Miami Cars & Rust

Generally speaking, are cars from this area to be avoided, as they are close to the ocean?

I can't answer Miami in particular, but I have family on the east coast of Florida, in the Port Canaveral area. Seems like there is a significant amount of cars with rust issues right by the coast. I'm not sure how far inland you'd need to go to be "safe".

for a moment I thought this was like a "cars and coffee"

My experience after living here for 20+ years is that they dont rust unless you live on the intracoastal.

I never had rust issues.

I can always tell if a car is local or not by the paint. Faded and peeling but no rust? Local. Good paint but rusty? Tourists. Both? Coastal car. But rust here isn't nearly as bad as midwest rust.

Florida rust is much more common east of the intracoastal, and also tends to go from the top down. Blame the sun (compromises the paint) and torrential rains (washes stuff down to block drainage holes and trap water).

Florida also has far more than its share of transients, esp. Miami area. So if you are looking at cars there, best not to assume you are looking at a "Florida car."

Margie

I grew up in the SoFla. Generally, the rust isn't nearly as bad as the sun damage.