IT HAS NEVER been easier to obtain and maintain a factory-built 500-hp car, one with a payment book and a manufacturer warranty. These very thoughts were on our minds recently and got us thinking further that this may be the best time ever to acquire one of these mega-muscle machines. After all, in theory, recent models should still be heading for their financial nadir, what with depreciation and all.
However, as we set about gathering intel for this guide, we got a sharp slap of reality, as it turns out that America’s highest-performance cars have held their value better than most — some are actually gaining value. We probably shouldn’t have been surprised. These are turbulent times, unsettled by inflation, recent chip shortages and the resulting lack of new-car inventories. Plus, the push for Americans to move to EVs could well be prompting traditional horsepower fans to hoard Detroit’s internal-combustion heroes.
What this means is the big-power bargains we’d dreamt of are hard to come by in this stratum. But perhaps this is still the best time to buy one of these machines, just for different reasons. There may never be more of them available, and maybe today’s pricing will look good when viewed in the future. We don’t have any sort of crystal ball, but suffice it to say, if a car from this list joins your fleet, you can drive it, enjoy it, and ride the value wave as more and more people clamor for what history tells us will be fewer available cars. We’re currently spoiled for choice.
What surprises (and pleases) us is the variety of vehicles meeting our criteria (see list above) that have been blessed with so much power. Coupes, convertibles, sedans, even a station wagon. Our average pricing (from ) is admittedly with an eye toward collector-quality variants; you can surely find less-spendy versions somewhere, and so on.
