Drives Like New: 1988 Yugo GVS
A few years after Malcolm Bricklin made a decent amount of money importing Subarus in the USA, he launched his own auto company, which made the DeLoreanesque SV-1. The SV-1 is a cool car, but was arguably a financial failure, so Mr Bricklin went back to doing what he did best: importing cheap cars for the US economy car market. Except for the next project he didn’t find a reliable Japanese partner and instead partnered with the Serbian based Zastava Automobiles….and the rest is history. Find this 1988 Yugo GVS offered for $4,600 in Pleasant Hill, OH. Tip from FuelTruck.
Zastava Automobiles started production in 1980 of a subcompact called the Koral, designed in Italy under the designation Fiat 144, which was a variant of the Fiat 127. In 1987 Bricklin introduced five models of the same car rebadged as a Yugo under the model names GV (Great Value), GVC, GVL, GVS, and GVX, the last one allegedly sporting a 1300 cc “race-inspired” engine and 5-speed gearbox. Importation of the Yugo was ground to a halt in 1990 when the EPA forced a massive recall due to its failure to meet emissions standards.
No more damning phrase can ever be written in a car ad than someone
describing an 1988 Yugo GVS as “runs and drives like new”. We could have
hoped, given 27 years to improve it, someone perhaps would have.
Nope. Not here.
See another oddball economy car with low miles and in great condition? tips@dailyturismo.com
Dang! I knew I should have gotten into Yugos before this price bubble started. Oh well…..
But you gotta love the 0 depreciation. From what I found on the intrawad, the original sticker price for a GV was $4199 and was $4699 for a GVS. Think of all the fun that has been had over 27 years and no loss of capital!
Accounting for inflation, I'd say it did depreciate. $4699 in 1988 dollars = $9541 in 2015. However, 50% depreciation is far less than what I'd expect for one of these!
And if you had deployed your capital of $4,600 in an S&P 500 index fund in 1988, it would be worth $22,664 today, based on an average yearly return of 8.3% for the S&P 500 over the last 20 years.
Ok ok. Good financial arguments, but I still think you are under-appreciating the pride of ownership and pleasure received from that 'Italian-like' design and fine-ish engineering over those oh so long 27 years…
I will take the M-45 and have $500 for gas !
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27 year old tires! And you thought high speeds in a new Yugo were scary…
When I was in the Army of course every other dumbass like me spent all their money on new flashy cars once out of Basic. I had a 1965 Mustang, a friend had a new Corvette, so on and so forth.
Dan? Dan bought a Yugo. Dan hardly ever went anywhere, either, and saved his money. His Yugo always ran but no one wanted to ride with him since it was a Yugo.
Dan stayed in for four years and got out and bought a sailboat and single handed it to Greece where I lost touch with him.
I got out with a boom box and a handful of CDs (someone stole the Mustang).
I worked on one of these like a decade ago, and I might be wrong, but my memory tells me that the hoodscoop feeds the heater.