Used Car of the Day: 1998 Volvo S70 T5

by Tim Healey

Published: June 24th, 2024

Today we give you what could be a sneaky fun Swede -- this 1998 Volvo S70 T5 with a manual.

I almost didn't share this car because of the photos available -- they aren't great -- but the description intrigues.

The seller has owned this thing for 16 years and it appears to be in good shape despite having over 262K miles on it.

It has a performance ECU but otherwise I don't see much in the way of mods. The manual is factory, not a mod, and the A/C appears to work well.

There are some issues -- the car needs new rear control-arm bushings and the dash rattles. There is also some rust and rock chips.

If you'd like to see this car, click here. The asking price is $4,500 for this Pennsylvania-based ride.

[Images: Seller]

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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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2 of 15 comments

Ras815 on Jun 26, 2024
The 850/S70 can be a great daily driver, but like many imports of that era - you've got to be comfortable doing most repairs yourself, otherwise you're going to easily pay much more than the car is worth in keeping it going. And there's a long list of regular (but not difficult) maintenance for these like the PCV system, tie rods, etc that can quickly add up at shop labor rates. With this mileage, it should be $2k, $2.5k max.

2 Reply
EAM3 on Jun 26, 2024
We had 2 S70s, both GLT models though. They were fantastic cars, comfortable, great on gas, quick and did everything well. We trade one in on an S60 T5 (finally got a T5!) and it felt more advanced than the S70 but not as well screwed together. Kept that one for another 12 years.

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