First of all, I wanted to introduce myself. I have been a Mazda "fan" for a looong time... Currently I have a Turbo Miata 1990 that I am selling so I can get some money for the RX8...

Last Monday, at a current track event at THILL, I made the "mistake" of driving a RX8... and that's all it took,... 1 lap and I was hooked... 24 hours passed by and I already had my Miata for sale...

I am decent track driver and I instruct some events... Needless to say, I will leave the RX8 stock until the end of warranty so I need to get for the right package for me...

Anyways,
I am looking to get a nice RX8 for a decent price...Definitely a sports package...
So my questions are...
1) What is the best time to buy the 05? late summer I believe right? since 06 are showing up at the dealerships right?
2) What should I expect to pay for a sports package? Online buying is better than any other places? Currently the dealer has a $3500.00 OFF MSRP (yeah right) incentive on new 05
3) Based on my needs, what package do you recommend?

Sorry for so many questions...
TIA!!!

Pololo

 

Why not get one of the many leftover 04s right now? It's the same car...

 

if you can find a 'new' 04 with *low* test driving mileages, and you plan to keep the car at least through the warranty period (which looks like you are), then a leftover '04 will save you probably $3-4000 compared to a similarly equippeed 05 one...

the big question is, will you be able to find one, especially now that Mazda has taken '04 listings off of their website.....

also another thing to consider, early 04 builds have been known to have inconsistent build quality issues, so if you want that peace of mind, a late '04 build or any '05 should give you a much better built car...

 

The touring is nice unless you want the leather. What color do you like?

 

oh and i recommend base pkg, as the only redeeming items from the sport pkg are the HIDs and the fogs. You're a track instructor in CA, you don't need no stinkin' electronic driver aids

as for time to buy, right now, you still need to do some negotiating to get the 05's at or below invoice, so have fun lol

 

Best time to buy an '05 is late Summer-early Fall.

 

When were the early 2004 RX-8s that had some problems built, early 2003? I am thinking of buying a new one that was built in July 2003. Could that be a problem one? Thanks

 

i'd recommend something built during '04 just to be on the safe side.... of course, there ARE owners with early builds that have perfectly driving 8's (after doing all the recalls/TSBs of course). how many miles on this july '03 car? that's 1.5 years sitting on the lot... july 2003, that's probably like the 2nd batch that's built for NA market... If you really want this car, negotiate with the dealer to have ALL the recalls/TSBs fixed before delivery (tell them to show you paperwork that they've been done), otherwise walk away :p

the biggest benefit of getting a later built car is that almost all the fixes are already applied from the factory, and the likelihood of bringing the car in for warranty services decreases by a whole bunch.

 

my may 03 build has had no problems at all, so they arent all bad at all.