I have about 200,000 miles in the Crown Vics, 1992-2000 police cars, and just bought my 04 marquis. They are smooth cars that get good gas mileage for their size and V8 engines. The 4.6 is absolutely bullet proof given good maintenance and is a fantastic smooth runner. The early ones (92-94) tended to smoke a little with high miles, but they got it right in later years. My Marquis cost me $8400 with 40K miles, it has leather, power everything, power lumbar, etc, gets 26mpg on the highway and is one of the more comfortable rides there is. It is very easy to find a babied low mileage example (median age of new buyer...retired). You really can't do better for the money in my opinion. If you want to improve them there is good aftermarket support (mustang cams, P71 brakes,P71 swaybars, marauder airboxes, etc). Parts are very cheap and very prevalent. I dig em.