What happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object? Friction? The sort of cacophonic bang you’d hear in a 1920s films? An irreparable social rift? Sometimes, it’s just constant bickering about a lump of late-aughts plastic. The Dodge Avenger has done some funny things to the house of The Autopian as of late, specifically that low-mileage 2008 Dodge Avenger SE up for auction on Bring A Trailer.
On the one side, those of us who think the Avenger is an abominable POS. On the other, those who, um, like the Dodge Avenger. Look, it doesn’t take much searching to find out which side of the line I stand on, but my coworkers are more divided than a house that cannot stand. Intriguingly, David was the first one on the anti-Avenger side to fire a salvo.
From there, the pile-on continued. After all, why shouldn’t it? That awful grey steering wheel makes a great punching bag.
Of course, not all of us are on the same page here.
Particularly Gossin, who has recent firsthand experience with a final-gen Sebring.
To be fair, the Avenger takes may require a little clarification, in the case of David’s. If your choice is between a Dodge Avenger and walking, door cards made of stinging nettles sounds preferable to blisters.
You know what? Jason’s right here. The Bring A Trailer Dodge Avenger is nigh-on useless. Oh, and Steve had a negative experience with an Avenger that involved temporary sun blindness, so you can probably work out what camp he’s in.
Unfortunately, any attempts to bring up the Avenger result in some, um, behavior. Today, while discussing what Tales From The Slack should be about, Gossin used rationalization, and Mercedes took a different approach.
Well, now that’s an impressive threat of self-sabotage. So, will Mercedes buy an Avenger? I guess we’ll just have to wait and see. In the meantime, the Dodge Avenger should probably go on the list of banned topics in The Autopian Slack, like “Two Girls, One Cup” or whether or not a vanilla bean latte is a type of soup. Who knew that such mediocrity could cause such a divide?
A can can fill a necessary role (cheap, reliable transportation) and still be bad.
See also: my nemesis, the Nissan Altima. I wouldn’t call the Altima reliable, but it’s at least been a car, sometimes, when it works, at an accessible price point.
I want to see the discussion on the vanilla bean latte…
THIS IS A BLOG
you are poo pooing on this car, yet fetishing over the Dacia Sandero. Neither of them have any redeeming qualities besides being cheap transportation.
based on the battery location, it’s a bad car
One can be “pro car” without pretending that every car is good. You’re not going to lose some “true car guy cred” points by saying “this sucks” because you can love the concept of something while recognizing that certain examples are simply not goo. In fact, I’d argue that a somewhat critical eye is necessary in order to hold a truly “pro car” outlook.
Think of it like being a teacher or a coach. Certainly in such a position, you want the best for your students/athletes. Pointing out weaknesses isn’t cruel — it’s how people learn, grow, and improve.
Now, there’s no improving this specific car. Cars aren’t like people that way. But by being critical of its shortcomings, we can advocate for better cars in the future — learn from your mistakes and don’t make the same mistake twice. Improving the overall state of the car landscape is certainly more “pro car” than a circle jerk where everyone says: “Ackshully, that terrible car is good!”
Welcome to the 2014 Chevy Citation.
This is a rear wheel drive sedan that somebody put a front wheel drive drivetrain in. Even if it didn’t have its era’s Chrysler build quality, this isn’t a very difficult decision.
Whether it’s bad or not has nothing to do with whether it’s a good deal, of course. It can always be garbage and still be the best garbage in its price range.
If this BAT Avenger sells for $3k you can daily it as it will never sell for more than on BAT. Are you worried a $3k purchased car will lose value? Yeah Mercedes likes it, that is what we love about her Gambler cars. It is like DT and his mostly rust free jeeps that are 90% rust. People who have BAT money can buy a $3k pos and gambler 500 or just launch it into the air.
As others have mentioned, this car will potentially be a future Cars and Coffee favorite because one of these in mint condition will be such a rarity because near zero survived. It’s like when Mr. Regular did the RCR video on the Plymouth Horizon.
That’s about the only interesting thing: It’s a time capsule you’d never expect to find.
Though I can’t imagine what someone’s life must’ve been like for them to look at a Dodge Avenger in 2023 and go, “Yes, I’ll spend $17,000 on that.”
Is BaT just accepting anything at this point? They wouldn’t take my ’69 Saab Sonett V4 that while not completely back together, had a documented *$30K+* spent on it’s restoration by the previous owner – I had ALL the invoices. He died, a friend bought it from the widow, I bought it from my friend and never had time to deal with it. Rebuilt and upgraded motor, perfect paint and body, perfect shiny chassis. Just needed the motor run in and the interior finished. But nope, they weren’t interested. Yet they list this rental-grade turd???
I ended up selling the Sonett for $10K to a guy who shipped it back to Sweden.
I missed this conversation in the Slack, but my two cents worth: this is a car for those whom life shits on from a great hieght. Regularly. A car so utter devoid of any redeeming quality it only exists because it must, to give balance to the good things in the automotive universe.
A lot has been made about the fact that this Avenger is on BaT. Just because it’s on BaT doesn’t mean that it’s going to go for some ridiculous price. There are plenty of cars that go for relatively low prices on the site. Speaking as the owner of a roundly unloved by the collector community 1988 Jaguar XJ6 who would love to see his car go up in value, you only need to look at the auction history to see how well that plan has been going…
As for worst car of 2008, it’s not even the worst product of that year from that manufacturer. I’d rather have the Avenger than a Dodge Nitro or Jeep Compass, and I hated the Nissan Versa (at least with the auto) of that era so much I’d pick virtually anything else.
If someone wants this for the ironic enjoyment of owning the best Avenger around I say let them have their fun.
10x on the Nitro and Compass. No way the Avenger was the unequivocal worst car, but it was definitely among the worst.
Other than the meh looks and boring gray interior, what’s so wrong about these? I mean mechanically are they really that terrible?
Clearly, not an enthusiast vehicle, but other than that it seems to be a normal, average nondescript commuter car.
I grew up in Eastern Bloc shitboxes in terrible condition and I always have a hard time believing when people tell me that an Altima or an Avenger or Caliber is so terrible.
You have valid points. To most people, a car is just something that allows them to do the things they need and want to.
And context counts a lot: I drove horrible shitboxes for years—but they pale in shityness next to your experience.
As they say, your mileage may vary-widely 🙂
It’s boring and not particularly reliable or long-lasting. Certainly better than any of the Eastern Block cars of old in every possible way – but that is a HELL of a low standard. I owned a Trabant for summer in Hungary and got to drive most of them while I was there, so speaking from some experience as well. At least the Commie Cars were entertaining – this is NOT.
There is just no reason to buy one of these over any of the Japanese or Korean options. They simply are not enough cheaper and nowhere near as good over the long haul. I say that from personal experience, my kid brother had a Caliber which is most of the same bits in a different shell, and it was a completely unreliable build quality disaster. At least these avoided the CVT, as ancient as that 4spd slushbox is, it’s better than that.
Pentastar 3.6 failures are a known quantity. Experienced mechanics will always advise customers to steer clear of them, because previous owners that weren’t meticulous result in you inheriting the problems that will arise from deferred maintenance.
Biggest issues are rocker arm and oil pump failures, but they generally have oiling issues which coupled with neglectful owners, often results in sludge-related failures.
They’re not the worst engine, but considering how often many car owners kick the can down the road, they end up problematic because of deferred maintenance. There are many engines that cope much better with shirked maintenance. Same for the transmission — it’s fine, but without fluid changes, it becomes problematic much faster than other transmissions from other manufacturers.
A lot of, “Toyota reliability” isn’t just that they’re more reliable when well maintained, but they still hold up very well when they aren’t, and tend to fail progressively.
Awful car at any price. How they sold any of these outside of rental fleets boggles the mind. Seeing a Dart, Avenger, Nitro, or Journey on the road always gives me a sense of wonder, where did this person’s life go so wrong?
A reminder of the existence of “Two Girls, One Cup” is definitely an unappreciated addition to this Tales from the Slack installment.
Anyway, the Avenger is irredeemable. If I had a friend going through a hard patch financially, i would never recommend an Avenger. Tight finances are already stressful enough, and the mental anguish of interacting with an Avenger would not help.
In order to achieve redemption, a vehicle must have redeeming qualities. An Avenger does not. What the Avenger fails to understand is that a mainstream commuter can be an absolute miserable shitbox to drive…if it gets great fuel economy. This is what redeems the Geo Metro, and what incriminates the Avenger.
Agreed, never wanted to think about the cup incident EVER. Forgetting that will be the only redeeming quality of Alzheimer’s.
For context about my top speed run: The speedometer stops at 120 mph, but I was using one of those GPS speed apps on my phone.
Look, I was a dumb teenager, and the app happened to record the fastest speed achieved with the app open. I would go a speed and then show it off to my friends, who would then also download the app and see the fastest speed they could set. I was surprised when the rental Avenger hit 120 mph and then just kept accelerating. I’m not sure if these cars are supposed to have limiters, but if they do, the one in my car wasn’t doing a good job. lol
It’s OK, we’re not here to judge. An important part of driving a new-to-you car is to figure out its limits, and that includes the speed governed. Ya know, just in case. For safety.
I got a rental Corolla up to 100mph before backing off because it was vibrating like it was possessed and trying to crossover from the underworld. I wasn’t a dumb teenager though, I was in my late 20s.
Here’s a listing for a $9k 08 Avenger SE. If the BaT auction ends below this, and I think it will, it should be a pretty decent deal
https://www.cars.com/vehicledetail/2b5eea2c-c70f-4a6b-8cbb-db724e3e1196/
Yeah, I already felt like it was a weird line in the sand to think this was BaT losing its/their mind(s). If it goes for a relatively reasonable price, it might mark one of the more sane BaT auctions to get any attention in recent memory.
The Avenger was definitely a terrible new car, because you spent new-car money on what is effectively depression on wheels. That interior in particular is miserable (I’m going off my experience in the Caliber because they look so similar inside). But if you could snag a low mileage one for a decent price, in this car market? You could probably do worse. If the one on BaT sells for $5k or less I’d say it’s not a terrible car. Great for a new driver–who gives a fuck if they put a couple dents in it and never clean the interior? Most teenagers are just happy to have a car, I remember friends being thrilled about old Luminas, Tauruses, Buicks and Sunfires handed down to them from parents and grandparents.
It’s bad, very bad. If you had a choice new, you almost couldn’t make a worse one. I think even an Altima was better.
It falls in, for me, the same bucket as a Nissan Altima.
Fleet? Rental? Low-Credit? Banged up in the parking lot by an owner who clearly doesn’t care? Raced from light-to-light by someone with more anger issues than you believe could ever have? Driven by grandma or grandpa who just wanted to have a car? The answer is yes to all of those.
Yes its bad, if you want reliable transportation for someone in a budget, buy a 90s Toyota. This with the Chrysler Sebring / Jeep Compass/Patriot / Dodge Caliber are the era of bad cars from Chrysler, bad transmissions and anemic engines, you see more Chevy Malibus or Ford Fusion driving around in Michigan, the hell for cars.
I remember the rental Dodge Avenger I got once and how awful it bounced from the back.
I suppose this Avenger, at a minimum, has a novel exterior design. It doesn’t look like anything else. Does it happen to also, look like crap? Yes. But at least it’s unique crap?
Outside of that, I really think you need to spend some time inside one of these before you can claim to stand up for it as a car in general. I really can’t explain how bad they are. The powertrain is shit; it isn’t economical, it isn’t fast, it has serious NVH issues. It was seriously uncompetitive back in 2007, and was hilariously uncompetitive by the time it was discontinued. The interior is one of the worst of all time, and no, it’s not “hardwearing decent quality, well put together plastic panels”. I had those in my SX4. These are poorly finished, poorly assembled, hard as hell plastics from a company on the verge of bankruptcy. The designers certainly didn’t bring any personality to the interior, it really is as bleak and sad as it is in pictures. And when those panels start to rattle (they do) whooooo boy is it a bad place to be.
We don’t need to get into reliability as a lot of Chrysler’s bad reputation comes directly from this generation of vehicles. Well, and a lot of the other generations of vehicles too, lol. I only know one person to own one, and he called it “the worst decision I’ve made in my entire life”. I mean, small sample size, but that’s the most severe response to ownership of a mid-size commuter car I’ve ever heard.
For the record, I love some reallllly crappy cars. Especially crap that has personality, or thoughtful design baked into it’s crappiness. It really doesn’t take much. But the Avenger is a bridge too far for me.
I took one apart, put it back together and think it’s a fine cheap car for any budget-conscious driver today.
Far better than many other cars Ive owned.
Here’s my take, since I was too busy at my day job to chime in before. A Dodge Avenger with 200,000 well-earned miles, whose owner has photos of it in all the cool places it’s been (Pikes Peak, the PCH, Key West, etc) is the coolest car in the world, way cooler than some pampered supercar that has never seen the right-hand side of its tachometer.
A pristine, low-mile Dodge Avenger? Not a collector’s item. But it’s a nice practically new car for cheap, just begging to be driven to all those cool places.
In short, stop worrying so much about what you drive, and just go DRIVE.
But you have to sit inside of a car to drive it. Have you seen the interior?
Jason is correct though. This car is only “worth” anything because of the low miles, and even then it’s easy to nitpick. The tires are 15 years old, so it’s not like you can even say it was well cared for. It’s just an old car that someone forgot about. There’s probably a just as old, just as equally forgotten about Avenger sitting in a parking garage or rental lot somewhere with even lower miles and just as old tires
Well, now I think someone should buy an Avenger and take it through a coffee shop drive-through for a cup of delicious vanilla bean bisque or soup (if it’s a chowder, you should probably ask them to remake it).
Unpopular opinion, it reminds me of the charger or a smaller 300