its looking bad out here gentlemen, our kind might not exist very long. im 18, I own a 2002 mustang v6, automatic, with 134k miles, and I love it to death. no i will not be modifying it, you stinky

my dream car is a challenger. any look, any trim, just low enough miles to not be beat to shit, but not so low I won't be able to afford it until it's liable to be registered as a classic. manual required, so r/t trim at minimal

now, after some light research, here's the listing of mods you can do for a somewhat reasonable price;

1. cry

2. cry harder

you cant really do any besides basic shitty bolt ons, and those aren't really power adders, moreso random nothing to waste money on, except maybe an exhaust, which will make it sound pretty nice. other than than, you're choices are limited unless your money is unlimited

I come from mustangs, a platform where its not unheard of to strip it down to its birthday suit, do major rust repair and prevention, rebuild the motor, manual swap it, repaint it, rebuild the suspension, and have it back on the road in like 5 years, for something like 30k, just a random number. in truth, that wont even get you in a challenger worth it's weight in salt, and to do anything kind of actual modding, you'll have to deal with computers, sensors, reprogramming shit, getting expensive tunes done, its bananas what all you have to do, to basically get no extra power added

all of this to say, im afraid im seeing what everyone else here is. we are quickly approaching a day and age where, as a mechanic, its getting harder and harder to even service your mom's pop-tart aquire-er, let alone if you actually ever wanna do cool shit with these cars, it'll basically be impossible

long story short, fuck new cars, im buying a manual Ford ranger, and saving up for something cool. Will maybe still get a challenger, but won't be for maaaany years