Is the 1995 Protege expensive to maintain?

Hi everyone,

I'm looking at a 1995 Mazda Protege with the following specs. I was planning to take it to my garage on Wed. or Thurs. of this week for an inspection. My garage said, "It's a good car, inexpensive to buy, but quite expensive to maintain." He said the parts make it generally not a cheap car, and I'm on quite a tight budget. I'm also considering a

1994 Tercel...less luxurious, apparently needs a half-quart of oil every few months, equally well-maintained (but seems to burn "a little" oil--haha).

Any comments? The Mazda seems very clean, no visible rust underneath, runs well, and the owner seems pretty anal about taking it to the dealer for maintenance (which I don't plan to do). The problems I know about are that the AC compressor has been removed (went out, she said she didn't want to pay $600 for repairs) and the front passenger seat door lock is broken. She's asking $2275, which is the Kelly value for "good," despite the broken lock and dead AC. Should I overlook this? I can deal without AC, but will have to have the lock fixed.

Specs:

1995 Protege DX 113K 1 owner, dealer maintained, records available new exhaust pipe (assume muffler changed as well, but will check) timing belt replaced (will check mileage) tires have 20K miles seems clean, drives well (but I haven't had a chance to take it up to highway speed)

Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

-Denise

P.S. If you reply on the newsgroup, please also send a duplicate to my email address: snipped-for-privacy@NOSPAMaol.com (remove NOSPAM). Thanks.

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dtanyol
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