Can We Still Enjoy Enthusiast Cars or Are Things Getting Out of Hand?

At first sight, you might say that it's a decisive "no," but let's get a deeper dive into this. First of all, we should see what an enthusiast car actually is. As expected, the answer it's not that simple. If we look at it in plain English, an enthusiast car is a car that a person is enthusiastic about. That means almost every car out there - except the Nissan Juke, nobody likes that.

But, if we take a look around us, enthusiast cars are usually classics or cars that had an impact on the industry, be it racing, the immense numbers in which they were sold, tuneability, you name it - and these are the cars we are talking about today.

I also want to add that I’m not talking about an old Ferrari or a Mercedes-Benz 300 SL here, as this kind of cars are, have been, and will continue to be out of reach for normal people. No, I’m talking about cars that, until a couple of years ago, were somewhat affordable and have only recently been blown into the overrated territory.

Prices, especially for Japanese cars, have skyrocketed in the past years. Toyota Supras and Skyline GTRs are easily going for six figures, which is a little crazy. Paying 100,000 dollars for a Japanese sports car from the ‘90s with 300 hp (304 ps) and a plastic interior is ridiculous. But don't think for a second that I'm only talking about Japanese cars or extremely expensive sums. No, I'm talking about everything. It is downright absurd to pay 10,000 dollars for a clapped-out BMW E36 that barely runs and is filled with rust.

What I want to point out is that slowly, prices are getting out of hand, but we're still ready to pay for these rust buckets. So why's that?

Nobody knows for sure, unfortunately. Even though I may sound like a bitter old dude, I think at least partially social media is to blame. What happens is that a lot of cars get praised online doing all sorts of incredible things, and thus get overrated for no particularly good reason. You see a 10,000-dollar car appear in some YouTuber's video, and that triples its value overnight - it's ridiculous.

That said, social media isn't the main culprit here. Yes, it plays its part, but this rise in prices comes from their scarcity. I think we would all love to travel back in time to a point when you could easily find a decent project car for a couple thousand dollars, but that's not possible. The fact of the matter is that time isn't slowing down, and its effect can be seen on cars.

While some are more reliable than others, that doesn't really matter. Sooner or later, all cars suffer from age-related problems. There's no escaping rust and old technology that gets harder and harder to maintain. As time passes and a big part of them are rotting away neglected, there are fewer and fewer decent ones remaining, and keeping them running is taking a toll on the ol' wallet, thus, prices go up. So, is there anything you can do about it?

Well, the easy method to combat this would be to plainly stop buying them. But that isn’t simple at all, as passion and love for cars usually exceeds any form of rationality, especially when it comes to financial decisions. Maybe we should just accept this since it happens to the best of us.

Circling back to the problem at hand: can you still enjoy enthusiast cars without spending a fortune? You can, but you need to be more attentive. See what your needs are, what you can afford to buy and keep, and only then make a choice. Do your homework, and you can enjoy a classic or a tuner car on a reasonable budget.

There are a lot of options out there. I don't want to give particular examples because prices and availability will vary depending on your location. That said, cars like a Civic, some generations of the Mustang, or Toyota Celicas are still pretty good choices on a budget - just don’t expect to “chase clout” in them.

It is sad, infuriating even, that we can't enjoy our favorite cars anymore because they skyrocketed in popularity. But this is the reality, and there's nothing we can do about it but embrace it. We should make the best of what is available right now, as they won't be around forever.