before passat, I had a ford Mustang, it's a 9 years old with 90K miles for $900. drove two years. donate and got aprox 500 tax return. it's a good deal for me.
the Sentra was bought at 3rd month when I was in US too.
sounds like transmission fluid leaking is common issue on Sentra.
I was told in autoshop, the trans fluid tank was empty when it's died. shoot!