why so many price threads?

[arcteryx]

Probably opening a can of worms but here goes.....

These threads are not tech and are very subjective, which locale plays a large part. If you look on the first page, there are 4-5 threads all the time. What a waste of space IMO. All other series forums don't have this type of "noise". Don't get me wrong, I am all for people getting into a cruiser, but the "hey, what is it worth" or "is this a good buy" is not a question that can be answered without opinion. I'd much rather read and answer a "how do I replace my rotor" or "what does the VSC light mean" or "I am getting a vibration at 45-50, what could it be?"

Do we need to set up an "Newbie/Price chat" section like other forums have done and leave this section to tech? 99% of these can be answered with a FAQ thread IF the people would read it. It's starting to get old seeing these and clutters up the meaningful Q&A in the tech section. My fear is that it becomes a place where the regulars do not ever post there because they feel how I do.

I am open to suggestions on how to minimize these and make this a better place. I just want to see less price opinion threads.

ccing @woody

 

[DFXR]

There used to be a single, very active thread dedicated to "what's it worth?"... but something happened to it and I can't remember what. It had the positive effect of consolidating all of the questions and opinions into one thread that stayed on the first page just by virtue of activity. But there were apparently some negatives too... and I can't remember that part either. I may be getting old.

 

[SmoothLC]

100 Series Buying / Selling Thread

 

[ton504]

I was wondering the same but didn't want to start s*** with the new guys looking to join the 100 crew lol

 

[jLB]

It would be nice if most of the pre-purchase questions were consolidated into a single thread.

Which might reduce the number of repetitive threads.

Such as:

"Is this a good deal?"

"What should I look for in a 100 series?"

"Is this too much rust?"

"I found my dream car. It has no service records, it has only been in 3 accidents, is covered in rust, has 500K miles and has a salvage title, but it is cheap. Should I buy it?"​

 

[PabloCruise]

I would be nice if most of the pre-purchase questions were consolidated into a single thread.

Which might reduce the number of repetitive threads.

Such as:

"Is this a good deal?"

"What should I look for in a 100 series?"

"Is this too much rust?"

"I found my dream car. It has no service records, it has only been in 3 accidents, is covered in rust, has 500K miles and has a salvage title, but it is cheap. Should I buy it?"​

And of course the famous "do these pants make my ass look fat?"

 

[e9999]

Yes, it's very repetitive. No, it's not very interesting technically.
Yet, hopefully we also don't forget that before some of us learned a teeny bit about cruisers -some of you a lot-, well we didn't know anything about them, and the main and most important issue was to buy the first one, which likely generated some trepidation and anxiety, and the urge to ask those questions. And if somebody hasn't been much on the site yet, well, then it's not quite as repetitive to them, I guess... And the patience of the "old-timers" with newbie questions is surely appreciated by the latter. Maybe that's why some ex-newbies are willing to help the new newbies...
Not to mention that we don't actually have to open that thread, right? Easy to skip what you are not interested in, no? Does it use that much real estate on your screen that it's so objectionable if it helps somebody get into a 100? Snapshot: as of this instant, there are 2 such threads out of 20 on my screen. So not rare. But not overwhelming the forum either perhaps.
Personally, I can live with a few questions like that every so often- especially remembering that I asked them too, but I'm open to suggestions for a better system.
So, the question may be what is the best format to use, while maintaining a sense of community. Do we want a thread where only people asking questions go and nobody goes there to answer them? Probably not. Are more "personalized" individual threads with a catchy title more likely to elicit good response? Maybe, maybe not. Is a single thread the solution? Let's hear your opinions.

 

[YotaTrail]

Hey guys I'm looking at an 06 lc with 50k miles. Does 18k sound fair ?

 

[bwell]

x2 @arcteryx I would say it is due too 85% of the current active posters wanting to dump the equivalent of what they paid for their 100 in bolt on's to drive to the mall, rather than a lot of the ingenuity and individualism you get with the older series vehicle crowd so to speak. But hey, I'm just a cheap skate with a welder and plasma cutter who built my own sliders and winch bracket for half of what most pay for a set of sliders, and I even re-packed my front hubs last night in two hours.

 

[arcteryx]

@e9999 valid points. I welcome newbies and their questions, just not the "is this a good deal?" threads. I have my prefs setup to alert me of new threads in this section, partially because I can see if someone posts something I may be interested in, partially if I can assist/help. So I see all of them. I am guessing you probably do as well being a mod here. Yes I can choose to ignore them and for the most part I do. I just posed the question to see if there was a solution to this.

I don't think a new sub-section is the answer as the only people who would go there are the new newbies and ex-new newbies (love those terms!). Perhaps we can have a sticky for a Buyers Guide? I have seen those on other forums before and they have been helpful.

Or the mods like yourself can move these threads to Chat since it isn't tech? But then that becomes more work for the mods. And it could detract from community, so that's not a great solution either. I wish I had a better answer/suggestion.

As I mentioned, other sections don't seem to have this issue nearly as much and there is much more tech in there. Perhaps the audience here isn't as much of a DIYer and more of a "lets throw money at whatever to make my truck the coolest/baddest/hippest/toughest one around"? That would be an interesting poll- how many wrench on their truck and to what level.

 

[onemanarmy]

60 series forum is the same

all forums, on all subject matters, have the same amount of useless threads and people who just discovered the internet yesterday.

gotta take the good with the bad.

Was reading a thread last week where a guy specifically stated he wanted a FJ60, and he had some guy pushing his 62 on him (and saying it was a 60, when he clearly had no idea there was a difference between a 60/62). Just a total waste of time.

 

[Trunk Monkey]

For awhile they got moved to classifieds and people complained that there was no visibility there. Then they got deleted with the suggestion that they price shop the classifieds here for comparisons. Then, we had a big sticky thread that they all got lumped into and people complained that it was jumbled and they couldn't follow posts or see when someone responded to them (every hear of @?).

You could say the same thing about tire threads, there's one or two new tire threads every day that have nothing to do with the 100 specifically, but that's where they get posted.

 

[cap80]

I heard opinions on this matter vary widely by region. Opinions from the east coast and mid west should be avoided because no matter how good they look they are always rusty and hard to work on, opinions from the PNW are way overpriced and the only place to get opinions is the SW or California cuz they look new and you can get $.04 of opinion for $.02 but then you have to ship it.........

BTW what tires will look best on my new opinion? Do these tundra rims fit it? And those rubber accordion boot looking things on my opinion are leaking. Is there any info here on that?

 

[Sandroad]

I appreciate the 100 series newcomer questions, even if not technically tech. I also appreciate the great job the mods do with winnowing out chat from experienced users. In addition to the valuable tech info, this forum plays a crucial role in encouraging folks to get into the 100s. I know it did for me and I’m not far off from being a newbie. It’s also pretty cool there is so much interest in buying vehicles that are now 9-18 years old. And, those finding this forum and asking the 100 series newcomer questions are more likely than not to use their vehicles in interesting ways. I find the questions about condition important and I say “bring ‘em on”, even if the answer is to just point out the forum FAQs. On the other hand, most asking price questions simply want reassurance they are not paying too much for an “old truck with lots of miles”. Answering those can bring new folks to the forum and their new ideas are essential to the discussions that go on here. If others are bothered by price questions, that is one specific topic that could be moved to it’s own sticky. The Subaru Outback forum I’m active on does this and it’s very helpful to new and experienced users alike. The sticky thread on that forum is called “New Buyer Research”. It might help to have one on this forum titled something like that, or perhaps “Price Research”, right up front and not buried in the FAQs.

 

[spaber05]

As a newbie (hopefully soon to be ex-new newbie) I can say that as someone who was familiar with the do's/dont's of car forums, I found it relatively easy to search around here and find answers to most everything I needed.

That being said, people that are new to these vehicles may not be all the familiar with the code of conduct here (i.e. search a LOT before asking a question) and as a result, feel the need to post up their specific problem/question that could easily be answered. I do see that if someone starts an introductory thread that there will usually be a "read up on the FAQ's" post which is always good advise.

More specifically, the "is this LC worth it..." threads are helpful in some cases but utterly redundant in others (the latter could be people simply searching for reassurance on what they already know is a good purchase). But there will always be that one person that thinks something is a good price and then a few of us on the boards here come along, notice something that they don't in the listing, and save that person from a huge headache.

I think consolidating would be a good idea (the Subaru forums had a "Newbie/FAQ" section) and then all potential owners could ask their questions there with the regulars chiming in with sage advice every so often.

However, I'm still a newbie so.....

 

[murf]

With a culture of instant gratification with the minimum amount of excersion (search), are you suprised? Also I would suspect it might also be a way for newbies to more comfortably "break" into the forum and start thier introduction under the guise of the above?

Overall MUD is a pretty healthy place vs. most other forums - gotta take the inconvienent along with the good stuff imo. The forum community will allow the interesting threads to thrive and the not-so-interesting ones to quickly pass to page three. If there are alot of responses then the community has spoken as a whole on the interest in that particular topic?

 

[PabloCruise]

Yes, it's very repetitive. No, it's not very interesting technically.
Yet, hopefully we also don't forget that before some of us learned a teeny bit about cruisers -some of you a lot-, well we didn't know anything about them, and the main and most important issue was to buy the first one, which likely generated some trepidation and anxiety, and the urge to ask those questions. And if somebody hasn't been much on the site yet, well, then it's not quite as repetitive to them, I guess... And the patience of the "old-timers" with newbie questions is surely appreciated by the latter. Maybe that's why some ex-newbies are willing to help the new newbies...
Not to mention that we don't actually have to open that thread, right? Easy to skip what you are not interested in, no? Does it use that much real estate on your screen that it's so objectionable if it helps somebody get into a 100? Snapshot: as of this instant, there are 2 such threads out of 20 on my screen. So not rare. But not overwhelming the forum either perhaps.
Personally, I can live with a few questions like that every so often- especially remembering that I asked them too, but I'm open to suggestions for a better system.
So, the question may be what is the best format to use, while maintaining a sense of community. Do we want a thread where only people asking questions go and nobody goes there to answer them? Probably not. Are more "personalized" individual threads with a catchy title more likely to elicit good response? Maybe, maybe not. Is a single thread the solution? Let's hear your opinions.

I can see where these threads are of questionable value. I will say that, for me, these threads were very useful when I was on the verge of pulling the trigger on a LX. This was not a planned addition to the family garage. Some unfortunate individual totaled my beloved DD, and we had to make some decisions. These threads helped me understand that there is not a surplus of 100/470s out there, and a lot of them have high miles. I had some concerns about pricing for a 16 year old vehicle.
These threads helped!

 

[Clunky]

I can see how the price of a vehicle doesn't really fit in a tech forum. On the other hand, price discovery around maintenance items, mods, parts, labor, etc. are quite helpful for consumers of these items. That might not be as popular among vendors who contribute greatly to the community here, but I agree that participation in a given thread is a good market-based solution to monitoring what is/isn't a good topic.

 

[PabloCruise]

In the 55 forum, there are lots of questions about value, and it helps people out who are wanting to get into Pigs. I myself bought one that was too far gone, just b/c I had to have one.
These 100/470s are a little different than the 40s and 60s in that they will likely see more DD use, and more use by a non-wheeling spouse. So I think it makes sense that the threads in the 100 section are a little different flavor than the 40/55 and 60 sections...

 

[SNLC]

80% of these kind of threads can be answered by the person posting the thread if they have a basic understanding of cars/trucks in general. Rust, mileage, leaks, ect ect ect are things that apply to any vehicle a person buys and are not specific to a Land Cruiser.

The other 20% relates to Cruisers directly like timing belts, trans, ect ect ect.

The rust threads really get me....I mean for crying out loud, people don't know what rusty steel looks like!? People don't understand how rust works and how it gets worse? I am dumbfounded by some of the rust threads.....


Cheers