Tompah

Ok took the car for a little drive, didn't want to put the foot down as it's been raining all day and the road are very slick (being auto it's unpredictable). I'm a little weary; the driver has given it a bit of a thrashing but says that he does let it heat up before he puts the boot down and idles the engine for a couple minutes at the end of a ride (ever since he had the first turbo replaced at around 50kkm because it was warped). I also asked on the phone about services and he said it was serviced regularly, however when I asked again in person he said it was serviced "whenever it needed it" and I noticed the service date sticker on the windscreen has been peeled off recently. Is something amiss here or am I being paranoid?

Hey guys, I'm aware there's a thread on what to look out for and I've read through it but I have a couple of questions. I'm going to see a private seller about an '03 model with 120k on the clock; he's only asking $9k for it so I'm inclined to believe he wants rid of it and quick. I know to look out for the trans fluid in the coolant etc. but when I drove past this morning (30mins before I was meant to see the car) they had the car hooked up with jumper cables to their 4wd, so I decided that they were trying to hide something and didn't bother staying to check the car out, but about 10 minutes later I got a message from them saying the battery was stuffed and they were going to replace it so I'd have to come and see it later. This has me hooked back in but I'm sure that there's much more than just the battery being stuffed that could result in a dead battery. What do I look out for? Also, I've never driven a turbo before so I'm not too sure on what to listen out for as tell-tale signs on misuse/lack of maintenance. In case you hadn't noticed, I'm not very mechanically clued but I don't want to get jipped here and end up with a car that'll cost it's price in repairs/replacements.