I have a 2001 Mercury Sable but not the wagon - the 4 door sedan. I would
never get another one. We've had to repair to many things and the
interior is cheap IMO (things falling off) That is a lot of miles that one
has on it.

Thanks for being honest, Nikki, thing is, everything I've looked up seems
the opposite to what you've said. Could you give me a few ideas of things
which have fallen off? I didn't play extensively with the inside, but
everything I did use, such as windows, vents, mirrors, behaved as expected
and to be honest, I was astonished at how good the interior condition was.
We're getting a new (to us) car, because we got unlucky with the brand new
car we bought, we're not aware of any other 2006 Passats being returned
under the lemon law, maybe you were unlucky with this one? Anyway, we will
be getting the carfax report, we will take the car to a garage and get an
assessment, our friend is very kindly letting us borrow the car, so we can
thoroughly test drive it and don't have to rent a car whilst we make a
decision. We're also trying to consider carefully what we need out of a car,
we reckon it has to be cost effective for 3 years, we're not looking for a
car that is going to last a decade, the purchase price on this one is low,
lower than the book value, even taking into account the high mileage, so
maintenance would have to be very costly for this not to be the case, though
of course we have to take into account the faff factor! We've pretty much
decided we will not take any kind of loan, so that considerably reduces our
options, and means a private sale is likely to be a better bet for us as we
can do without the dealer mark ups.

Anne