Porsche-less....first time in 14 years
I dont think i have ever started a thread of my own before, but here is one and hopefully not the last one. In the last 14 years there was always some kind of porsche in my garage from boxsters to cayennes to 911s and i have a macan turbo black/red combo on a ship right now with delivery next month. the macan is supposed to be my wife's daily car and would replace our 2011 cayenne turbo that now has 55k miles. my wife saw a macan S at the dealership and she was impressed with the interior but not that much with the exterior, especially the rear. fast forward to last weekend, we were on a family short ride to LA and i decided to swing by the Mclaren dealer in beverly hills to check out the 650S in person.
The Mac dealer had a few 12Cs and a few 650S and frankly even though the 650 looks better in person, i didnt feel any wow factor compared to my 13 spider. same interior, same rear, front end in dysharmony with the rear etc.., what i didnt notice was that during my checking out the 650, my wife walked to the other room and i realized then that these guys are also a Maserati dealerhip. needless to say that my wife went immediately gaga over a black AWD Ghibli SQ4 and the first words that came out of her mouth were: " i dont want the Macan any more, i want this. Macans will be all over the place in a few months since the S version is so cheap and i want something more unique at this price". i had nothing to say back to her.
i look at the sticker and its 91k (fully loaded ghibli, black with red interior and black wheels), i said: this is going to be much more to lease than the 80k Macan we have coming. one of the salesmen overheard and came over. he said what do you expect to pay for the macan lease?, i low balled him and he said we can work it out!, i said to my wife no way he can do that. i told him we have a cayenne turbo sitting outside that i need to trade and the porsche dealer had offered me peanuts for it. so he went out, he looked at the cayenne and came back and long story short, my wife now has a 2014 Ghibli SQ4 with a 91k msrp that we are leasing for LESS than a 80k macan turbo term for term, plus free maintenance thrown in for the duration!!. i drove 2 different ghiblis and in sport mode they reminded me of my 430's noise and i was overall surprised with how good this car is.
this means, 2 canceled porsche orders in one year and for the same reason: overpriced, not so unique machinery. yes i know, quality and reliabilty of the Maser is unknow but what i know is that Porsche as a brand is slowly becoming just another pricey car maker, more and more available to a wider customer base using cheaper versions of the same model, while losing some of that fanciness the word porsche had when i was a kid. I hope one day porsche will correct its path so i can become a customer again.
ps: i also started looking at the 4C to replace our Audi cab and i put my name on the list locally......
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2011 CTT, 2013 12C Spider, 2013 A5 cab, 2014 4Runner Trail Edition