Welcome to CEG!
If the car has had regular maintenance (timely oil changes, etc.) done, and has not been unreasonably thrashed-upon, it should last a
long time. I have over 130,000 miles on my '98 Contour, I just hit 240,000 miles on my '87 Escort today, and my '82 Escort (which has subframe damage from an accident, and hasn't been driven for a few years) has 372,000 miles on it. The only major maintenance repairs I have done were to the '82 Escort when, at around 250,000 miles, second gear went out in the transmission. I replaced it and the clutch at the same time. It was still the original clutch too, despite its starting out life as a rental car, and despite its delivering a whole lotta of pizzas with me! Otherwise, most of the repairs have just been alternators, water pumps, timing belts, and the occasional performance mods like headers, a hotter camshaft, throttle body mods, suspension upgrades, etc.
Additionally, my Contour and the '82 Escort have been to several performance driving schools at Portland International Raceway, and the '87 Escort has slid around its fair share of logging roads on the way to and from working SCCA pro-rally stages.
So it's not like any of them have exactly had an easy life!
See if the owner has maintenance records, and get it checked out by a good mechanic to see if there are any hidden mechanical problems, or if it was in a severe accident or something. I've never had one run, but I think a CarFax report would tell you if it has ever been in an accident that was reported to the insurance company and/or police.
Also, be sure to check out the
FAQ section where there is a list of common problems with the Contour, to see if any of them may apply to the car you're looking at.
I hope you get a good one!
Marty
