International 500c price

I am looking at buying a IH 500C. Shows 1300 hours on it. Comes with a 6 way blade and rippers. Starts right up but has a small water leak along the casing below the head (could be welded shut or JB pretty easily, leak is pretty small). The guy is asking $4500 for it and says he negotiable. I can't find any ads or prices on this dozer. Did some research and sounds like the torque converters are a main problem with them. Curious is anyone can give me a educated ball park figure of what it would be worth. Do not want to get ripped off and it seems to be a decent asking price from what I can tell. Don't plan on doing heavy work with it, minor grading, removing small 10 acres orchard type stuff. Any help or advice would be great!

I know someone who has one, and I believe he had a hard time finding undercarriage parts twenty years ago.
Check into it before you buy.

that sounds like a decent price--20 years ago i paid 4000 FOR MINE---COUPLE OF YEARS AGO i LOOKED AT ONE FOR MY BROTHER AND IT WAS $6700
never had a problem with my torque converter--the weak point was the dog clutch off the front pulley that drove the hydraulic clutch--had to replace the dogs 3 times

Well 50 year old crawler with 1300 hours is hard to find. That being said the only thing food about the 500 crawler was they were better than the t340 which they replaced. My father was a ih dealer in that times and those little crawlers were fine for a fellow who was going to spread loose stone on us leveling a little land but if they were put to real work parts stated flying. Your deal will go like this (or at least this is my experience after 70 years) You buy it for the $4500 get it home it needs a battery, a few hoses, and things say you spend a thousand the first month then something like the fan comes off the water pump gets the radiator, OK just another 4 or 5 hundred. Three months latter it needs another mid price repair like 6 or 7 hundred. Now we have $6500 or so in the crawler. Then the engine or a final drive goes, you either have to spend another 2500 to 3,000 . Or you can just have a 6500 dollar yard ornament or you have invested clos to 9 grand in a unit that will do very little work. Take part of you $4500 go rent you a skid steer for the week end and see what you can get done. Or take the $4500 wrap it around a rock and toss it. At least that is all you will loose. Forty year old dozer is just a money pit. Hope I am not too hard on you but I have see it time and time again..

(quoted from post at 18:58:24 01/04/17) that sounds like a decent price--20 years ago i paid 4000 FOR MINE---COUPLE OF YEARS AGO i LOOKED AT ONE FOR MY BROTHER AND IT WAS $6700
never had a problem with my torque converter--the weak point was the dog clutch off the front pulley that drove the hydraulic clutch--had to replace the dogs 3 times

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How often do you use it? Sounds like you've been somewhat happy with it?

I see what your saying. The guy who is selling it just replaced the water pump and some hoses and did minor repair work. I was hoping this would be a piece I could use to rip up a few tree stumps and small grading. Don't really want to dump a bunch of money into it. But I also have a 1960 D2 Cat w/out a blade and it's been decent with little investment. But a Cat vs IH might be different quality.

Undercarriage for those small dozers is not available anymore so make sure all the components are usable. These are wear items and make up 50% of repair costs on a dozer besides not being available.
Dennis