High Performance Beasts That Are Now Surprisingly Affordable

The used car market in America is interesting. And by that I mean predictable in an unpredictable way. And by that I mean utterly confusing and frustrating to those who have any sort of involvement with it on a semi-regular basis. Are you following me? No? Good, then you can sympathise with those who overpaid for specialty cars then got hosed a few years later when their resale value tanked. Or you can celebrate with those who bought a second-hand Subaru 10 years ago and just sold it for a profit.

Among this insanity is a crop of supercars that, for whatever reason, didn’t hold their value. I’m not going to say there’s an affordable Lamborghini Gallardo in your future, nor am I going to convince anyone that reliable supercars can be bought for pennies on the dollar, because we all know how such relationships turn out.

But there are a few tantalising supercars that can be bought quite reasonably, and in some cases, very reasonably. You probably won’t get a warranty, and there’s always the high maintenance costs to consider. But could such things be negated by the rush of owning a legitimate supercar? That’s for you to decide. I’m just the messenger…

Ferrari 456

Let’s jump right into the insanity with a relatively affordable Ferrari, which in this case means about $65,000. Not cheap, but before you sign that loan contract for a new BMW 5-series, consider putting a proper V12 Ferrari in your garage instead. And the 456 is actually a four-seater, so there’s some legitimate practicality to it.

Chalk up the lower value to the 456s sedate styling and the fact it never received much press. In reality, it was actually quite a stout grand tourer for the 1990s, and the 5.5-litre V12 delivered 436bhp of Italian sopranno, so it certainly wasn’t slow. I suppose if you absolutely want a Ferrari on the cheap you could get yourself a Mondial, but friends don’t let friends do such things. Spend a bit more for the 456 and have a proper Ferrari that looks good, sounds exotic, and is actually quite reliable for an Italian supercar.

Mercedes-Benz C63 AMG

If you can stomach the expensive maintenance, you can find six-year old C63 AMGs with under 100,000 miles for as little as $25,000. At that price you get a 451bhp 6.2-litre V8 with a paddle-shifted 7-speed automatic and all the sinful styling that makes these cars look so damn good.

The Merc is certainly the most mainstream car on this list, and some argument can be made that it’s not necessarily a supercar. There’s also the maintenance, which to be fair isn’t going be any more expensive then wrenching on a 20-year old Ferrari. But the C63 AMG is at the very least an exotic beast with supercar performance, and with several examples available at such a low price point, it’s tough to find reasons not to buy one.

996 Porsche 911

911s have always been the “value-priced” everyday supercar, which makes sense when you consider the price difference between new 911s and similar models from Ferrari and Lamborghini. But it’s no secret that the 996-era cars from 1997-2004 took a bigger hit than normal, partially because they were criticised for being somewhat bland, and partially because they were the first water-cooled 911s, resulting in unfair bashing from 911 purists because of it. And there was also the small issue with the intermediate shaft bearing that would occasionally destroy the engine without warning. But I’m sure that has nothing to do with their resale value.

And what are those values exactly? Well, give yourself a bit of time to look and you can score a very nice 911 Carrera with under 100,000 miles for 20 grand. As in $20,000 U.S. dollars - or about the same price as a new Ford Focus. And the Carrera brings 300bhp to the mix with all the rear-engined handling excitement of a 911. As for that intermediate shaft thing, there are fixes available that can run around $1000-$1500. Overall, that’s a very small price to pay considering the rest of the car is spot-on awesome. A 911 for Focus cash? That’s almost a no-brainer.