Parts car?
 

As many of you may know, I have a 1.6 miata. I found someone who is selling a 1996 1.8 m-edition miata. The car runs and drives fine, just doesn't have brakes. He wants to sell it for $1,000. It has a soft top that is riped to shreds and he owes almost $1,000 on registration fees. I have been talking with him for some time now and have been able to get him down to $500. Does anyone here think it would be a good idea to buy the miata for the parts (i.e. stripe it down completely) and sell the shell to a junkyard? I plan to turbo my miata later down the road and would need to upgrade my brakes, diff and driveshaft at very least which would cost me more than this one would cost. He has the title and proof of ownership so I wouldn't need to worry about the $1,000 in fees he racked up.

Buy car. Put brakes on it. Sell your car. Build new car instead.

Yeah that could also work just as well. The other miatas brake master cylinder went out so not a huge issue to fix.

Fixed.

If the 1.8 is just a question of replacing the brake master, why doesn't the owner repair?

The $1000 worth of registration fees would be bigger concern. Isn't Cali strict about shit like that?

Because he owes $1,000 on back fees and for California he can't renew or do anything except pay the fees.

Yes Cali is strict about that. But I'm a military member and my home of record is Washington so I don't need to register a car here. I can register it in Washington. They don't care if a car has fees from another state as long as the title isn't damaged.

Then buy the 96. Fix it. Drive it. Sell 1.6 and prosper. Or swap the 96 roller skate to 1.6 car, so long term don't have as much emissions problems long term if you move to other states and such.

That that is why I'm thinking of fixing the 1.8 and swapping over my hardtop, fenders and bumpers. My 1.6 is painted the way I want it and the fenders on a 1.8 are a little dinged up.

Are you not even able to perform repairs on a registration-fees-owed car in Kalifornia?

You can work on cars if they require work or maintenance, but they cannot be driven on public roads. The current owner of the car lives in a busy city, so even if he gets the work done on it that he needs it will still cost him the 1k before he can get a 1 day moving pass to take it to get smog tested. If it doesn't pass smog he will get a 30 day pass. The car needs a new top, along with some minor work making the cost of repairs almost as much as it cost to be registered.