[Perfectlap]

^ I agree on the 944 being dated. At the time it was being sold I much prefferred the 944 design over the Carrera. The 944 and the 928 had a sleek forward-looking designs. In my book there was nothing else on the road that captured that flair. But the funny thing is even then people were denigrating anything that wasn't a 911. One guy at my school had a 944 and the haters would say "the poor man's Porsche". I didn't get it, to me the Carrera looked like a VW Bug. Why does everyone have such an infatuation for a car that reminds me of Herbie the Love Bug? So when the 996 came around with a much more aggresive and futuristic design I was one of the few who welcomed it.

The 986 is now a 20 year old design. That's kind of crazy when you think about it. When I first mounted my 997 Turbo replica wheels and added the PORSCHE side decals my neighbohr came out and asked me if I had traded in my old car for the new model! He took a closer look and said "oh ha ha... you tricked me!". That sort of impression would have never happened with a car whose design does not stand the test of time.

p.s.
The level of Boxster attrition that will be needed for the values to ever come up so that a 986 or 987 recoups (inflation adjusted) original value is beyond possible. First, the 996 and Boxster were too expensive (Porsche tax) from the start to hope for price-boosting attrition. You would have to be REALLY in love with the 986 over later versions like the 981 to reject a newer, more powerful, more reliable, less mileage-beaten Boxster. In other words Boxster production would need to shut down now, ideally in 2004 (which probably makes the case for a strong Honda S2000 market some day). In order for something produced in high numbers to be a hit, what comes after must be viewed as subtantially inferior. Quiet the contrary, the 981 is proving to be a huge hit in the sports car world, it has the looks and the performance and they will sell a metric ton of them before we are into the 6th generation. And the other issue is that at the $10-$20K mark, the enthusiast pool that look after Boxsters and 996/997 Carreras will be perhaps the largest one Porsche has ever had. It won't be that hard to find a well maintained Boxster or water-cooled Carrera, most will not survive but those that do will be large enough to make finding one a simple matter of logging onto Autotrader and Ebay and voila you've found a high mileage but well kept car. One can only imagine how many hundreds of thousands of water-cooled Porsches will be rolling around on the streets by then.

However if you bought either a 996/997 or Boxster used, it could stand to reason that you might one day sell it for the used purchase price, but that's really moot because there's no such thing as owning an old Porsche that isn't burning a big hole in your wallet unless you are part of that small % of drivers who can replace their own water pump or shocks. 99% of all driven Boxsters and Carreras (as in not low mileage garage queens) purchased new, will ultimately be net losers or barely break even. Air-cooled engines have very expensive rebuilds that few know hot to do anymore and the water-cooled Pcars have over-priced parts that can easily surpass the purchase price.