Brown death is part of it, but mostly it's everything else it needs. I only paid $350 for it and planned to do rust repair on it myself as I want to teach myself body work and painting. What killed it for me was realizing it needs both front wheel bearings, all tie rods, shocks / struts all around. I would have easily another $600 or so in parts just to make it a good driver, just not worth it for a rotted pile haha!
Paid $250 for the Century and the body is very clean with some minor surface rust underneath and just a little rot on the passenger rocker, well worth fixing up I think.
I just don't want to drive my 3/4 ton diesel in winter again. Big tunes with built trans, bigger injectors and more boost makes for hard starts when it gets crazy cold and smoking out the parking lot at work for a bit, not so much fun!