mesothelioma claims: Question: What’s the Best Sports Car $3,500 Can Buy?

Friday, March 11, 2011

Question: What’s the Best Sports Car $3,500 Can Buy?

This 1991 Mazda Miata was one choice. Could you do better? (image by miataturbo.net)

I really don’t have a problem admitting I’m a bit of a nerd when it comes to certain topics: cars, smart phones, science and technology in general are all things I geek out on without hesitation. I’ve also got this thing for social media, too. I’ve got active accounts all across the Web 2.0 sphere. Oh, and not to change the subject, but since I mentioned Web 2.0, have you followed us on Twitter and Facebook yet?
Ok, let’s get back to the original point. Since I am quite capable of geeking out, I was thrilled to see a recent post on social networking site Reddit. Inspired by the gearheads from TopGear, the post challenged redditors to come up with real world examples of the best sports car one could buy with just $3,500.
Here are the actual rules. While they aren’t complex, they did contain more than just a dollar amount:

The car had to be offered at $3,500 or less. No haggling allowed.
If you had money left over after picking your car, you were free to allocate it for any upgrades, repairs or modifications.
Users were only allowed to post a single car, and were not permitted to buy two cars. And no James May limousines.

And redditors came up with some very interesting choices, to say the least. Here are the ones I found particularly interesting:

1983 Porsche 944 – that “needs a little TLC.” $3,200
1991 Mazda Miata – with a turbocharger. $2,500
1982 BMW 644 – with 117k miles. $1,750
1984 Mazda RX7 – used as a daily driver. $2,000
1988 Merkur XR4TI – I had almost forgotten Merkur. $1,500
1990 Nissan 300ZX – Third owner, must sell. $2,000

There were many more potential cars offered up, including an MG (Craigslist post has been removed) and questionable entries like a 1988 Dodge Daytona Shelby Z (again, Craigslist post has been removed) and a 1992 Chevrolet Lumina Z34.
I’ll admit, while some of the redditors did a great job, others, not so much. It got me to wondering if we could do better – so, I’ll pose the exact same challenge to you: What’s the best sports car you could come up with for just $3,500? Let us know what sort of sports car you could cobble together for such a low sum, including purchase of the car, any upgrades or modifications you’d do.
We can’t wait to see what you come up with!a