Mostly idle curiosity here. Middle class folks should be able to afford an exotic if they have their life and finances in the right way. It's more than a financial planner might budget for a midsize sedan, but seeing the number of party barges, motorhomes, pools and Harleys in suburbia, it's probably just as reasonable to think one could find a 911, R8, or Ferrari.
Maintaining and insuring such a car are their own challenges.
Has anyone done this?
How many children do you have?
I heard on the radio that there is no more middle class. Maybe your a 1%er
My 911 is 23 years old so I'm not sure if this is really what you're talking about but......it's cheaper than buying pretty much anything new. It was a couple thousand more than my Mazda2 and insurance is about $200 more a year. You do need to budget for maintenance and have some sort of savings in case a $10k engine problem happens, but if all goes well then it's quite easy. The only problem you might run into is financing. I try to only pay for things like this with cash so I don't know how easy it is to get money for them if you don't.
trucke wrote: How many children do you have?
Zip. Zilch. Nada.
Well, I think we're middle class or what's left of it.
I'm currently looking for a 911 (most likely a 996) and could possibly afford an entry level Ferrari, an Elise or if I shop carefully an NSX. Older 911s especially aren't that hard to maintain either so if you can afford a $20k-$30k Camry and are handy, you can probably afford to run a 911.
Mind you, we have no kids so I can blow the cats' college fund on a car.
Heck, I used to own a 911 and an Elise at the same time, but that was before I came to the US - the prices for used cars in the UK are much lower than over here.
I meet this criteria but not really. Not sure what to say. I have no kids and the girlfriend doesn't care what I do with cars. I work lots of overtime and have a budget for everything.
I also dont have the internet at home or TV. I dont spend money on useless stuff so i can have a larger car budget.
The Ferrari sort of doesn't count but I've have done other exotic ish car like this because I've adjusted my life to whats really important to me.
crankwalk wrote: I meet this criteria but not really. Not sure what to say. I have no kids and the girlfriend doesn't care what I do with cars. I work lots of overtime and have a budget for everything. I also dont have the internet at home or TV. I dont spend money on useless stuff so i can have a larger car budget. The Ferrari sort of doesn't count but I've have done other exotic ish car like this because I've adjusted my life to whats really important to me.
All good points.
Whoa. STI Ferrari.
Yeah, go for it.
mazdeuce wrote: My 911 is 23 years old so I'm not sure if this is really what you're talking about but......it's cheaper than buying pretty much anything new. It was a couple thousand more than my Mazda2 and insurance is about $200 more a year. You do need to budget for maintenance and have some sort of savings in case a $10k engine problem happens, but if all goes well then it's quite easy. The only problem you might run into is financing. I try to only pay for things like this with cash so I don't know how easy it is to get money for them if you don't.
I think that's part of his point. Even the avg middle class person, thanks to the desire to live in huge houses and such, don't likely have $20k in expendable cash lying around.
I have a C5, my friend has a Lotus Elise. Exotics, even fantastic plastic ones, are well within the realm of a young-30s income.
Well yeah, I could go out tomorrow and buy a C6 Z06 and afford it (as long as I didn't track it regularly), but buying it cash........no.
16v 928?
22 y.o. 944 S2 cab as a DD. My commute is 3 miles roundtrip when I don't bike. Paid cash 3 years ago, and maintain a "fix it fund" for upkeep, and found a great indy shop who knows 944's. Helps that it's been pretty much bulletproof other than regular maintenance (timing belt, water pump, cam chain tensioner pads, etc.). 2 boys, 8 and 5 who I take to the historic sportscar races at VIR - great experiences. Just comes down to the fact I refuse to drive boring cars...
Don't know if it classifies as exotic, but with around 2,000 imported I certainly don't see myself very often.
Honestly, I know I could afford it. We are very sensible about our house and I've got a nice savings built up for the next toy car.
Once I get the current student loan debt paid off, That would more than free up enough money in the budget to afford an exotic or at least an unusual.
I've done it...before I had kids. Had a few C5s, though not sure they'd qualify as exotic. But I also had a FFR Cobra replica, as well as a '99 Viper GTS. Could I do it now if I wanted to max out credit? Probably, but no way on earth I'd even consider it. I'm happily driving my sub-challenge money '90 Miata as my toy now.
Middle class DINKS, already had the vette (still own the bike, not a damn hardly) and selling it.
This should be fun, I think the definition of both middle class and exotic is almost impossible to define. Then throwing a non-definable income status purchasing a non-definable vehicle will blow at least my brains. Fun to think about though.
The first part of the problem is defining middle class. I've never seen a cast iron definition, and the fuzzy ones I've seen you could classify anyone with as a house hold income from mid thirty's to close to two hundred K as middle class. If you accept say $100k as the starting point for upper middle then if you prioritize you can easily afford something with very high performance. It's that prioritization thing that gets you, also a single person or couple with no kids living in the mid-west on that income will have an easy life. A couple with 3-4-5 kids living in NYC, LA, San Fran or many other places will have a hard time on that income.
Next, what's an exotic? I think all the threads over the last few weeks have shown that it's almost impossible to define. Personally I don't consider any of the following as Exotic, even though they are all great sports cars:
911/911S
Boxter
Cayman
Elise
C5/C6/C7 inc ZR1
Borderline exotics I would include:
Most Aston's
R8's
Gallardo's
Base Ferrari's
911 Turbo, GT3, GT2RS
True Exotics:
Aventadore
McLaren
Top line F cars
etc.
From a personal point of view, I earn a lot more than I did in 1996 which is when the C5 Corvette was launched, I was 27/8 at the time and thought it was the coolest car on the planet. I was planning on getting one as a 30th birthday present to myself as a 3rd/4th car toy behind my Mustang, Miata and Econoline. I got married instead and now my priorities rule out even the cheapest C5 under any circumstances, but there are plenty of other things bought and paid for that were not even on my horizon then. My personal hope is that once the youngest starts driving and I can drop the pretense of a 4 seater as a DD I can buy a 5-10 year old Boxter S as my commuter car to replace the C30 that will be 10/11 years old by then.
28 year old Porsches and a race car build hanging around. An F car is on the radar after clearing out a few things.
Some people have a big boat, or play a lot of golf or go to Hawaii every year. If you have the money it's just a matter of what you like to do.
stuart in mn wrote: Some people have a big boat, or play a lot of golf or go to Hawaii every year. If you have the money it's just a matter of what your spouse likes to do.
Fixed it for ya, yeah I'm Bob Costas whipped
i could certianly afford to go buy an f car, say a 308 or 348, but these days i don't want the maintenance costs that go along with them. when i was younger and daily driving alfas and fiats, i would have spent my entire years salary to keep one....now, not so much.
one day i'll get another porsche, but i don't consider those an exotic. fot the same amount of money a 308 would cost, i'd much rather have say a brz or miata and and hang a supercharger on it. same performance and less headaches, at least at lower speeds. and you really don't worry about choosing between a new roof on the house or the next service on the ferrari.
I'd say any Ferrari, even a Magnum PI 308 is an exotic, and those should be in reach of the middle class. As others have stated, its all about priorities. I couldn't afford to buy a 30K used Ferrari with cash, but some might, and others might be willing to do a HELOC or an unsecured loan to do so, and the payments would probably be no worse than an uplevel Camcord. The main issue would be making sure you put aside a bit extra for when the expensive failures start happening, but I doubt it'd be much worse than running an out of warranty late model Audi or BMW at this point.
Adrian_Thompson wrote: If you accept say $100k as the starting point for upper middle...
Not around here! That's entry level middle class at best. Without kids and a reasonable house, a used exotic might be doable, but with the standard McMansion and 2.4 children, no way.
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