I had a 96 GMC Jimmy SLS on lease that was in a terrible accident - Insurance company insisted on reparing it, and $13000 later, it still wasn't the same - I wanted out of my lease, and GMC was willing to let me break it with no penalties (I was 6 months early), because the SUV was in high demand at the time. So I went down to the Ford dealership to look at a 98 Cobra. They had about 30 Cobras (coupes & verts) on the lot, but none in the right combination for me (Coupe with leather, black on black).
Having read so much in the magazines about the SVT Contour, I asked the sales guy if they had any. He didn't even know what it was, but we finally found one. I test drove it, thought it was pretty cool, and thought about it for awhile.
The only other car I was looking at was a 98 Eclipse GS-T Spyder. But the only one left within 100 miles was red, and I wasn't too keen on that color. Factor in the lousy financing rates, and the lack of flexibility in price, and I was getting frustrated.
I switched jobs at this point, so a month went by between when I first drove the car, and when I finally bought it.. In this month, the E1 models came out, so that worked out great!
So back to Ford I went, to drive the car again.. I was able to get a $400 recent college grad discount, a $1200 Ford Citibank discount, 0.9% financing, and buy the car for like $300 over invoice, and there was no comparison.. Now the gap between the SVT and the Eclipse was about $6000! So I signed the papers, drove it home, and never looked back.
Just sold the car today, 2 days shy of 46 months of ownership. Was sad to watch her drive away.
