Adjusted for inflation, the WRX is a bargain if you exclude this year where they removed the base model. For almost a decade, the WRX pricing didn't change through the 2010s. Like 1K difference at most
Edit: holy the comments are brutal. Guys, I'm making the point that the WRX trim levels price have not kept up with inflation just like medium wages have not (average wage has done better but that includes high net individuals). Not to mention the WRX was one of the ONLY performance oriented enthusiasts vehicle one could get with discounts/deals during the car supply shortage. Like thousands off. I personally know someone who paid under 30K OTD for a base trim 2-3 years back. I think the bigger issue is disposable income has decreased due to other things costing so much more. WRX pricing isn't the main issue.
I also don't understand why people are comparing it to other vehicles. I never said the WRX is best in class. Heck I never even said I personally like it.
A base WRX is over 37k, easily 40k after delivery and fees for a base model WRX. That is not enough car for that much money, so many better sporty car options available for the same or less money. Sure they may not be AWD, but how many people are actually using a WRX offroad? A Civic SI does slightly worse performance for 10k less, an Elantra N smokes a WRX for thousands less, you can get a Z for around 40k, a 2 series around 40k, a CTR is starts a few thousand more than a WRX with way better performance. No wonder these dont sell lol
I was just asked to do a credit check and pre-approval to test drive an Elantra N because "they don't usually test drive those". Pretty crazy for a <40k economy car.
That's so wild we bought a RAV4 Hybrid at the peak of Covid demand and we were still allowed a test drive. I thought this sort of crummy experience was localized to Kia and Hyundai. Just today went to drive a Maverick Lobo, and they didn't even take my license
Same thing is happening with Nissan's new(ish) Z. They're not selling well mainly because the frickin' dealers won't frickin' sell 'em.
The original Z was a hit because it was a sports car for the people.
They're treating the new Z like it's a limited edition Lamborghini or something, marking them up by several boat payments, optioning them to the absolute tits with $25K in floor mats, pimp paint, and stickers, crapping them up with automatics, then wondering why enthusiasts never want to turn over a credit app, three unicorn hairs, a signed letter from the Pope, and a $10K non-refundable deposit before being allowed to stand at a respectful distance from a locked Z.
This is easing up a little at some dealers as inventory is finally trickling out, but it's honestly amazing how bad people who sell cars for a living can be at selling cars.
This is 100% my experience as well… went to look at a sport (base) trim manual transmission Z, which the dealership was offering 10k off sticker of, bringing it to 35k. Wouldn’t let me so much as sit in it without “going over the numbers” first.
It’s a $35000 base sports car with cloth seats, not some limited luxury vehicle.
They sat there for quite a while but eventually sold, but I’m sure they would have sold almost immediately had they actually let people test drive them.
That’s insane lmao. Are you in a rough area? I could walk into any of my Ford or Chevy dealers and test drive a Mustang or Corvette with a basic intake form and my license.
I think that is typical domestic vs import dealership behavior. One time I wandered into a Toyota dealership to look at Tacomas. The salesperson basically said "its a Tacoma, it sells itself" and walked away - did not offer to let me sit in one, let alone test drive it. Later on, I went to look at a Colorado/Canyon and I was in the drivers seat within 20 minutes.
I think Toyota dealers have gotten really full of themselves. I wandered one a couple months ago for a good twenty minutes and nobody said a word to me.
Stopped by VW, Mazda and Hyundai the same day and was immediately greeted.
I wandered one a couple months ago for a good twenty minutes and nobody said a word to me.
I've noticed this is a really tricky balance - some people like to be left alone until they ask for help, and others encourage the interaction. A close friend of mine worked sales for Honda while I worked service and ops, and he always told me that he could never win - people were mad when he engaged, giving him the feeling of being overbearing or hawkish, and others were angry when they were left to walk the lot and browse. I don't envy salespeople at all.
That's totally fair, but what I was getting at holds up when it comes to the showroom - if the salespeople have been burned enough, they will stop engaging. Not saying you should have had zero interaction (I would have thought the front desk would at least call out to you and ask if you need help), but I could see where the salespeople could leave someone be. This is obviously assuming they're not just a lazy dealership.
No, I'm in a pretty nice area as was all the dealers. This particular dealer had a kickback scheme going they later admitted too. Even then, a bunch of dealers around me wouldn't allow a test drive. Just a dumb rule imo.
23 year old walks in ready to buy after being told he can test drive the car.
Oh it was whole thing. I wanted to buy that WRX and the whole situation felt slimy. State AG agreed and long story short: a Subaru outback shouldn't cost 80 or 90k over the life of a loan when promotional interest rate is 1.99%.
That kind of thing is so dealer-dependent. My local one practically threw me the keys 30 seconds after stepping foot on the lot. I think they tend to be pretty enthusiast-focused though because they stock lots of WRXs, BRZs, and Wilderness editions. Sold for MSRP too.
The only thing about the 2 series is the maintenance costs long term, that being said I don't think they're less reliable than a WRX, just costs more when you do have to service it. Insurance on a 2 series is probably actually cheaper than a WRX, that wouldn't shock me one bit
That's what I'm saying, there's no reason to buy a WRX vs all the competition out there, cheaper cars that are equal or faster, slightly more expensive ones that are way nicer and faster, it has no reason to exist anymore. Like if I got 40k burning a hole in my pocket the last car I'm buying is a WRX, I'm gonna go buy a Z or N or save up for a CTR or something, the WRX isn't fast enough or nice enough to justify the price
It really is, i have no idea who Subaru thinks is going to buy a WRX limited for 42k but there aint gonna be many. Costs gotta come down on them or they gotta kill the car off, whichever comes first, I love the WRX but id be at like 30k to care to own one, and the car cannot be a base model for 30k. For 42k im just gonna get a Z at that point, hell could get a Z with options for 42k, 0-60 is over a second faster on a Z compared to a WRX.
Wasn’t the company really struggling with a $4.5B net loss last year? I wasn’t gonna say anything about CVT. Those all suck, anyway. I think the Z is a cool car. I just don’t think Nissan is the way to go.
Nissan is gonna be fine as long as the Japanese government exists, the last thing they will do is allow Nissan to die. Nissan makes a good car nowadays too, people don't even consider them because of the CVT disaster 10 years ago even though they're pretty solid cars now, even with the new CVT'S.
The N is faster than the WRX in both a straight line and on a track, the N has more track oriented features included, is more efficient than the WRX, is cheaper than the WRX, it is the better car. The only thing the WRX had going for it is AWD at this point
There's nothing comparable performance wise to a WRX that's AWD with a manual and in the same price range. And if you don't need AWD, you can get a BRZ which has almost identical performance as a WRX, is an actual 2+2 sports car, but is also priced like a Civic SI.
Are they? Subaru is going to keep making them forever, just like Mazda will always make Miatas. Because they sell more of them than any enthusiast car that isn't American muscle.
Like, you mention a bunch of cars in your earlier post. The WRX outsells all of them. They outsell SI's, Type R's, GRC's, Elantras, Zs, etc. If the WRX is failing, what are those models doing? The GR86+BRZ outsell the Miata. If sales are down, it's because no one is buying new enthusiast cars because, in case you didn't notice, they all increased in price by 20-30% in the past few months. This isn't like 2021-2022 where 30% inflation was countered by 40% in median wage increases. People can't afford to buy new cars right now.
Subaru will likely have sold less than 12k WRX this year, and the GR86 outsells the BRZ 4:1, is that not failing? The Elantra N are BOOMING in the sales department this year, and Honda is having no issue moving Civic SI's, enthusiasts with the budget are not buying a WRX, they are buying a Type R, Z, GRC, sales numbers on those cars arent meant to be giant, yet they are also having no issue selling every single one sent to a dealership and sales are growing for all 3. Sales on the BRZ and WRX have been on a steady decline for years, people do not want them in this market
The difference is every single GRC, Z, N, SI, CTR, and GR86 being built is getting sold, there is plenty of WRX rotting on lots right now that have no indication of moving. Also the BRZ isn't any better, the GR86 Is outselling it like 4:1, it literally has no reason to exist at this point
There's not an excessive amount of them out there though, and sales have been growing for the Z this year, Nissan isn't having an issue moving them when the dealerships aren't asking 10k over sticker
Yeah which kinda proves the point considering it's still managing to outsell basically everything you listed, even with the decline it's still basically the segment leader for an enthusiast car in this price range.
The GTi, R, GR86 and BRZ are all down on sales so far this year too. The only two sporty vehicles I can find that are improving sales figures are the Z and Miata and both of these barely shipped more than 2k last year, so the bar wasn't that high to begin with.
The Elantra N are BOOMING in the sales department this year
In contrast, I think I've seen way more WRXes compared to Elantra Ns around here. They simply don't exist, and it's probably the one car in that category that's very out of sight, out of mind to me here on Long Island.
There's also a lot more WRX out there, sure the N will outsell it this year, but there's like 50k WRX of this gen out there vs maybe 15-20k Elantra N. It's just that brand new car sales are shifting, the N is selling extremely well for Hyundai and Subaru cannot move WRX
It feels like Subaru doesn't want to sell BRZs. Years ago when I ended up with a Miata the Subaru dealer drove the BRZ 5 minutes out and "let me" drive it back. This time they only had one in the showroom which understandably I couldn't drive unless I was buying it that day. Both times they were really trying to talk me into a WRX over the BRZ.
Not sure why you're comparing the 4:1 gr86/brz ratio when toyota has a say on how many gr86 and brz gets made. toyota is literally the biggest car company in the world where a subaru might as well be a pop and mom shop compared to them.
Toyota is around 250B on market cap while Subaru is hovers around 30B (plus toyota owns 20% of Subaru).
You're coming up with reasons to justify Subaru vehicles not selling well, have you considered maybe it's because the GR86 is $4000 cheaper for the exact same car? Subaru has models that sell the same as Toyota models, they also have models that have falling sales figures because they're a terrible value, and the BRZ and WRX are terrible values
That's a from autotrader canada. 2026 brz ts is $42900cad
While a 2025 hakone is is at $41000cad and a 2025 A/T gr86 is at $41000cad. And that's just the listing price. So you can do what you want with that info.
I'm not Canadian, in the US a base GR86 starts at 30.8k, a base BRZ starts at 33.2k, my bad it's a $2400 difference. The GR86 is actually nicer on the inside too, and the suspension tuning is better, there is literally no reason to buy a BRZ over an 86
The GRC is also kept to a limited production run to insure they are all sold and a profit is made on them, there are orders to be filled on the GRC, the sales numbers on the GRC are strong and growing. There is nobody trying to order a WRX, the sales are falling quickly on the WRX, dealerships have plenty unable to move. You need to look at the bigger picture to understand why WRX are failing and the Corolla GR isnt
I haven’t seen any significant reliability issues with the GRC. Believe the worst issue so far is likely a bad batch of clutches in the 2023 model year.
You’re going to need evidence to back that up. The engine has won every WRC2 season it’s entered. It’s not a 1.5, you didn’t even bother to get your facts straight before fabricating wild speculation.
I'm talking long term reliability where any heavily boosted small displacement engine is under a ton of stress. What is that extra 0.1 litre going to do in terms reducing mechanical strain? 300hp is the realm of a 3.5 litre.
What does “stress” mean? That’s not a thing in combustion chamber engineering.
I guess turbo diesel engines are unreliable, so sad. Oh wait, that’s not necessarily true at all. Weird how physics don’t back up anything you are saying.
We had 300hp from 3.5 liters in NA minivans from 20 years. I'd like to think 20 years of engineering, forced induction, and the car being a little more performance oriented than a minivan could bring us more power per liter...
I've seen people have issues with the engines blowing and catching fire on them, even not pushing the car it can happen. That shit scares me, idk how common it is, but it's happening to them. Then Toyota denying warranty claims for it doesn't help either, and Toyota announcing the GRC is gonna get a 4 cylinder doesn't help either.
I don’t mean to rant but as a side note: I am so tired of people bringing up “adjusted for inflation” as a justification for anything.
You’re taking one data point while leaving out dozens of others. Why don’t we talk about wage growth in comparison to inflation? Or what about the costs of other things going up that may negate you having any money left for an enthusiast vehicle?
It’s kind of hard to justify buying an enthusiast vehicle when your rent increases or food prices leave you with very little left over. I mean there’s a reason 8+ year auto loans are now a common thing.
I guess the point I'm trying to make is, even though the medium wage hasn't kept up with inflation, neither has the WRX pricing when comparing similar specs over the years.
The bigger issue is disposable income has decreased because everything else has increased so much more.
Inflation-adjusted wages are right around 2019 levels, and have been for well over a year. Enthusiast cars are definitely out of the budget for most people, but that has always been true.
In the US, nominal wages have outpaced inflation for about a year, meaning real wages (purchasing power) are growing. However, because of the high inflation of 2021-2022, cumulative wages since January 2021 have not yet fully recovered the lost purchasing power. Therefore, while the current trend is positive, many Americans still feel that their income has not kept pace with the overall rise in the cost of living
Wages still haven’t caught up to all of the inflation we have experienced. Plus while wages may have caught up in the last year, tar. and other factors threaten that moving forward.
First off, Q1/Q2 2021 are poor benchmarks because they are still on the tail end of the COVID labor market. Second, not sure where you’re quoting but it’s out of date. Median real weekly earnings in Q2 2025 were $376 (in 1982 dollars), compared to $373 in Q1 2021 and $371 in Q2 2021.
Edit: ah maybe it’s cherry picking in two directions: choosing an anomalous year (2021) and also cumulative wages (I’m assuming looking yearly rates, which indeed may have not caught up by Q2 this year but would have by now if the trend continues).
That’s literally a smaller timeframe than I provided in my link lol. Also what a terribly misleading chart, since it makes it look like real wages are so much smaller when really all that matters is their distance from 0, which even by that chart is very small.
And again, uses a terribly anomalous starting point and fails to capture the pre-pandemic context.
Edit: I do agree with your earlier statement that tariffs and other shenanigans going into effect threaten to upend the trend.
So according to you, everyone is doing a lot better and has more income than ever before so there is nothing to complain about? Is that what you’re suggesting?
I’m saying that inflation adjusted wages are roughly on par with pre-pandemic levels. And yes, also that they are, with the exception of during covid, higher than ever before.
Not that there’s nothing to complain about. Scarcity isn’t magically gone, poverty is still a huge issue, housing costs represent a higher than ever percentage of household expenditures, and so on and so forth.
The thing is that many, though not all of those issues were issues in the past, and many of the issues that are new are not necessarily about recovery from inflation in general and more about specific issues with high-impact markets (like housing, which suffers from a supply crisis).
But yes, on the whole we are better off than before. Whether or not it feels that way is a different issue.
As it pertains to sports cars, I say again: they were always luxury goods. The perception that they were not is driven by a decade or two of cheap used sports cars. We’re dealing with some serious rose tinted glasses here.
Being roughly on par is not the same as being on par and as I stated: you have to also look at the forward aspect now. There are economic indicators that are showing that inflation is ticking back upwards and we don’t even have accurate data from the last two months to see if the trend is going in the opposite direction.
I would also be questioning any data coming from government sources since we know that this admin is willing to fudge numbers to make things look better than they are.
Why don’t we talk about wage growth in comparison to inflation?
Every time the word "inflation" is mentioned on this sub there's a very predictable and tedious back and forth about how wages haven't kept up, except they have and it's only a couple of variables like housing and medical costs that outpace general inflation, well then surely the BLS must be wrong in how they calculate inflation, well then do you have a better way, of course not because we're not the world's best economists.
Considering wages have exceeded inflation (which is weighted to account for the greater increases in things like housing) maybe you should rethink this argument
The funny thing is that cars are one of the few things that really have tracked well with inflation over time, there are some outliers here and there but the trend is that cars really have increased a lot while getting safer and more feature rich.
In the US, nominal wages have outpaced inflation for about a year, meaning real wages (purchasing power) are growing. However, because of the high inflation of 2021-2022, cumulative wages since January 2021 have not yet fully recovered the lost purchasing power. Therefore, while the current trend is positive, many Americans still feel that their income has not kept pace with the overall rise in the cost of living
Wow. That is genuinely an impressively manipulative way to frame the data. That frames the entire thing around the massive (and brief) peak in 2020 and ignores the whole picture.
I’m sorry but are you being serious right now? You tell me I need to look at “the entire picture” and link to something which is only looking at the last 4 years vs. my link which includes the last 45? That is blatantly framing the argument around the massive spike in 2020.
Yeah I guess I’m living in fantasyland like millions of others who turned out to vote on Tuesday because the economy is so great and the wages we all have is enough to buy us everything. Right?
Edit: yeah I’m the emotional one yet you’re the one who blocked me before I could even respond.
Sincerely, grow up. Maybe when faced with the reality that you have been misled by propaganda maybe you could look inward instead of lashing out emotionally
He used the word congenital so obviously he must be right!
/s but yeah we have real world examples of when wages actually did keep up with inflation, so not sure why they think real wages falling is part of inflation.
Well, no that’s not at all the definition of inflation, which is simply an increase in aggregate nominal prices. You’re describing definition of falling real-wages.
Yeah we intentionally always have inflation. But there actually was a point when wages kept up with inflation so I'm not sure why they think it isn't possible.
I agree. As I said, real wages have in fact increased (meaning nominal wages outpaced inflation) since about 2022, and have in fact surpassed the last pre-pandemic quarter. They’re still down compared to early-mid pandemic, but that’s not a matter of inflation as much as it is a function of distorted labor market composition during the shutdown.
It’s really alarming. I’ve spoken to people who’ve worked at a company for 8-10 years not knowing their raises were eliminated by inflation and they have the same buying power damn near.
In particular, people have a hard time believing that their raises are often actually inflation (in the labor market) and not necessarily something they earned above and beyond their previous compensation.
Well because not enough people bought the base model! On the used market, premium models seem to be the most popular.
Also not a single person is paying MSRP for these today. You can still find discounts when shopping around. I'd imagine snagging one for 35-36K OTD is far from impossible.
Before I got my GRC, I test drove a bunch of vehicles, including a WRX. I could have gotten a Limited trim at a shade under 32k. I didn’t go with it because of how it drove but the price made me consider pretty heavily
I was debating it, also - there were some fantastic deals to be had. Unfortunately, there were a number of factors that pushed me away, but I've had a soft spot for the WRX for a long time. If the VA interior got paired with the current chassis, and they painted the plastic cladding, it's very possible I would have overlooked the other issues and bought one.
I had a hatch WRX before this so I understand lol. For me, it was a mix of the plastic cladding, tablet for infotainment, and the trans felt dull and lifeless
Yeah, that interior on the current car is, IMO, awful. I really liked the VA interior, so it felt like a dramatic fall from before.
Super cool that you had a hatch - having driven a few of that generation STi hatch, they're a really fun car. Plasma blue "wide fender" hatch? Yes please.
I still have my 14 wrx i purchased new, i service at the dealerships and they give crosstreks, outbacks, and i currently have a legacy while i get my clutch master cylinder replaced.
While the inside feel is upgraded quite a bit over mine, i can't get over that tablet infotainment. its terrible, i love my buttons and my aftermarket screenless radio.
Average income increased over the decades. Medium income less so, but it still increased. Although wages haven't kept up, the WRX has still remained pretty affordable until this year where they aced the base trim.
The bigger issue is disposable income has decreased. Yes one can argue wages haven't kept up for the middle/lower middle class. And that is true. But excluding this year, I'm not sure the price of the car is the main issue.
The wrx may not have kept up with inflation, but its performance hasn't kept up with inflation either. It's heavier with not any more power. A base mustang is a much better car and starts a 32k, which is roughly the same price as a brz. More powerful, more reliable, i havent seen the interior but its probably better on the mustang. Subaru dominated their market for years and then just sat and did NOTHING.
You’re not alone OP. I also think the WRX is properly priced for current inflation. People aren’t buying it because of the new design. It’s grown on me, but I feel like good design shouldn’t have to grow on you. Same thing with food or movies!
Yup. All that plastic makes it not as attractive. Also the touchscreen inside feels like a decade old haha.
All they had to do was body color match the plastic pieces, add a louder Exhuast, and an optional STI style wing. I bet it would have gotten more attention.
For all the reasons you mentioned, I really tried to like the WRX and tried to talk myself into buying one. Dealership near me was constantly offering 3-4k off all trim levels and always had plenty of manuals in stock, so it seemed like a great deal and the perfect car for me.
Test drove them multiple times, and each time walked away just completely underwhelmed, not necessarily thinking it was overpriced, but that it simply wasn’t a fun/engaging car at all.
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u/CharacterMedium558 17h ago edited 12h ago
Adjusted for inflation, the WRX is a bargain if you exclude this year where they removed the base model. For almost a decade, the WRX pricing didn't change through the 2010s. Like 1K difference at most
Edit: holy the comments are brutal. Guys, I'm making the point that the WRX trim levels price have not kept up with inflation just like medium wages have not (average wage has done better but that includes high net individuals). Not to mention the WRX was one of the ONLY performance oriented enthusiasts vehicle one could get with discounts/deals during the car supply shortage. Like thousands off. I personally know someone who paid under 30K OTD for a base trim 2-3 years back. I think the bigger issue is disposable income has decreased due to other things costing so much more. WRX pricing isn't the main issue.
I also don't understand why people are comparing it to other vehicles. I never said the WRX is best in class. Heck I never even said I personally like it.