Quick Hit – 908 Mile 2016 Nissan 370Z – 6MT

*** Before we get started on this car, I just want to let everyone know my 2010 Mercedes S600 luxo-rocket is still available, and I even dropped the price to $25,900 OBO! Still has 28,000 miles / 19 months of MaxCare warranty! Here’s the link once again.

Now about this 2016 Nissan 370Z Sport unicorn for sale, with only 908 miles on it. Like the 378 mile 2013 Dodge Charger R/T Max I covered earlier this month, this sports car is really only mostly of interest because of the peculiarly and unusual low mileage. Check out the trip odometer below – if I’m reading the left one correctly the car has been driven almost 84 hours covering only 908 miles! Average speed 10 mph? Where has this car been going and why?

The interior is as pristine as the day it came off the dealership lot five years ago. But it’s a 2016, you say, isn’t it six years old? Oddly the car was shipped to the Illinois dealership in March of 2016, but didn’t sell until June of 2017. (There’s an entry in the vehicle history of 8,000 miles during emissions testing in 2022 – clearly a typo.) Why didn’t it sell?

The 2016 Nissan 370Z Sport sold for maybe $45,000 new. It’s an okay sports car. The best reviewers can say is it’s “balanced” – decent handling and acceleration, but offset by a harsh ride, limited space (although leg room up front is fantastic), and a high price tag. Per Motor Trend, “the Sport trim adds a limited-slip differential, 19-inch Rays forged alloy wheels, the SynchroRev Match feature on the manual gearbox, sport brakes, and a Bose audio system.” This car had the rear view camera option added, but not much else.

I have to say in bright red this little sports coupe is not unattractive. I wouldn’t be embarrassed to be seem in it. Wheels are funky, styling muted – spoiler doesn’t exaggerate or suggest it’s faster than it is.

The 370Z has a hatchback, but that big ol’ bar across the shock towers doesn’t leave much room back there for stashing stuff. So no back seat and no storage space. Disappointing.

The 3.7 liter V-6 is actually a solid engine with 332 hp, and mated to the six speed manual it’ll run a 4.7 second 0-60 mph – pretty darned good for a naturally aspirated six cylinder. My hunch is it’s got all the kinks worked out and is pretty darn reliable. The 370Z has been around since 2006 and was terminated in 2020. It had a good run. You buy one and you know what you’re getting.

Bonus points if you read this far and know this obscure country music performer I dig. His name is Jimmie Dale Gilmore, from Texas. Spent some time in a Colorado ashram studying metaphysics before launching a mediocre career. I once saw him play in Atlanta, where he introduced a song by suggesting we not really focus on the lyrics too much, that wouldn’t be fair. Then he said actually don’t focus on the music much either, just sort of take in the experience.

That’s how I feel about this 2016 Nissan 370Z – ignore the pedestrian parts and the unremarkable attributes and just enjoy a decent enough sports car that really nobody has driven. Hell, you could buy this and have 149,000 miles of MaxCare coverage over five years if you wanted. What’s hard to ignore, though, is the price – it’s pushing $37,000 – not much discount from new. In fact, to show how used car prices have skyrocketed, check out this post of mine from 2019 (scroll way down) – a nearly identical 2014 Nissan 370Z 6MT with less than 2,000 miles was offered by CarMax for $10,000 less! But if you like Z-cars, this single owner, accident free one is available in Omaha here at the moment.

Stock # 22893281 VIN # JN1AZ4EH1GM937543

Quick Hit – Range Rover Evoque HSE Convertible and BONUS Murano Cross Cabriolet – “Not Much Sport; Even Less Utility”

RR Conv sideSorry about two Range Rover posts in a row but this deja vu SUV unicorn caught my eye.  The 2017 Range Rover Evoque HSE convertible.  Fascinated that this didn’t go so well for Nisssan with the two door, faux luxury convertible SUV, and hadn’t realized Range Rover headed down the same path.  That said, this 2017 Car and Driver review suggested the Range Rover is actually not a bad car, if what you want is a “niche within a niche.”  I also stole the not much sport….line in the headline of this post from Car and Driver.

And I had to borrow the photo of the car with the top down from them, since CarMax rarely (and foolishly) provides photos of their convertibles with the top down.  This Range Rover Evoque has the 2.0l four banger good for 240hp, and it is not fast by any means.  But it rides well.  Disappointed that new it sold for close to $60,000 and is only discounted by 25% after three years.

Fortunately, it has some manufacturer warranty left and perhaps the MaxCare warranty isn’t too expensive.  I’d think long and hard about getting MaxCare – I mean CarMax shot the marketing photos with the car already in the garage!  So if a convertible two door SUV is your thing, find this one owner California car here in Sacramento.2017 Range Rover Evoque HSE Cab $44,998 21k Sacramento 6-10 Continue reading “Quick Hit – Range Rover Evoque HSE Convertible and BONUS Murano Cross Cabriolet – “Not Much Sport; Even Less Utility””

Quick Hit – Nearly New 2011 Nissan Cube Krom. Someone Somewhere Likes This.

Cube sideAdd the Nissan Cube Krom to the list of cars I didn’t know existed, perhaps for good reason.  I like looking for older, ultra low mileage cars in the CarMax inventory and this little unicorn just keeps catching my eye.  Turns out Nissan’s Krom editions were opportunities for buyers to choose lots of accents and options that weren’t available on the run of the mill cars.

Back in 2011, when this car was new, someone actually spent about $22,000 and made the choices you see here.  Not sure what they really thought of that choice, since the car was only driven 10,000 miles in the nine years since.  I love the color and I love the ballsy faux chrome front end, and I love that 2011 was the last year for these Krom cars.

Here’s a review from Automobile Mag back in 2011.  Cubes in general never sold very well.  I suspect there are not a lot of Cube Kroms out there.  It comes with a 1.8 liter 122hp four banger.  I wondered at the “Power/Cycle” knob by the shifter and had to Google it – turns out it rotates through accent lighting.  Who knew?  Why?

Rental cube Full disclosure, because my then-teenage daughter suggested it, on a vacation to Texas I actually rented me a Cube.  In the land of pickups no less.  The things we do for love.  Don’t tell my wife I posted this.

 

 

If a Nissan Cube Krom is your thing this is a nearly new one for half price. Find it here in Athens, Georgia.

2011 Nissan Cube Krom $12,998 10k Athens 5-20

$15,998 Nissan Juke Nismo RS – Ugly Unique Unicorn (and Extinct)

Juke sideNissan imported a good 200,000 plus Nissan Jukes into the US, but only about 2,285 were the Nismo RS unicorns during the 2014-2017 run for the RS. Owners on the Juke Nismo forum think the six-speed manual model to be fairly rare.  Nismo of course stands for ニッサン・モータースポーツ・インターナショナル株式会社 Nissan Mōtā Supōtsu Intānashonaru Kabushiki-gaisha, or Nissan Motorsport per Wiki.  The plain Juke and Juke Nismo came with a 188hp turbo four, and the Juke Nismo RS beefed up to 215hp.  See, its not all about the red mirrors!

The crossover was available with a 6-speed manual transmission and all wheel drive and good for a 0-60mph in an okay mid six second run.  The suspensions were quite tweaked and lowered for the RS models, but I don’t get lowering an elevated crossover that started out as a much lower car in the first place?   Here’s a review from Autotrader.

The Nismo RS got good marks for the shit-hot race car seats and for being fun to drive. That said, Car and Driver named the Nissan Juke as one of the 20 ugliest crossovers and described it has “frog faced”.   Beauty is in the bug eyes of the beholder, I guess.

New Nissan Juke RS models sold for almost $30,000 so would have liked to have seen these for cheaper at CarMax, but the price isn’t that far off of the similarly low mileage comps on Autotrader.   Unfortunately this model is 2WD.  CarMax has a 4WD Nismo RS but it’s automatic.  Will be on the lookout for a 6-speed 4WD model and update if I find one.  Find this low-mileage, two-owner 2014 Nissan Juke Nismo RS here in Boynton Beach, Florida. 2014 Nissan Juke Nismo RS

The $577 Million Car Loan and Other Fascinating CarMax “Analytics”

Small 73000
The total cars on the lot around noon, November 18th 2017.  The numbers fluctuated by hundreds between the beginning and completion of this blog, rendering all my calculations estimates.

The CarMax nationwide inventory jumped from just over 40,000 cars in the summer of 2017 to over 73,000 today.  That’s the highest it’s been since I started tracking CarMax unicorns a year ago and it got me pondering on all things cosmic CarMax.  For example, that 33,000 plus-up in stock equals a staggering $577 million* investment in cars in just a few months.  I’m thinking like you and me, CarMax didn’t pay cash and owed somebody a helluva lot of money.  You think they get dealer financing? I’m thinking CarMax needs to move some cars and hoping there are more unicorns and lower prices!

*The average CarMax vehicle sells for $19,677 with a gross profit of $2,178, indicating a rough guess each car costing CarMax $17,489.  See “CarMax Reports Second Quarter Results, September 22, 2017″.

So I decided to do my own homemade “analytics” and dive deeper on what makes up an inventory of 73,000 cars.  CarMax knows what they’re doing, and I suspect their inventory largely reflects what America wants in a car.  So here’s what I learned. Continue reading “The $577 Million Car Loan and Other Fascinating CarMax “Analytics””