Good point. In my experience, I’ve found far more room to negotiate on a used car.

Yep. Several of my racing buddies from back in the early ‘90s switched to MTB. Our saying at the time was “more likely to get hurt, less likely to get dead”. 20 years later I’m still racing cross country MTB (will be pack meat Cat 1 next season) and most of my body is still intact.

My local shop had a Cooper S on the lift and I noticed there’s a friggin’ fan underneath and behind the engine pointed upwards. The guys told me something about it being a bandaid to keep the power steering pump cool(ish). They didn’t have many positive things to say about Minis...

Yeah but you did it. So many people come up with excuses not to. Many stars to you.

My brother-in-law, the wonderful market timer that he is, sold his ‘88 911 Turbo for ~$37k 3-4 years ago. He had owned is since 1995 or so and it had 60k(ish) miles on it IIRC. It had some nice upgrades (I don’t think this is such a no-no in the Porsche world) like a bigger turbo, gigantic intercooler, and some minor…

I’ve heard this more than once. My banker friend’s UK buddies all have beaters to drive around in locally because vandalism.

The first time my dad, a long-time owner of boring cars (save for a ‘64 Mustang in his youth), drove my 2 year old E36 M3 he went a little nuts. “This thing is amazing. I’ve never driven anything like it.” “They call that steering feel dad.”

So much this. There are so many cheap fun used cars out there. Alternately, there are so many boring cheap transportation appliances that would allow a more expensive fun car.

You can easily tow a kart in a small landscape trailer with a Miata. I don't know that I'd do multi-state runs with it but if your track is local...

Hah. It was a Volt. Oil change every two years whether it needs it (based on gas engine usage) or not!

Thanks. It’s fun here. Nice people. I think I’ll stay.

Well, it does include new trim.

I had the exact same experience with my Volt a few years back. I can’t remember the details but the service manager delivered the news of some trivial expense as if reporting a dead loved one. I guess people get really worked up when Every. Single. Thing. is not covered by Warranty.

A colleague with a Lexus brought it in for a low tire warning light. Helped himself to a sandwich and coffee, promptly spilled the coffee in the car, then got out and asked them to clean it up! They did! “Yes sir, Mr. S. Sorry for the inconvenience.”

A friend is a Service Manager at the local BMW dealer. These people are the bane of his existence. The sales guys are more than happy to put anyone into the "best" version, then he gets to explain what's normal about an ///M car to an irritated wealthy customer who thinks his car is broken. The E60 M5 with SMG was a…

I can’t figure out if this reporting is just lazy or deliberately misleading. Tesla’s gross margin was 23.9% on automotive sales.

I was careful to say “just culture”. :) Culture may be a component but my daughter manages to have little interest in dolls (temporary exceptions were made for Elsa, Anna, and Maleficent) no matter now big the display is at Toys R Us or what her classmates do. Her imaginary world is her gazillion stuffed animals.

My dad fixed all our cars, did he ONCE take me to the garage to show me how? Was there ever anything in my formative years that encouraged me to like or even be interested in cars? Nope.

Aluminum block engines too. :)

I own an maintain an ‘00 XJR, ‘04 V70R, ‘01 360, and an FFR cobra that I also built. Maybe I’m just not a car enthusiast because I looked at SLs of this generation (the price point was so tempting) and came up with “NFW”. They’re just not interesting enough to put up with the hassle.