30+ mpg. The Z would have a fit with anything less than 91 octane and would laugh at mpg. As for insurance costs goes, well, let’s just say I don’t have to pay for full coverage anymore. In terms of the fun-to-drive aspect of a car, the Z is a rockstar. To make up for the loss of a fun-to-drive car, I bought a Honda CBR600RR. After riding a motorcycle, the thrill of driving a car disappeared. To me, the motorcycle is more fun to drive than any car. Maybe someday down the line I’ll get another sports car. Maybe.
So thanks for having me 370Z forum. This place has been pretty cool. I’ve met some cool folks when I did go to the meets.
