new frame of mind

I was just speaking to a friend of mine who has had 5 boxsters since they launched. seeing as this is going to be my first porsche i was asking him some questions about options. for me one of the most important factors about this car is going to be resale. i want to enjoy this car as much as possible and not think every time i drive it that i'm losing money. so in his experiance with his cars he told me to keep the spec down as much as possible and just make the car look good( metallic, 19's, bose maybe). that way he said you have not made the car too personal and applicable to a lot more people. the thing that has worried me with the car since i ordered it is the price the options are going to run into. imo i can not see me getting back 8000pounds worth of extras when i come to sale the car. so that leads me to this, i'm not paying for options that should be standard. i passed my driving test 12 years ago, the first vehicle i had was a vauxhall van....... it had a rear wiper.

It is the old trade-off between what you enjoy and what you get out of it when you sell it. That equation is highly personal and it sounds like you come down on the 'sale' side. It is not a bad decision since Porsche continually updates their cars and our first generation Caymans are going to be lacking beside future models. However some prefer to use it and lose it. Hard decision. I lean a bit toward your decision.

I can tell you objectivly your friend is right. Silver with no options will be the easiest andbestresale. The older the car, the less options factor into the price. Unless it's very close to new and being sold by the dealer, resale value is based on the average price of the model. So if you're heavy on the options you're behind, if your lighter than average on options, you're ahead. My plan is sell just before the warranty ends, that's when resale takes biggest drop (other than when it first leaves the dealer!).

Doesn't it depend a lot on how quickly you 'roll over' the car. If you're trading in every two years (like a guy who's owned five Boxsters), then you need to think hard about what will re-sale. But if you're going to keep the car for, say, four years, then you'll want to personalize it to maximize enjoyment. Four years would be a very l-o-n-g time to drive a car that wasn't just the way you want it.

i think i will keep the car for maximum one year

Be prepared to loose10-12K. The first year's depreciation is the biggest.

that is the thing, 10k lost low spec, 18k lost high spec.

Ordered mine equipped the way I would like it, with exception of PCM (AAA does good job of routing and maps), and the $3k paint option. I am not worried about losing money when selling it as I usually drive a car until it quits or I quit. Most of the time it is 15-20 years unless it gets wrecked.

I really struggled with a few decisions when I specd my car. I love a light colored interior in my cars, and especially in a two seater where imo a light color makes it look more spacious. On the other hand, I did not want to spend 3k for a paint job and was thus limited to a small selection of colors. Of those, I wanted a metalic and a light color. This reduced me to two colors that my dealer thought were not a good match: Arctic silver and Sand Beige. I obsesed with this for a few weeks prior to finalyzing my order. Guard Red and Sand Beige would be great, but it is not metalic. I was ready to go Arctic Silver and Stone, which in my opinion is almost black, or obviously more dark than light, when another salesman who had traveled extensively through Europe, chimed in and said the hex on Sand Beige and Silver cars is a US thing, and in Europe is very popular. In the end I decided to go with what makes me happy and not with what someone buying my car years from now might prefer. As it turns out, I'm glad I went with Arctic Silver and Sand Beige, because when we arrived at the Frankfurt Auto Show, the Porsche rep. that escorted us up to the Cayman S Lounge told me that this combination is very popular in many countries and in his opinion will look great. I hope he is right, but either way I will be happy to have my light metalic exterior with a light color interior. The bottom line, given the essence of this thread, is that I believe it is best to enjoy what you want and makes you happy, rather than base a decision on whether you may or may not get an extra 3k on a70k purchase, years down the road when you sell it. /fckeditor/editor/images/smiley/MWPX/thumbsup.gif

Agreed! If one is only keeping it a year like confused then the sellingpenalty is so great that it really doesn't matter what options are ordered (why buy a hot item like this if you plan on selling it in one year anyway). But if you keep it awhile then get what pleases you. I didn't go for things that didn't make sense for me but did order options that I know I'll enjoy and understand that I will never see the purchase cost back in the selling price. I'd like to keep this carfor a long while but I know Porsche and in about 4 years they will have upgraded the Cayman to a point that it will be hard to resist trading up. I know this from experience./fckeditor/editor/images/smiley/MWPX/wink_smile.gif

I do not want to sound negative, but it just does not make sense to keep a $60K+ car just for year, especially the first year it comes out. Your cost of driving a Porsche for one year is, over $10K; there are certainly better ways to spend that no matter what your financial status is. If you are decided on a Porsche for one year, you should really find a way to move up to the 997S, I think that is safer bet. You do not know how the Cayman will be perceived by the general public, you do not know the improvements Porsche will make for 2007 (and you can bet that they will), you do not know if the engine and the overall quality will be up to par (which Porsche generally missed the mark in the first year of each model). IMHO, that $10K loss is really your best case scenario. Not to mention that you will feel like you are driving someone else's car every single day. /fckeditor/editor/images/smiley/MWPX/whatchutalkingabout_smile.gif

My bet is that for 2006 the vehicle will hold more value than you think. 1) the waiting list will reduce availability for 1st half 2006, then 2)production will continue to lag demand for the 2nd half as people become more interested in it after seeing them on the road. I doubt that you'll lose more than 5-10% after the first year, if that.