Nice choice! I like wringing out my 500 sport as a daily driver. The mpgs are most important, so I'm happy with the slower version. That Abarth should be a lot of fun if it's basically the same car on steroids. The short wheelbase is irreplaceable in a fwd car as refined as that.
Glad you are ok, and stuck with it despite the unfortunate occurrence! Now all your bad FIAT karma is hopefully burned up. You might need it. ha
Mine is holding together decently enough, but be prepared to probably fall in love with its "character" too.
As far as I can tell, there might be some steering and transmission issues that pop up on a lot of 500s regardless of model. If you feel a clunk in the steering, there isn't a reliable fix from FAIT on that. Also, from my experience with the lesser 5 speed transmission, I think owners need to treat the operation of the manual with more care than the regular econobox. What I do, is complete clutch depressed shifts even though it doesn't seem to need them. It's more obvious when downshifting while the chassis is upset. There is a mount available that stiffens up one of the connections on the Abarth (dog bone probably) and that should help. Something is just too lose/flexible in there.
Since a lot of clutch issues are also popping up, I'd say leave the sport button reserved for long-winded drives, instead of stop and go. Also, turn off that hill assist thing. I think it just burns up clutches. Trying to get to the bottom of why people are having to replace so many, so early (and FIAT isn't covering most of them because of wear and tear item.) The sport button on the regular 500 is massively boosted for a stock item in my opinion. Can't imagine how many cars are being lugged to death out there with that turned on. It does make a rather nice change to the weight and speed of the steering though. Have fun!