97 986 with 118K miles. Part out or get a new key?

[Rotmilky]

Yea, this is a bit of a strange question I'm asking...and in doing some online searching, seems to be rather unique. I'm either considering parting the car or I'm considering getting a key. Let me explain.

The car is a '97 with 118K miles. It runs well, given the mileage, but you can tell it's had 20 years of use on it. Driver's seat is ripped. At some point in its life, it was resprayed. Whoever did that decided to remove the Porsche emblem and Boxster emblem and then bondo over the holes. So even if I want to replace them, there are no holes to put them in.

I picked it up to be my wife's autocross car a few years back. It's got less power than the 997. So it made it a bit easier on her to get it around the track without the rear end suddenly becoming the front end. Now we've moved to the 2001S for the future season and don't need it anymore. I have a friend who offered me 5K...but his plan is to part it out--with my help. So I'd get a bit of a kickback out of that. However, I told him if I could find someone locally who wanted it as a driver car, I'd rather do that. I just don't like seeing them parted.

In the process of getting it ready to sell (e.g. washing it), I managed to snap the only key I have. It broke off just at the place where the tines enter into the head of the key fob. It's not a remote key -- it's the smaller solid plastic one. So, now I need to order a new key and get it programmed. The nearest dealer is 2 hours away. I think a new key is something like $100 and reprogramming is another $100-200. That's quite an investment on a car that is worth only 5K.

I was wanting to keep it together until I snapped the key. Now I'm thinking part it out is a better option. But, before I did that, I sorta wanted to get a general feel from other 986 enthusiasts. Is there a point in saving a sorta tired '97 or is there more of a demand and need of parts to keep the other ones out there going?