You know how sometimes that little voice says no?
My litle voice was nagging at me to say no at $1500 for this ZJ.
Rustys 5.5" Lift, 17" Alloys, 5.2L Auto, 249 Case...

But then seller says how about $1000 I need to get the wife a car to drive and she doesn't want to drive this...

Well I was going to go see it, and guess who decided to visit the Area due to tornados last week... Yep Obama, anytime the President goes anyplace they shut down freeways etc, so the evening I was going to look at it I could not get down there for grid lock. So I took the fellow at his word, and its 90% what he said it was.
Interior in good shape, body pretty fair, drivers door droops and doesn't shut. But he told me that.
He even delivered it 100 miles for free. Couldn't drive it for a death wobble he said, needs bushings, well I was thinking trackbar from my previous years owning XJ's. Been there and done that right. More than once.
He shows up at noon today and everything appears good, starts moves, so far so good all the oem suspension parts in the back, but I neglected to look for the front shaft, he told me it was out...
I plan on doing a NP242 transfer case swap anyway. So an XJ front shaft will work I hope.
Okay time to run it down the road, sputter, pop goes the weasel, I think we have a fuel filter partially plugged or a fuel pressure regulator issue.
The A/C blows warm, and the fuel gauge starts off at 1/4 or so but then drops to E and the light comes on.

The engine is nice and clean for 230k miles and not completely unmolested, but workable and no knocks, rattles or smoke. Just a fuel issue.

If you look closer you will see the detent cable plastic clip is broke, how you do that I do not know.
Looks almost Black but its a bluish purple color. I told kids it gets named Barney.
Typical clear coat peel on the hood. But I love the height and stance...

So stay tuned as I work out issues and and then upgrades...

Future plans,
Transfer Case swap, NP242 since i have one already,
Would like to go to some sort of e-locker front and rear,
Not sure how much larger I can go on tires, 265/70R17's on it now.
But would like to go with a mud tire....
Fix A/C and paint it.

 

Yeah, you've got yourself a project but a good base to work with. It does look pretty, doesn't it? My 97 ZJ was a siren that sucked me right in so I was blinded to her faults enough to sink almost $5K into her before the "frame" broke. Jeeps can be money pits just like boats, lol.

 

Still a good price worth that in parts good starting point good luck