Aron9000

I find this to be an interesting price point, as it gives a lot of seriously nice options, but the Germans are rather stingy at this price point, its kind of loaded midsize, or spend about 20-30k more for one of their mongo luxury sedans.

Honestly if I had to pick a German car for 70k, it would be the Audi A7 all day long. Just love the styling on that car, yes its pricey without a lot of options at 70k, but I'm fine with that. Just a beautiful car, and probably what I'd pick if Dodge didn't offer something with double the ****ing horsepower and IMO equally awesome styling for the same price.

Seriously though for 4 doors and 70k, it would be the Dodge Charger Hellcat. Base price is at 67-68k, and its pretty much fully loaded at that price. 707hp, automatic, big 4 door with tons of room, huge trunk over 200" in length. Plus it has some semblence of handling, in addition to being stupidly fast in a straight line. I took a test drive on one of these, holy crap is it a bucket of fun, yet so refined/comfortable if you just want to put around town or drive 400 miles at 75mph. The Charger Hellcat really is Dr Jeyklle and Mr Hyde, a ****ing Viking with an axe coming to split your forehead in two, yet at the same time its a Sedan Deville if you never push that right pedal to the floor.

SW17LS

I'd buy a Genesis G90

EZZ

Base M3 or loaded S4. Maybe the CTS V-Sport would also be in contention. So many good choices in the $70k range

Johnhav430

haha what an interesting price point....I have my doubts as to whether I would ever spend that much. When I bought my 335 in dec 06, I was literally embarrassed to have spent more than 40k on a car. It listed for $46,400. It's quite fascinating how we are alarmed at the rate increase on college educations, health care, but not cars. I test drove a A6 which I thought was not anything very nice, and it already was beyond 70k. And 340i's for 60k, with a muffler turned sideways to look like dual exhaust. Seems like one does not get much for 70k today...my .02 (maybe I live in the past and lament on what 40k used to get lol)

SW17LS

Adjusted for inflation, car prices actually haven't really gone up. In fact, in some segments they've gone down.

bagwell

Agree 100%, I just have no desire to spend over $40K on a sedan....unless we're talking BMW M or AUDI S/RS and those are just outrageously high $.

pbm317

S5 Sportback!

geko29

Because the two are not even remotely relatable. I'm reading (listening to) "Hackers" by Stephen Levy right now, and one of the guys being profiled in the section I went through this morning chose a particular College in the California state system because he could afford the tuition of $24 per quarter, or $96/year. This was in the early 1970s. The average new car sales price in 1975 was $4,951. As of 2016, this average was $25,449, an increase of roughly 414%. I challenge you to find a college with a current in-state tuition of $494/year.

http://wgntv.com/2016/04/25/the-aver...you-were-born/

Socal858

Agree 110%.

Though the numbers are big and frightening compared to what we are used to from the past, the actual prices haven't moved too badly. Before I got my GS350 Fsport, I was shopping BMW's and almost pulled the trigger on a 440i gran coupe (msrp 59k, almost agreed on 54).

I thought that was a ton of money till I realized my previous 2007 335i stickered at 48k, which now is around 56k wtih inflation. a 56k msrp 2017/2018 340i can have the m sport package and navigation, which were both missing from my older bmw.

FatherTo1

Both interesting points. Even adjusted for inflation I am astonished at the price of new cars now. Minivans cresting $50K and trucks optioned beyond $70k! Even if it is consistent with inflation, I feel new cars cost way too much. Perhaps it's because we spend our income on different types of activities and entertainment that were not available before, leaving behind the same budget for a car that we allocated 20 years ago. So although we earn much more now, cars seem more expensive because we haven't grown the budget for a car expense. Kind of like how most people's dental insurance coverage has stagnated at $2,000 per year despite your premiums going up. You now have many more treatment options for your teeth and gums but your coverage limits have not kept pace...at least not in decades in California.

Edit: Meant to say $2,000 per year.

mmarshall

70K for just ONE vehicle?

I'd pick a Lincoln Continental Reserve with the 3.0TT and AWD.

SW17LS

When you think "Minivans cost $50k!" you're thinking through a 20 year old lens. In today's dollars, a loaded minivan approaches $50k. If you adjust that figure down for inflation its $33,000. Was a loaded minivan $33,000 in 1997? It sure was, perhaps even slightly more. So no, prices haven't gone up.

Take my many years of LS ownership. My 98 LS400, almost totally loaded was $59,000. My 2004 LS430 fully loaded was $67,000. My 2015 LS460 almost base but AWD was $79,000. Optioned similarly to those others my LS460 would be about $85,000 (UL and air suspension but not AWD). You think, wow. prices have gone up a ton huh? Well, plug it into the CPI inflation calculator. $59,000 in 1998 was $67,600 in 2004. It was $85,300 in 2015. Thats not a coincidence, the price of the LS has held the line.

If you look at my Explorer. In 1995 we bought a fully loaded Explorer Limited, sticker was $37,000. Today, a fully loaded Explorer Platinum with WAY more features, equipment and quality is about $60,000. You say, "$60k for an Explorer?!?". Well...plug it into the calculator, $59,780. If you figure that the Limited is no longer the top trim Explorer the price of a comparable Explorer has gone down.

Take my ES300. In 2003 I bought a fully loaded ES300, it was $39,800. Plug that in, you get $53,192. A similar ES350 today costs about $43,000, there is a UL trim above it that is higher optioned and that maxes around $48,000. So, the price of an ES has actually gone down considerably.

Play with the calculator, its very eye opening: https://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/cpicalc.pl

Lurker9

I was heading down that path thinking that I would be more satisfied with more expensive car for at least 4 years. However, I've now realized that I am more happy when owning at least 2 cars with totally different characteristics at any given time. The best part is that they don't have to be expensive cars, and I can throw the leftover funds into other hobbies.

mmarshall

While what you say is correct as far as how inflation can be compared in the level of equipment of today's vehicles vs. those of 15-20 years ago, the real question (the one that matters the most) is how much vehicle you, as a consumer, can buy with your specific income or savings level. If, for example, back then, one had a good factory job, as a union member, with good wages/benefits, and a (potential) pension to look forward to, then lost it all through no fault of your own (if you were laid off or the plant went out of business) and are now working a much lower-paying service-job to at least try and make some ends meet, then you probably can't buy as much (or more) vehicle today with your wages, even though the average vehicle today comes with more standard equipment. While that is not typical of the conditions that you and I live in, here in the affluent D.C. area, it is for literally vast stretches of states and counties across the Rust Belt and Upper-Midwest.

SW17LS

All of that is totally off topic Mike, we're talking about cars and car prices relative to inflation.

People are still buying cars, so clearly people are still earning enough money to buy cars.