The current owner is a Mercedes tech and maintenance has been kept up well.
I'll pick it up on Saturday. I'll know more then.

I'm ok with spending money on maintenance and repairs to keep my cars going. I have 40 years of experience with used cars, never bought a new car in my life. Buying used cars I know going in they'll cost more in maintenance. On the other hand depreciation is negligible. Comes down to the least expensive option. Until I started buying Mercedes models 2006 and up. Perhaps I'm just the unluckiest guy but the newer generations are stuffed full of electronics, servos, air struts and other things that do not hold up very well and cause enormous repair bills. And for what?

There is no advantage that I can see to having a shifter lever talk to a computer that talks to another computer and a bunch of servos to put the transmission from P to D. That really isn't a very complicated thing. Am I missing something? The mechanical shifters have worked perfectly fine for decades. They don't have computers that make all 4 wheels of an R350 lock up when they fail (making towing a f@#$ing nightmare) and then cost $1,400 to replace on top of that. Of course, repairs only done at the dealership $160/hour because the replacement computer needs to get matched to the ECM. My usual import car go-to workshop cannot touch it.

There are plenty of other issues I've had with my newer Mercedes vehicles. So my strategy is to go back a decade or two and buy a car that has just the minimum (and beneficial) amount of electronics built into it. I'd rather spend my money on preventative maintenance and repairs than spending it on things that only make dealerships and towing companies happy.

I'm very much looking forward to having a solid Mercedes once again that I expect to cause less trouble if I do my share to keeping it going.

Sorry for the rant! Ask me how I really feel about new-ish cars.....