New owner! Making a Dice Roll on a $1000 '08 Prius!

Hey everyone, call me Dill!

I took a possibly huge risk and bought this Prius at a government auction. Almost scored it for $925 but someone bid me up to $1125 at the last second! Take a look at the auction listing then prepare for my story. I hope it is entertaining!




So let's rewind a bit! My wife does a lot of commuting. We have a 2014 Chevy Spark that we love but it lacks trunk space plus the CVT Jatco transmission is a ticking time bomb ala Nissan. I wanted to find a car that had trunk space with a good fuel economy... Hello Prius! I had been planning on spending maybe 3-5K on an okay Prius we would use as a commuter car.

I occasionally glance at government auctions and happened to spot this Prius. Obviously, the description and the QA section scared me but a few google searches brought me here. I did some research and felt that I could likely get it to drive by holding the shifter into gear. The only way to know was to drive 4 hours from Raleigh, NC to the beautiful mountains and try it out.

So I wake up at 4AM and start out. I arrive at 8 and look at the car. It is exactly as pictured. Cosmetically it's alright. The paint looks rough on the roof and spoiler. Lots of paint chips on the hood and the lower grill is missing a little. The guy comes to give me the key and tells me that it was a well-maintained car and always driven well. They just couldn't get it to drive anymore. Lights on the dash and nothing.

The guy gives me the keys and I go to unlock the trunk. Nothing. I try to unlock the door. Nothing. Guy says "Yeah we had to put the jump box on it to get it in neutral to pull it down here". Hmm... I use the key to get inside the car and it smells very faintly musky. I asked about it and he said he wasn't aware of anything. Floors were dry. I sit in the driver's seat, insert the key, and hit start. Nothing. I then crawl back to the trunk and realize there is no way to open the trunk when the battery is dead (I later found out how) but I knew where the 12v battery was from research so I pulled everything out from inside the car and got to the battery and saw... water? About 5 inches of water! At this point I am thinking... oh no this is NOT good ABORT! So I hop out of the car and tell the guy I may be back later, I needed to do some thinking and I leave.

You see, there was a small detail I left out. This beautiful mountain town had zero cell signal on AT&T. Like, I couldn't even phone a friend for Google help. So I drove to the next town over and got on the internet, found a Walmart, and went in to buy a Jumper box. I had read before that the Prius does crazy things when the 12V battery is low and also had read about how sometimes you need to hook directly to the battery for a jump. They had tried jumping from under the hood. I used the magical internet to find advice here mentioning how common the water leak issue is so I felt better. I did see warnings about how it could also mess with the hybrid battery as well... Armed with my new knowledge and a battery jumper, I went back to the Prius. The guy came back out and I popped the trunk manually (yay) and put my jumper on the 12v battery. Sat in the driver's seat and hit the button with my foot on the brake. Lights! But no ready. Maybe I didn't do it, right? Hit the button again (or maybe two times more?) and the ready light came on and it started! OMG! The look on the guy's face was hilarious as he had said the car had not driven in some time. Looked like the gas was on E and was flashing so I was scared I would run out of gas. I put it in drive and... it stayed! No popping out of gear. Maybe the only issue with the car was when they went to do the listing to sell it, the 12v battery was only alive enough to show lights and not start? But no... there it was... a red triangle and a slew of other lights on. I knew what this meant. I had one shot to drive around and look cool but it would likely not start again. I drove it in a small circle, not enough to test much besides the fact that it moves, and put it in reverse and parked in the same spot. I turned off the car and gave the keys to the guy and headed back home.

Do I bid? The price was at a nice $800 by this point and I felt like maybe I could get a good deal. After all, they said no one had driven to the small town to look at it but myself, and the auction ended the next day. To the rest of the world, this was a blind chance, but I knew that it would at least drive and that alone was worth $1500 to me maybe. I came home and did more research. Ugh, $3000 for a hybrid battery maybe. Wait... No, the price is much lower now. Dealer up the road is $1600, that's good! Then I found a youtube video. from someone named Bekah or something mentioning how to fix a red triangle on a Prius for $5, haha.

Yeah, I was googling how to fix the red triangle without knowing any codes. I left my OBD at home in my haste that morning. But that video showed me something that intrigued me... A water leak... causing an issue which leads to the red triangle... hmm... I recalled when I checked the car a second time and jumped it that water was fully filling and overflowing the driver's side cubby. I recalled feeling water along the trunk towards the hybrid battery from where the overflowing water had tried to escape elsewhere. Could this be it? It's worth a shot. So armed with the new info I placed my bid. I felt confident that 5 minutes before the auction close, I could drop a bid of $1350. If I got it, I got it. If not, oh well.

I won.

I was now the proud owner of an $1125 2008 Prius shrouded in mystery. Maybe I made a mistake, but who knows. This leads me to my current setting. I plan to pick up the car on Friday. My thought process right now is to preemptively go to a Toyota dealer and purchase a new 12v battery, I of course forgot to see what the date was on the old battery and maybe it isn't even bad but just needs jumped and idled a bit. Oh well. I remember a yellow sticker on top and it looked like the true start battery. Maybe it was the original? My second plan was to pop the rubber grommets and drain out all the water, then jack up the front of the car to maybe remove any excess water from the battery area. From there, install the new 12v battery, add a bit of gas and see if it will work for me again. Then take it on a nice drive home or maybe just to the grocery store across the street before towing home on my truck. My hope is that will be the end of my worries. That magically the trunk will dry, all the lights will go away and the car will run beautifully for many more miles. Perhaps I would look in the trunk to find the Hybrid battery was replaced not long ago or some other magical thing. I really don't know what I am getting in to but I intend to come here and fill in everyone on this adventure as it continues.