Yahoo Autos 10 '90s Cars That Are Still Totally in Demand
Sorry, Millennials, but even the cars your parents shuttled you to school in are being left behind.
There are still a whole lot of people looking for 1990s cars, but that number decreases with each passing year. Mark Williams, analyst for Kelley Blue Book, did some digging and found that vehicles from the ‘90s are on a consistent decline, which he doesn’t find at all surprising.
“As new model years are introduced to the market, the older model years are being suppressed and yield less interest,” he says. “For example, the most shopped 1990s models are 1999, 1998, 1997, respectively.”
Williams pulled up the Top 25 cars from the 1990s searched on Kelley Blue Book and came up with the Honda Accord, Toyota Camry, Honda Civic, Jeep Wrangler, Ford F-150, Jeep Grand Cherokee, Ford Mustang and Toyota Corolla among the top 10. Much of that group’s current models are still among the best sellers in the U.S. In fact, discontinued rarities such as the Chevy Blazer, Saturn S-Series and Cadillac DeVille scarcely crack the Top 20.
We spoke with the folks at KBB and used car pricing site CarGurus and came up with the 10 cars from the '90s that anyone cares about in great numbers anymore:
10. Toyota 4Runner
A reliable off-road vehicle is hard to come by, but a cheap one is especially rare. Sure, the '90s models are roomy, have a power-sliding rear window and may have appeared in a hip-hop video or two, but the fact that their owners typically don’t have to put a whole lot of maintenance into them is a big seller.
That, and they’re still beasts on trails and dunes. This is no crossover. The body-on-frame construction that its competitors ditched in favor of unibody chassis long ago is still with the 2014 4Runner today. With Toyota just dropping the FJ Cruiser and the cost of a '90s 4Runner in the low- to mid-four figures, though, it might pay to stick with the classic.
“Our site gets a lot of traffic from enthusiasts who are not always looking for maximal value, but they are looking for something distinctive in a car,” says Steve Halloran, content and social media manager for CarGurus. “Either something that will take them pretty much anywhere they want to go or something that they can haul huge loads with. The 4Runner has a niche that it pretty much fills all by itself.”
Born in 1993, the Grand Cherokee was designed to give an off-road vehicle some luxury comfort. Though drivers in the '90s turned them into the hulking grocery getters that took the “U” out of SUVs and gave the whole class a bad name, the '90s Grand Cherokee has been redeemed by off roaders. The 1999 model received 4.2 out of five stars from CarGurus readers for both its ground clearance and how it handles snow. It only took about 16 years and a switch to a crossover platform for people to love the original Grand Cherokees for their intended purpose.
“If you’re looking for a car to modify and want to take it out in the woods and beat the crap out of it, you’re not going to want to spend a whole lot of money on it,” Halloran says. “A beater SUV is going to be a great place to start for somebody who wants to do that with their vehicle.”
Photo: Brenden Ashton | Flickr
8. Toyota Camry
It’s still the best-selling car in the U.S. today and one of the Top 5 selling vehicles overall. Why? Because it’s reliable enough to still have a whole lot of '80s and '90s models on the road. It’s been in the U.S. since 1983, and just about every model year has adequate representation on our streets and highways. It is one of the most boring, uninspiring cars available, but you can’t kill it without a whole lot of effort or blunt force. It’s built to last and not ashamed of it in the least.
“The older a car you can buy used, the less expensive it’s going to be,” Halloran says. “A lot of the cars on our list are incredibly long-lived vehicles. The Camry, the Accord, the Civic — these are all cars that are recognized for the fact that they retain their value well because they run reliably for hundreds of thousands of miles, and any buyer who’s looking for value should be starting with those cars.”
Photo: Greg Gjerdingen | Flickr
7. Ford Mustang
The Mustang brand is an icon, but the generations of Mustangs can sow discord between the most fervent fans. Aside from Lee Iacocca’s Mustang II of the late '70s, perhaps no form of the Mustang divides allegiances as much as the long, Fox-body platform of the '80s and '90s. The latter decade, in particular, was an incredibly tough time for the vehicle. The last of the original Fox-body generation drew attention from Vanilla Ice, who name-dropped his 5.0-liter dream machine in both Ice, Ice, Baby and over a Steve Miller sample in the less-subtle Rollin’ In My 5.0.
