{"id":2120559,"date":"2026-08-31T13:25:00","date_gmt":"2026-08-31T10:25:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2120559"},"modified":"2026-08-31T13:25:00","modified_gmt":"2026-08-31T10:25:00","slug":"what-car-would-you-buy-for-5000-right-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2120559","title":{"rendered":"What Car Would You Buy For $5,000 Right Now?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"columns-holder\">\n<div class=\"add-on-google-widget\">\n<div class=\"add-on-google-heading\">Add Jalopnik on Google:<\/div>\n<div class=\"add-on-google-buttons-row\">\n                        <button type=\"button\" class=\"add-on-google-btn\" id=\"preferred-source\">Preferred Source<\/button><br \/>\n                        <a href=\"https:\/\/profile.google.com\/cp\/Cg0vZy8xMXBneTRxX2Zw\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"add-on-google-btn\" id=\"google-discover\">Google Discover<\/a>\n                    <\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"columns-holder \">\n<p>Do you feel that?\u00a0It&#8217;s not <a href=\"https:\/\/www.jalopnik.com\/2242465\/summer-temps-needohs-and-squishy-toys-in-hot-car-dangerous\/\" target=\"_blank\">90 degrees out<\/a> today. In fact, in the shade and the wind, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.jalopnik.com\/2220792\/how-temperature-affects-psi-tires\/\" target=\"_blank\">it&#8217;s barely 80<\/a>. The dog days are in fact over, and the specter of winter draws ever nearer. Soon, you&#8217;re going to need a winter beater. If you&#8217;ve already got one, you might just need something to wrench on while you huddle next to a space heater in your garage, counting the days until warm temperatures return.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Either way, today&#8217;s question is for you. It goes like this:\u00a0You&#8217;ve found a briefcase in a public park with $5,000 in cold hard cash sitting in it. You can spend all of it, but only on a car \u2014 anything you don&#8217;t spend on the car is shredded, Banksy print style, to ensure you don&#8217;t just get cash from the deal. With $5,000 burning y hole in your pocket and your local car scene to pick and choose from, what car would you buy?<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"columns-holder \">\n<p>There are a few truly terrible Subaru Baja Turbos in my local area for under five grand, and I do\u00a0<em>desperately\u00a0<\/em>want what could be the most Amber car ever created by human hands. But I&#8217;ve owned enough Subaru boxers to know that you want one in a good state of repair \u2014 not one that&#8217;s surrounded by a rusted hunk of color-mismatched metal, and bolted to a tragically automatic transmission. So, with the wisdom of having recently turned 30, I\u00a0present a more practical option:\u00a0The Honda Fit.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The Fit is reliable, roomier than you&#8217;d expect, and more sporty than you could imagine. I&#8217;ve sat in the back seat of one while helping a friend move, I&#8217;ve ridden shotgun in one out on track, and I can confirm that the Fit is a fantastic buy \u2014 especially for $5,000. It&#8217;s the car I&#8217;d pick, but what would you buy for five grand?\u00a0Leave your answers below, and I&#8217;ll collect my favorites later in the week. Bonus points if you can find an actual listing near you.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Add Jalopnik on Google: Preferred Source Google Discover Do you feel that?\u00a0It&#8217;s not 90 degrees out today. In fact, in the shade and the wind, it&#8217;s barely 80. The dog days are in fact over, and the specter of winter draws ever nearer. Soon, you&#8217;re going to need a winter beater. If you&#8217;ve already got [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[226,247],"class_list":["post-2120559","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-crawlmanager","tag-jalopnik-com"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2120559","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2120559"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2120559\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2120559"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2120559"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2120559"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}