After an overhaul in 1989, the Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera continued to be one of Oldsmobile’s most in-demand models, with strong sales right through its 1996 discontinuation. The 1991 model was the last Cutlass Ciera to feature three body styles, coupe, sedan, and Cruiser wagon. Today, we’re taking a look at a high-condition 1991 Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera SL four-door sedan that’s currently listed for sale.
Posted for sale at a dealership in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, this ’91 Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera looks to be near-pristine, has just 33,000 miles on its odometer, and is otherwise clean and original.
The exterior is finished in a sleek coat of light metallic blue paint, set off by a contrasting stripe of narrow, horizontal black trim running around the whole circumference of the vehicle. This Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera rides on a set of 14-inch silver rollers with a highly detailed pattern of holes and spokes providing visual interest.
In the interior, slate blue cloth upholstery complements the light blue metallic exterior. The front seat features a split bench seat with separate headrests and a rear bench set with lap belts. The front seats feature shoulder harness seat belts mounted to the door rather than the B-pillar, a feature introduced in 1990.
The 1991 Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera model year introduces several updates not found in earlier Cutlass Ciera models. These include a remote lock fob, a six-speaker sound system, and a refreshed instrument cluster including a temperature gauge for the engine and a trip odometer. This particular sedan includes air conditioning, a cassette player, and an AM/FM radio.
This light blue 1991 Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera is motivated by the naturally aspirated 3.3L V6 LG7 gasoline engine developing 160 horsepower and 185 pound-feet of torque. An automatic transmission performs cog swaps and delivers power to the pavement via a front-wheel drivetrain.
With only slightly more than 30,000 miles on it and its paintwork and interior crisp and fresh, this 1991 Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera is a time capsule of a generation-ago bestseller. The dealership has this particular Cutlass Ciera listed with a price of $8,999.
So, dear reader, what do you think about this? Is this price a fair one for a clean and well-kept low mileage 1991 Oldsmobile Cutlass Sierra SL? Be sure to share your thoughts with us in the comments section below!
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Comments
Ridiculous price. And, I’d rather have a slightly older model with the flush headlight front end but the old back end. Make it a coupe with floor shift while you’re at it. (Just saw one in this configuration for sale in the past few days. If it wasn’t days away, I’d have it already.)
Thank you for bringing these older vehicles for sale to GMA. I always enjoy reading about them.
To ask, as you normally do, if the car is worth the price allows a lot of room for what any one person sees as a deal or not. To most, they would never pay anything close to 9 grand for this car. But for others, it’s not just a 1991 Olds Ciera. For me, I try to look at these from the view of what do I get in today’s market for 9 grand? Not much. Yet there are a lot of newer vehicles that you can buy in that 7 to 12 grand range. Sure the miles will be higher and condition probably not nearly as good. So why pay this kind of money for tis car?
You pay it for the memories. For the condition/miles. Maybe even for the future collectable factor?? No matter why, someone will buy it, the main thing that comes back for me is that you just can’t buy cars like this any more. Say what you will, but the seats and column shifter in this makes it great. The ride and comfort and economy is very good. It’s just a really difficult car to beat, and for that reason I say it’s a good price.
Dan B – you hit the nail on the head! “It’s just a really difficult car to beat, & for that reason I say it’s a good price”. This car brings back lots of good memories, has mostly bulletproof reliability, and the condition w/ low documented miles makes it a decent buy in my opinion too.
One of GM’s better sedans back in the 80’s. Was a very popular car, a bit too popular for the GM pricing structure. It was performing in the market where Chevrolet should have been dominating.
I had a 1984 Ciera and it was so good that I kept it for 26 years and 126,000 miles. Then I sold it to my neighbor. It had a 3.0L V6 and cloth interior with bench seats. It even had a digital clock (actually a clock using time wheels showing white digits on a black background with illumination). The trunk was huge!
love it, wished it was closer to me in Tennessee/Mississippi….looks like a great keeper would take it in a minute!
Sadly, this and the rest of GMs mid-sized cars of this era lagged far behind Honda Accord and Toyota Camry in so many ways. I remember a neighbor of mine who rented a 1990 Ciera on business. He was shocked at the out of date interior and features. The tidal wave of imports that took so much market share from Detroit was well underway.
Sorry Rick. These cars were very good at almost everything. They weren’t perfect and there was room for making them better. However, I sold the Century next to the Accord from 1988 to 1995 and there’s zero way I’d take the Accord after driving them back to back. When I first started at that dealership, I knew little about Buick and I really liked the Honda line. My best buddy drove an Accord. But then I was around them daily and saw first hand the issues they had. The 4 cyl and automatic Honda’s would shake so badly at a stop light (when in gear) that you could hardly hold onto the steering wheel! The Century was more quiet, smoother and rode nicer. After so many years around those brands, I left that dealership not caring for the Honda’s and had a greater admiration for Buick.
I know I’m talking about Buick (Century) here, but it’s the same car as this Ciera.
Glad you liked those GM cars but as time told the story, Honda and Toyota took over the mid-sized car market because they built better cars the vadt majority of customers liked. They were not perfect but beat GM in every quality ranking….KBB, J D Power, Consumer Reports etc. Even I, a loyal GM customer, fled after 20 years because of 3 troublesome GM products in a row. GM now has less than 17% of the retail US market. I hope Detroit can recover but the current UAW strike is not helping. An EV price war is coming. Detroit will be the high cost producer.
Rick: Like I said, I started in sales with Buick, Cadillac, GMC and Honda back in 1988. KBB was barely a thing and nobody used them. Everyone knows CR is still and always has been import leaning. JD Power is still and has been the best source of quality reporting from the owners. Even back in the late 80’s the Buick was ranking quite highly and often times better than the two Japanese brands you speak so highly about. So excuse me for looking at your comments and seeing exactly what I’ve dealt with for so many years: People who feel the need to defend their decision to buy those brands. But don’t try to blow smoke up my behind because I’ve been on the front lines and saw daily what Honda was like. I have a buddy who’s been at a Toyota store for more than 30 years now, and he’s filled me in plenty of times about the many issues Toyota has. No vehicles are perfect and never have been. But to argue that the Century, Ciera, Celebrity and 6000 were lesser cars than the Accord/Camry is silly at best.
No smoke needed, plenty already up there. I’ll go with the American buyers who made Honda and Toyota successful at the expense of Detroit and especially GM. Today Accord and Camry dominate US car sales and imports sell huge numbers of SUVs. No Need to defend buying one. No vehicle is perfect but Detroit lost the quality battle with imports. Neither Honda or Toyota have declared bankruptcy. Detroit market share is at all time lows because they failed customers. Buy what you want and love it, it is a free country. I have a Tesla, Honda Pilot, a RAM 1500. All good vehicles so far. I left GM after 3 poor vehicles in a row.
To this day Japanese cars benefit from that bulletproof reputation. Malibu has great exterior design and handling but that interior is gastly when compared with rivals.
I’m about to buy a Malibu but GM needs to leapfrog rivals giving Buick interiors to all models. Buick isn’t really luxury and could fo well competing against regular brands
What a beauty, when the GM OKC plant was at it’s best. In the mid 80’s six plants built the four different divisions of the midsize car. The Ford Taurus came out I 1985 and GM had more competition than before. In1989 the ten year old OKC factory built all four “A” cars, Chevy Celebrity, Pontiac 6000, Olds Ciera and Buick Century. We had numerous customers send in sun visor surveys, mentioning how much they enjoyed their car and they bought another. Many were loyal World War 2 veterans, they preferred another updated model because of reliability. It had a long life 1982-1996 model years. In 1992 the OKC GM factory was the first GM plant to win the JD Powers Gold Award for best factory in North America beating out Toyota. By the mid 1990’s the Honda Accord and Toyota Camry had cut into the domestic midsize market. OKC built about 5 million sedans before transitioning to SUV’s in 2002. GM closed the 26 year old factory unexpectedly in 2006 after spending almost a billion retooling the plant and adding a new paint shop like the newer Lansing Grand River factory.
By 1990/91 this model Ciera which first introduced back in the mid 80’s was a bit out of date in comparison to then current Japanese and European models. Goes to show how Roger Smith wasted a decade at GM.
Good comment Evo.
The Ciera, Celebrity, Century and 6000 were all based on the aging A Body platform which was intro’d 10 years earlier and had only a couple of more years to run. As you said, the features and design looked old and dated because it was. It wasn’t competitive with the more efficient, better quality and more up-to-date design and feature set from the Japanese products. In it’s day (mid-80’s) it was a pretty good vehicle however.
GM knew that so the A Body was being phased out gradually about this time and being replaced by the W Platform (aka GM10): Cutlass Supreme, Lumina, Grand Prix, Century/Regal. That platform was about a 1/2 segment larger and was deemed a “high midsize” but many buyers particularly on the coasts weren’t looking for a larger, heavier car. They were still more interested in the more package efficient, high quality execution that the Japanese products offered. The decline of GM’s bread and butter midsize sales in the late 80’s and 90’s reflected that.
BTW the the existence of the compact Cutlass Calais the “low midsize” Cutlass Ciera and the “high midsize” Cutlass Supreme on the showroom floor at the same time caused major customer confusion and essentially destroyed the Cutlass brand. A truly awful strategy.
Exactly. GM could not compete in quality builds. Their marketing strategy was even worse. The RWD Cutlass Supreme was a last hurrah for GM mid-sized cars when Oldsmobile sold a million total cars in one year in 1987. GM thought they had found the stairway to heaven. It was merely a blip before the highway to hell.
I have a 83 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme 4 door Brougham. 52××× on the dash. I love this car. She floats on the highway
i had a 89 Buick Century and a 91 Oldsmobile, one with the 4 cylinder and one with the v-6, were absolutely great cars; little dated even for the time but were so dependable and maintanance free that they were hard to beat; wished that one was closer….
You would have to be a crack dealer to pay 9k. for this. Grandma passed and they probably paid 2k to someone who wanted nothing to do with it. I pitty the fool who buys a car from this dealer they are loaded with 4 to 5k cars they are trying to get 8 to 9k for.
These GM mid-sized were everywhere. I preferred the rwd Cutlass . I could see one of them going for $10k.
Easy 25k w/33k miles and w/buckets/floor shift
This is a nice example but these vehicles were not better than the Camrys and Accords of the time. I would consider it as still part of the malaise era. Detroit never could compete on quality only on price. I remember back in those days they would discount and offer all kinds of incentives to lure potential buyers. I’ve owned many GM vehicles and still drive one but if I’m being honest the imports still beat them on fit, finish, and quality.
These were and are decent cars; very popular in the 90’s but as mentioned in a few of the other comments, you can find newer cars than this for that price range. It’s not a Delta 88 or 98 Regency so imo it’s overpriced by 1500-2000. Not saying someone won’t pay close to asking just saying a little overpriced. Beautiful car in almost new condition…good luck with the sale.
I had the same color Ciera with the same alloy wheels, blue interior, door panels and dash. It was a 1993 with the 3300 and 3 speed automatic and was a bulletproof car that took me all over the place in better simpler times. When it was time for tires Pep Boys usually had specials for 199 to 249 bucks. When it came time for shocks at 110K miles at the rear they were under 10 bucks a piece. Oil could be had from the dollar store for a quart and the average repair such as the exhaust was usually well under 200 bucks the few times they were needed. In many ways I wish cars were this simple and honest these days.
I own a 1993 cutless Cierra. I drove it every day. It had 74000. I’m loving it.?
That car wasn’t even worth 9k when it was new. These cars were junk that were riddled with problems because they had one of the worst motors gm ever made.
They had several engines, so that’s a goofy comment. This 3300 V6 was excellent, smooth and powerful and reliable.
I owed one 1994. When I sold it, the odometer read arround 600,000 kms and practically no problems. One of the most reliable cars I ever had.