Used Car of the Day: 1997 Land Rover Defender

Tim Healey
by Tim Healey

If a left-hand-drive diesel Land Rover is your kind of thing, check out this listing.


Coming to us from Miami, this 110 five-door 300tdi has a five-speed manual and appears to be in good enough condition to drive daily.

The listing is a bit sparse, so you might have to do some digging to find out more, but based on the pics, the Defender mostly looks good, though there does appear to be some rust.


[Images: Seller]

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Tim Healey
Tim Healey

Tim Healey grew up around the auto-parts business and has always had a love for cars — his parents joke his first word was “‘Vette”. Despite this, he wanted to pursue a career in sports writing but he ended up falling semi-accidentally into the automotive-journalism industry, first at Consumer Guide Automotive and later at Web2Carz.com. He also worked as an industry analyst at Mintel Group and freelanced for About.com, CarFax, Vehix.com, High Gear Media, Torque News, FutureCar.com, Cars.com, among others, and of course Vertical Scope sites such as AutoGuide.com, Off-Road.com, and HybridCars.com. He’s an urbanite and as such, doesn’t need a daily driver, but if he had one, it would be compact, sporty, and have a manual transmission.

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3 of 13 comments
  • Arthur Dailey Arthur Dailey on Dec 14, 2022

    Let me just set this money on fire.

    • Add Lightness Add Lightness on Dec 14, 2022

      Way cheaper fashion statement than a new Jeep and relatively minor depreciation.


  • MaintenanceCosts MaintenanceCosts on Dec 14, 2022

    The styling of an early-industrial-age machine tool, the reliability of a low-bid contractor, the power of a trained squirrel, the handling of a Roman ox cart, the fuel economy of a natural gas flare, and the comfort of a jail cot? Sign me up!

  • Mike Beranek While the product may appear to be "better", only time will tell. The American automotive environment can chew a car up and spit it out. Will these Chinese EVs survive like a quarter-century old Cavalier, or will they turn out like VinFast's "cars"?
  • Mike Beranek This police vehicle will be perfect for when the State of Florida starts tracking every pregnancy.
  • Dave M. The Highlander hybrid, a larger, heavier vehicle, gets better mpgs. Why? Also, missed opportunity - if Toyota had made this a hatchback, they could have scooped up the "want a Tesla S but not ready for a full EV" crowd, however small or large they may be....
  • TheMrFreeze Difficult call...the more the mainstream automakers discontinue their more affordable models and only sell crazy overpriced EVs and trucks, the more appealing the idea of letting in cheap imported cars becomes with the buying public. If the government is going to impose tariffs on Chinese vehicles, at the same time they need to be getting with the Big 3 and telling them to fill the void with affordable models and not use the tariff as an excuse to simply raise prices. Otherwise, public pressure could see the tariffs withdrawn.I seem to recall the last administration put a 25% tariff on Chinese steel, at which point the US manufacturers immediately used the opportunity to raise their prices 25%...that needs to not happen.
  • Daniel J The real problem I see is it's about 8K too much. I'd prefer a lower trim but they don't offer enough HP for my tastes.
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