This guide assumes you have a daily driver, and you're looking to add a fun car to your life. Everything after this assumes that you have a reliable transporation system, and you're looking to augment it for fun. Still need a real car? Try: Balancing the compromises - Buying a real car.

Mental models for fun

Ready for fun? If you truly love cars, a good place to start is any vehicle that evokes an emotional response through connection with the machinery, balanced with the realities of budget.

The fundamental question is: Would you rather have one $90k car or thirty $3k cars?

No one but you can decide what is fun, generally speaking: Rentals are too short, clean titles are too expensive.

Sure, you can get great experiences driving high end rentals, Turo, and open wheel racing of various types. However, experience has shown the most fun is living with them over the course of months. It's usually about a 2.5 month window to truly explore and enjoy the vehicle at 1-hour per day. More time spent per day numbs the wow factor.

At the time of this writing (Early 2025), the best way to balance the realities of budget with emotional response is through salvage title vehicle purchases from auction houses. There are really only two options: Copart and IAA - most of the rest you will find are for business to business sales only, or are simply rebranding the Copart and IAA inventory.

What you might want is a clean-title, low mileage Porsche Boxster with a bent fender that you can fix. This does not exist in the marketplace. What does exist is a salvage title, high mileage Porsche Boxster with damage so severe the insurance company has written it off as a total loss and branded the title as 'salvage'.

The opportunity for fun is in the perusing the great selection on Copart and IAA, and then having a vehicle delivered to your door that you can provide limited fixes for. The insurance company has a requirement for essentially full restoration. The customer wants their car back, exactly as it was. That last 20% of work to bring the car back to market expectation is where you can save money.

This guide focuses on one segment: mid-range sports cars and sedans. Specific models purchased include 2001 Porsche Boxster, 2013 BMW 335i, 2005 Audi TT quattro convertible, 2002 BMW 325Ci, 2006 Infiniti M45.

The same mental model can be applied to any class of vehicle. Is your thing mid-90s Japanese trucks? No Problem - recognize that you're opportunity for fun comes in the great selection, ease of delivery and lower costs of less-than-perfect repair.

Before you commit though, let's go to the next session and talk in detail about the risks of this approach.