Used Car of the Day: 2004 Pontiac GTO

Tim Healey
by Tim Healey

The mid-Aughts Pontiac GTO was a pretty fun car even in stock form -- I drove more than a few during my time as a front-desk service grunt at a BPG dealer -- and today we feature a modified 2004 Pontiac GTO that's presumably even more fun, thanks to modifications.


The mods include a Whitehall strut tower brace, upgraded bushings, Lovell springs, Pedders shocks and struts, 3.91 Aussie gears with Eaton Truetrac LSD, black racing wheels, window tint, Halo headlights, NGK spark plugs, and racing ignition coils.

Oh, and a K&N cold-air intake and ported throttle body, "Cheatr" camshaft, and a new built transmission, among other things.

Click here to check out this car -- the sale price is $13,000.

[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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6 of 24 comments
  • Alan Alan on Sep 21, 2023

    In Australia only hairdressers would buy this Monaro as its known as. Real men had 4 door sedans and well hung men drive 4x4 dual cab utes with bullbars and towbars. I personally think this is butt ugly. Later iterations of the Commodore were far better looking.

  • Kendahl Kendahl on Sep 22, 2023

    Fifteen years ago, the GTO was on my short list of automotive retirement presents to myself. It was just a bit too big and gas mileage sucked compared to the 6-speed Infiniti G37S coupe I bought after test driving several brands. It's a pity owners of cars that are collectible the day they are bought screw them up with aftermarket modifications they don't need. I'd offer they seller top price less what it would cost to put the car back to stock. (I just traded in the Infiniti, in mechanically excellent and cosmetically very good condition with 78k miles, for a 2023 Cadillac CT4-V Blackwing.)

    • See 1 previous
    • Golden2husky Golden2husky on Sep 22, 2023

      ....aftermarket modifications they don't need...


      Well, that's like telling a pickup driver that they have too much capability that will never be used...a full diaper will soon need changing. But in all seriousness, in their eyes they needed it. Or just wanted it. Which is ok. Really.

  • ToolGuy TG Synopsis, from memory (do you trust my memory?): • First time Consumer Reports has published a used car ranking. • Primarily reliability based. • Based on reader surveys (TG note: selection bias, other issues). • 5- to 10-year old models (TG note: Chickens - my current fleet ranges from 11 to 29). • Summarized by brand but as Alex Knizek notes you have to drill down to model to get anything meaningful. (TG has told you this for years.) • Their 'Top Picks' for used vehicles (largely glossed over in the podcast) are questionable, to me. • Consumer Reports believes that anyone who buys used vehicles is buying used vehicles to save money and I don't necessarily agree with that. Is saving money the reason I watch old movies?
  • Namesakeone As several have stated above, this looks painfully like what Jack Welch did at General Electric: reward the top 20% and fire the bottom 10%. The short-term shareholders benefitted--and they made sure Welch himself benefitted (he died a billionaire), while just about everyone else suffered--the American middle class lost an estimated 100,000 jobs directly over Welch's tenure (and many more from other companies who mimicked what Welch did), and GE--for various reasons--is nowhere near the company it was before the Welch era.
  • Adam Bernstein Any 2018/22 Honda Accord 2.0T (though the Hybrid Sport variant would be a CLOSE runner-up) Best combination of style, performance, comfort, MPGs, carrying capacity, and reliability - all key ingredients for a successful road trip. And of course having a good crew makes for good times! 
  • RHD Define "best". Most likely to be reliable? Then definitely Lexus and Toyota, and you can add Scion to that list. Duesenbergs are probably very good, since any that still exist have probably been carefully restored down to the last washer, and would be in extraordinarily excellent condition. But this is another definition of "best". If "best" is highest profit margin for the dealership, then any heap at a BHPH in a bad part of town would qualify. My guess is the first paragraph of this comment is the correct answer to the question.
  • Lou_BC I'd like an F350 Lariet Tremor with a slide-in adventure camper with a receiver motorcycle bike rack. I always wanted to drive or ride to Tuktoyaktuk on the Arctic Ocean. It's mostly gravel roads.
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