First World Problems: Use a 27-Foot, Gold-Painted Limo as a Daily Driver

The one who will answer the question will be Carwow's Mat Watson, who did just that: bought a 27-foot limousine. He is on a mission to find the best value car in the United Kingdom and thinks – just for the sake of views, of course, we won't get fooled – that the 1999 Lincoln Town Car could be it.

All the 27 feet (8,230 millimeters) of the car came for 2,700 pounds, which translates to $3,403. Simple mathematics shows us that he actually paid 100 pounds ($126) for each foot of the car, and for starters, that's a great ratio. How would it be if you could buy an 18-foot (5,770 millimeters) Rolls-Royce Phantom for 1,800 pounds ($2,269)?

Mat is not just going to drive it to his office and leave it parked there until 5 PM and go home. He is going to go through fire and water with it just to make sure it is worth the money.

The price went down a little bit also because the stretched limo has some scratches, dents, and bends every here and there. It must be complicated to maneuver this never-ending limo around the city and not bump into anything. Corrosion has eaten out of the gold paint, especially around the window chrome trim. The front bumper is coming off.

The good news is that the horn works, but the air conditioning is dead. The minuscule digital displays on the instrument cluster come with a green light.

The glove box is gone, and there is just some carpet instead of the front passenger seat. An in-car phone and lots of switches and buttons are on board. A partition wall divides the driver's area from that of the VIP passengers.

Those VIP passengers will sit on a leather sofa at the back and benefit from the presence of a bar and a TV. Ambient lighting is also on the menu, going from green to purple and red.

Except for the strange noise coming from underneath the car, everything else seems to be working just fine. But how do you park a 27-foot car with no camera and parking sensors? Mat will need two parking spots for that.

A look underneath the car, and Mat is shocked. Everything is rusty under there and the suspension is to blame for the terrible noise.

Mat takes his new/old limo to a dealership and tries to sell it. But the dealer, who has never evaluated a Lincoln before, offers 1,000 pounds ($1,260), so Mat and his Lincoln Town Car are soon on their way.

Stopping for gas is also a challenge. It is not easy to pull the never-ending limousine right next to the gas pump. He eventually does it, but opening the fuel cap is just as complicated. The Lincoln hasn't been used for quite a while and the cap is stuck. However, the worst was yet to come. Going into a McDrive turns out to be a headache, because the car is way too long to turn without going over the curb.

Trying to pick up ladies in the street and give them a lift doesn't really work for Mat. He does not exactly look like the good samaritan in the gold limo. Men decline the offer as well.

Drifting the limo on a closed course is probably going to leave him without tires. But the engine is the first to give in. That 4.6-liter V8 seems to have come to the end of the line. The mechanics bring it back to life. It must have had enough of pulling the 6,614-pound (3,000-kilogram).

That engine used to pump out 220 horsepower and 265 pound-feet of torque in its good old days, over two decades and 6.5 feet (2 meters) ago. "It's slow," Mat complains. Of course it is. It is as long as a small bus, weighs as much as an Indian elephant and is 25 years old, while the odometer shows a quarter of a million miles.

Mat finds the Lincoln limo stylish and easy to drive. He must have forgotten the McDonald's drive-thru and the gas station experience. But he made it through the day without hitting anything. And the fuel economy is awful: 2.7 miles per gallon. And at the end of the day, he is sure that it is better value for money than a brand-new Mercedes-Benz S-Class, which is a $114,500 affair in the United States. But you can't sleep in one like you would in the Lincoln Town Car.