>>2790963I'm in a similar situation anon, I'm planning months long road trips to the US where I'll travel across the country to all the beautiful nature so I need something off-road worthy that can still cover long distances without falling apart (I don't care about comfort though, and I'll stick to byways so no crazy speeds). I need to be able to sleep in the back of it too by removing/folding the rear seats. Something very reliable and easily repairable. No bells and whistles. Also a 5k budget, maybe 6/7k if I really need to.
So far I've primarily been looking at 90's and early 2000s Toyotas 4Runner and Tacoma (with a shell). I've also looked at 90s Jeep Cherokee XJ, there seems to be quite a few on the market but I don't know what to think of them, I've heard so many bad things about Jeeps, but according to
>>2791015 the XJs are fine...
I'm a total newbie when it comes to buying a car, what should I be on the lookout for? Rust is an obvious one but beyond that, if I take it for a test drive at various speeds and it runs fine, am I good to go? Even if something fails afterwards it isn't gonna be expensive and hard to fix? What's the worst that could happen to an XJ, the head gasket failing?
Rn I don't know a lot about fixing and maintaining a car but as soon as I pull the trigger on one of these I'll get all the tools, common spare parts and documentation needed and I'll learn.
