The Two-Car Solution: Mirage vs Focus, Impala vs Jaguar

Good morning! This week we’ve been keeping the price cap at $2,000, which is about half of what we’ve been averaging recently. Hey, inflation, man, what are you gonna do? By my reckoning, though, that means you could buy two of this week’s choices for the price of one of those other cars we’ve looked at recently. Among our winners this week are two frugal little economy cars, and two soft and cushy project cars. So I’m going to have you choose one of each.

I don’t follow the vote tally throughout the course of the day, in case you were ever curious. I check it at about 5pm Eastern time, give or take, and declare the winner then. But I always read through the comments first, to get a sense of how I think the vote is going to go. Yesterday I thought the Jag XJ-S had a slight edge over the VW Cabrio, and as it turns out, that’s exactly how it went: Jaguar by a nose.

I went back and forth on these two myself, until it occurred to me that I already have a very pretty British coupe that’s a lot simpler to work on than a V12 Jaguar, and that it has been thirty-six years since I last owned a watercooled VW. I kinda miss them sometimes. I’d rather have another Scirocco, but I could make a Mk1 Cabrio work. But as always, my vote doesn’t count unless it’s a tie, so the Jag earns the spot in today’s runoff.

Like a lot of car enthusiasts with more enthusiasm than means, I’ve had some questionable daily drivers over the years: a turbocharged Chrysler Laser stuffed full of electrical gremlins, a Chevy Nova that I “hot rodded” so poorly it barely ran, and a scruffy Miata with well over 200,000 miles on it. Even my beloved green Chevy truck, now retired from most truck stuff and wearing collector’s plates, was my daily driver for a year. But these days, I know the value of a good everyday car, something with which to go pick up parts for the perpetually broken “fun” car. This week’s finalists just happen to divide nicely into two camps: daily drivers and project cars. You’ll be choosing one of each to create your perfect sub-$4,000 two-car garage. Let’s recap our choices.

Daily Driver: 2002 Mitsubishi Mirage DE

It’s got a salvage title and the bumps and bruises to go with it, but if you ask me, this little Mitsubishi has a heart of gold. It’s exactly the sort of simple, unapologetic economy car that is sorely lacking from the market today. Sure, the silly rear spoiler is writing checks that its tiny 1.5-liter engine can’t cash, and someone has defiled it with stick-on fake vents from an Autozone aisle end cap, but who cares?

It also has cool funky seat fabric in really good condition, and it’s the only manual transmission of the bunch, so if you want to shift your own gears, this is your car. Plus, it’s ready to hit the road for only $1,000, leaving some room in the budget for repairs that the project cars are certain to need.

Daily Driver: 2010 Ford Focus SE

Salvage title scares you off? Want something a little bigger and more substantial than the tiny Mirage? Well then, have I got the car for you! Yes, it’s hideous, but it’s a cool color at least. And while you can’t shift your own gears, its Duratec 20 engine is likely to keep chugging along for a good long time yet. At 253,000 miles, it’s no spring chicken, but it looks like it has been well-maintained.

Inside, it’s got some goodies that the Mirage lacks, like power windows and locks, and I would be surprised if the Mirage had air conditioning, come to think of it. It’s probably quite a bit safer as well, being a generation or two newer. Just don’t expect to derive any pleasure from it; this is an appliance, nothing more.

Project Car: 1976 Chevrolet Impala

Here’s a question: How big is your garage? If you’ve got plenty of room in there, might I suggest you fill it with eighteen and a half feet of good ol’ Detroit steel? This big Chevy has some rust you’ll have to contend with (or ignore), but it also has something most cars these days lack: presence. Its V8 is a low-compression malaise-era mess, but decades of know-how and warehouses full of parts stand at the ready to help you wake it up. And if you don’t care about going fast, it does run just fine as-is.

You probably don’t want to go too fast in this thing anyway, especially around corners; you’ll go sliding right across that bench seat, and those impossible-to-find original wheel covers will go flying. No, best to take it easy in this beast, listening to the 350 burble out its little song and floating down the highway on its marshmallowy-soft suspension.

Project Car: 1987 Jaguar XJ-S

It takes a special sort of person to want to fix up an old British car. You have to contend with faulty wiring, weird bolt threads, rust, and the occasional use of wood in inexplicable places. And for your trouble, you’re rewarded with a car that looks and sounds better than it goes, but will leave you feeling like James Bond behind the wheel – until the next thing breaks. Why put up with it all? Well, I mean, just look at this thing.

Calling this car “sketchy” is an understatement. Not only is it an old Jaguar, itself enough to make one question one’s sanity for even considering it, but since we looked at it yesterday, the seller has re-listed it at a higher price – and with no mention of the alternator warning light, the rust, the non-functional air conditioning, or any of the other problems, which I’m sure have not been fixed since yesterday. Oh well. To paraphrase that old Army ad: it’s not just a car; it’s an adventure.

Having multiple cars is a hassle; I know that. Extra insurance, registration, maintenance, and just finding a place to park the damn thing can be burdensome. But sometimes sacrifices must be made, unless you’re content to drive nothing but safe, reliable, boring cars forever. If you can have a boring everyday car and a fun weekend toy for the price of most “inexpensive” used cars these days, it might be worth finding an extra parking spot. And classic car insurance is dirt cheap. Your assignment for the weekend, then, is to take a second look at these four, weigh the pros and cons, and decide which combination of daily driver and project car is your favorite.