2004 with bad transmission

Hello, Im talking to a friend about buying his 2004 tacoma 4x4 off road v6 manual. Said the transmission needs replaced but drives fine just won't go into 4th gear, and grinds on deceleration. I live about 2 hours away so its a bit of a pain to go test drive. Just looking for some incite on what my options are. Does everything need to be replaced or just the internal gears? Can i get some numbers on how much a new (refurbished) transmission would be with labor, as well as just replacing internals. The truck is selling for $3,500 is in kinda rough cosmetic condition as well, worth it?

 

Post some pics 2 door,4 door ext cab,miles?

 

Its a 2 door ex cab, 160K miles

 

Rebuilt from Marlin is about $2000.

https://www.marlincrawler.com/transmission/rebuilt-complete/r150f

 

Also forgot to mention I've found used transmissions for $500 here that are in perfect working order. This will be a purely flip truck, if i can get it for 3k and put 3k into it it should be a 8k truck all day maybe more.

 

My guess you’ll come out even after the transmission swap,unless the body is tits,don’t see it going for more the $6500,unless it’s show room conditions.

 

The not going into 4th could be the shifter bushing, but the grinds sound suspicious. I bought a trans w/ transfer case for $500.

 

Transmission swap would be easy and cheap if you can do the work.
04 TRD OR with 160k even with some body work is still worth $8k. If you get body straight probably $9-9.5
I'd just do the trans clean it up and sell it easy $6500