$5000 Driver’s Car Stars: part one

Many car enthusiasts should have around $5000 laying around somewhere.

If not in cold, hard cash, then at least have a think about that next car purchase you’re about to make. Could you instead get a slightly cheaper first car to make room for a budget driver’s car?

These days, even as cars of all kinds get faster, legacy performance models from the last 20 years can still seem quick for not a whole lot of cash. Specifically here, we’re talking a $6000 car bargained down to $5000 on the nose. Fun to drive, less than 20 years old, with fewer than 250,000km, forms part of the brief; and not a Mazda MX-5, for once, is the other.

#1 Sports coupe: Early-2000s BMW 3 Series Coupe

With E30 M3 prices nudging E46 levels, the same has become true of the older non-M models versus the newer models. A 325Ci with 2.5-litre six, 245Nm and a 7.6-second 0-100km/h can be purchased for mid-four-figures, while the more desirable 330Ci with a 3.0-litre six, 300Nm and 6.7sec 0-100km/h needs at least 50 per cent more – both with 200,000km or less.

#2 Hot hatchback: 2007 Ford Fiesta XR4

Okay, the Fiesta XR4 was on the mild side for power, with a Focus-derived 2.0-litre four developing 110kW, but it only tipped the scales at 1090kg. In particular, the steering of this Ford was top notch, while the handling was grippy in a stand-on-its-nose fashion.

For an older and lighter Clio RS Phase II, though, best wait for part two.

#3 Sports sedan: Early-mid-2000s Ford BA Falcon XR6 Turbo

Sure, later models were obviously improved, but none quite offered the dramatic shift in ability from the preceding model like this one did, and with Commodore demolishing it in the sales race, it needed to.

In context, the BA (and BF) are barely younger than the more impressive VE Commodore that reignited Holden’s reign as the class (and sales) leader, yet the Falcons ask almost half the price.

Stay tuned for part two where we offer another three servings of $5K driver’s car star action.