Good deal on an NC?

Just out of curiosity, what would everyone consider to be a good deal on an NC right now? It seems to me that with the ND just realeased and the 124 coming out soon, we'll start to see a greater saturation of NCs in the used market.

I'd call this a good deal. https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/forum/open-classifieds/2008-miata-gt-mine-affiliated/119008/page1/

NMNA

NC1? NC2? NC3?

5 or 6 spd? Options? Mileage? Condition?

Probably NC1, 120Kish, whatever trans is cheapest. Basically, I'm looking at what would be slightly more car than an NB.

wait why nc1/2/3????

I have an NC1, sport 5 speed. Paid $8,000 for it, has 68,000 miles and a clean car fax with three owners. I replaced the exhaust (RoadsterSport), replaced the horrible stock springs and shocks with Mazdaspeed springs and Sport Bilstein shocks (barely used on Ebay) which lowered the car considerably. The addition of RX8 "yellow" swaybars completed the package. Now I have a fast and fun car that handles amazingly and cost me less than $9,000. I consider this one of the best cars I have ever owned and definitely the most "bang" for the buck spent!

I've been casually perusing Miatae on CL again recently and it certainly seems that the market has shifted significantly in the 2+ years since I was last looking at them seriously.

The NA appears to be appreciating slightly and will likely continue to do so as the good ones dry up. Looks like $3-5k for a decent driver anymore.

The NB has seemingly now undercut the NA. I've been regularly seeing examples under $2k, probably at a higher frequency than NAs for relatively better condition cars.

The NC has really begun to catch my attention, though. Last I looked, bottom of the market was like $10-15k IIRC. Now, sub $8k seems normal for damned nice looking examples with under 100k.

My 08 GT with 46k miles is for sale at $10k

In reply to Furious_E:

Good assessment of the market. I was originally looking for an NA/NB preferably a 1.8, but was open to anything, but it seemed like there were a lot of NA and NB cars still in high 5's and with Mazdaspeed Miata's siting at 10k, I started looking at the NC cars and I was surprised to see them under 10k. Swap out the soft stock springs and swaybars and it is a really nice daily driver that you can autocross on the weekends.

Furious_E wrote: I've been casually perusing Miatae on CL again recently and it certainly seems that the market has shifted significantly in the 2+ years since I was last looking at them seriously. The NA appears to be appreciating slightly and will likely continue to do so as the good ones dry up. Looks like $3-5k for a decent driver anymore. The NB has seemingly now undercut the NA. I've been regularly seeing examples under $2k, probably at a higher frequency than NAs for relatively better condition cars. The NC has really begun to catch my attention, though. Last I looked, bottom of the market was like $10-15k IIRC. Now, sub $8k seems normal for damned nice looking examples with under 100k.

I think what you're seeing is the typical curve as cars age. The NC is now obsolete thanks to the ND and the oldest ones are a decade old, so the values are dropping. The NAs that survived the bottom of the price curve are worth more as the lack of clean ones drives up the prices, while the NBs are at the bottom of the curve.

I walked through our local Mazda dealer yesterday, and they have 5 NC power hardtop Miatas in stock. Only one is a manual though. I would imagine they were traded on NDs, but they have them priced pretty high. I think all are $20k to $22K.

In reply to racerdave600:

Our local dealer has 2 NC power hardtops, both automatics, both priced similarly

Keith Tanner wrote:

Furious_E wrote: I've been casually perusing Miatae on CL again recently and it certainly seems that the market has shifted significantly in the 2+ years since I was last looking at them seriously. The NA appears to be appreciating slightly and will likely continue to do so as the good ones dry up. Looks like $3-5k for a decent driver anymore. The NB has seemingly now undercut the NA. I've been regularly seeing examples under $2k, probably at a higher frequency than NAs for relatively better condition cars. The NC has really begun to catch my attention, though. Last I looked, bottom of the market was like $10-15k IIRC. Now, sub $8k seems normal for damned nice looking examples with under 100k.

I think what you're seeing is the typical curve as cars age. The NC is now obsolete thanks to the ND and the oldest ones are a decade old, so the values are dropping. The NAs that survived the bottom of the price curve are worth more as the lack of clean ones drives up the prices, while the NBs are at the bottom of the curve.

Absolutely. I'm more so a bit surprised at how much the market seems to have shifted in the past couple years, but it makes sense with the ND now out and the early NAs achieving classic status.

Still, the NC is starting to look like pretty good value. I may have to find one to take for test drive some time.