Old School JDM, or New Car? Which would you want?

An article posted in the New York Times piqued our interest.  It was talking about how some people eschew owning a new car and import used Japanese cars which are over 25 years old.  This got us thinking, would you want to own a new car or something that's nearly as old as some of the readers of our blog?  Why would someone want to own such a car?


In our opinion, it's the passion, and to some extent knowing the fact that owning such a vehicle will put the owner in a rare circle since not many genuine domestic market Japanese or European cars are in the U.S.  You really have to enjoy cars to want to ship a car halfway around the world to own it.  The paperwork process looks extensive, and we imagine that the price to import a car isn't cheap.

Also, since these cars used, you can bet they will need something fixed, and not many people would want to take the leap of faith of fixing what 25+ years of various ownership can do to a car.   From dubious wiring jobs to half done repairs, we've seen them all.  There's is nothing worse than having to trace wires from the engine bay all the way under the dash and back to the computer to find a short in a car's electrical system. 

So we ask, what 25+ year old car/cars would you like to own that were not originally sold in the U.S.?