I Waited 16 Years To Buy My Dream Car And Somehow It’s Even Better Than I Expected

I just got home from an unexpectedly awesome trip. Over the weekend, I drove from Florida back home to chilly Illinois. It’s something I’ve done before, but this time it was different. This time, I did it behind the wheel of a 2009 Smart Fortwo Passion Cabriolet that I paid just $5,800 for. Despite the car’s immaculate condition I just couldn’t believe that someone drove this car just 27,000 miles over the course of 15 years. I accidentally bought a museum piece and got to live out my teenage dreams doing it.

Back when I was 15 years old, I had a dream that I would own a Smart Fortwo Cabriolet one day. I got to test-drive my dream car, too! Then, reality set in that the best I’d be able to get at first was a coupe. I then started to collect Smarts like they were trading cards, but the unicorn has somehow eluded me for a whole 16 years.

Unfortunately, 16 years of time is a lot for a car. That’s more than enough time to rack up hundreds of thousands of miles and countless owners. Or worse, that’s enough time for cars to be lost to natural disasters, crashes, or to destructive trends. I mean, I’m no stranger to beating on Smarts:

There was a time when you could do a classifieds search in any city and find piles of Smarts with low miles for basically the coins in your pocket and some lint. Those days appear to be in the rearview mirror as I’ve been seeing so many high-mileage, torn-up Smarts listed for sale for the kinds of money nobody should spend to get a beater. Low-mile Smarts are still out there, but then their sellers sometimes want darn near what these cars were worth new, and these cars just aren’t worth that much.

I’ve used the term “unicorn” here and it’s because it seems the car I was looking for didn’t exist. I wanted a Smart Fortwo Passion Cabriolet with every option checked and under 60,000 miles or so for no more than $6,000. That’s about what Smarts were worth in 2019 or so, after all. I looked long and hard for this car for years. It wasn’t hard to find fully loaded convertibles for too much money. It also wasn’t hard to find fully loaded convertibles in my price range but with far too many miles. Other cars that met my price range either didn’t have convertible tops, were devoid of the best options, or had one issue that made the whole thing not worth it.

I suppose a huge part of the problem was the fact that I’m living in 2024 and kept hoping to find something with pre-pandemic pricing. But I’m a stubborn miss and don’t like taking no for an answer.

I also know that this is all a bit silly. Most car enthusiasts my age dream about Ferraris, Koenigseggs, and McLarens. Sure, I had a McLaren F1 on my bedroom wall, but I also had a poster of a Chevrolet Cruze, an Audi TT, and oh so many Smarts. I have a list of attainable dream cars to go with a list of cars I’ll probably never be rich enough to own. Smarts rank at the top of my attainable dream car list alongside something absurd like the Ford F-150 FP700. I know a handful of people–at least one auto journo–who might say my dreams are stupid.

I’ve always hated the idea that a car enthusiast has to like certain cars and be a certain way. As far as I’m concerned, the person who lives and breathes Pontiac Sunbirds is just as much an enthusiast as the guy who can prattle on about the specs of the latest supercar.

Right, so the past couple of weeks have been a rush. I’m gearing up for my first international trip! At the same time, I’m also letting go of a bunch of vehicles I don’t want anymore. I decided now was the time to stop waiting. Now was the time I’d finally make my teenage dream come true.

My Smart search has led to a lot of disappointments. I checked out a car in Chicago that was in worse condition than described. I then checked out another near Rockford and while that one was in much better shape, it still wasn’t in good enough shape for me. A little later, I found a car on Florida’s Longboat Key that seemed to hit every requirement I had. Then that car got taken out by Hurricane Helene. Thankfully, the owner had an insurance policy worth more than the car was and his condo was entirely untouched by the storm, so the owner wasn’t particularly worried.

Weirdly, I’m thankful that I passed up on all of these cars, plus some other cars including some diesel vans and a pimped-out International turned into a pickup truck. Had I chosen any of these vehicles, I would have missed out on my unicorn.

On Thursday, I found it. Located near Gainesville, Florida, was a 2009 Smart Fortwo Passion Cabriolet.

The car had every option checked, perfect paint, untarnished wheels, a working convertible top, and shockingly, an advertised 28,000 miles. The seller wanted $6,000. I didn’t even take a full breath before messaging the seller. I don’t remember how long it took, but we chatted about the car’s condition, confirmed a price of $5,800, and I booked the earliest flight I could find for Saturday. I committed to buying this car without seeing more than a handful of pictures of it and hoping that the seller was being truthful.

Honestly, I was scared the whole time. I ran a VIN check and entries by Florida’s DMV suggested that the mileage was accurate, but I was still not convinced. Something felt off. This car seemed like it was far too cheap for its low mileage. But, I suppose the best way to figure this out was to find out for myself.

On Saturday, I boarded a Delta Boeing 737 flight in Chicago and flew a short hop to Atlanta. I then got stuck in Atlanta for around four hours as my connecting flight got delayed. Thankfully, it didn’t get canceled and eventually, I boarded a Boeing 717 for the shortest flight I’ve ever taken.

The Boeing 717 part was so fun because I’ve never been on one of those before. I chose a seat directly next to engine 2’s nacelle. It was loud back there, but I enjoyed the noise for all of the 40 minutes or so we were in the air. The pilots never even extinguished the seatbelt sign.

I didn’t stay in Gainesville for too long. The seller concocted a plan to meet me at the airport with the car. Sure enough, I exchanged the money and signed the paperwork right there. I’m not sure I’ve ever had an easier time buying a car private party. I was on the road maybe 15 minutes after I walked off of the plane.

What was immediately shocking to me was that the car wasn’t just in great condition, it was in nearly new condition.

My Smart-Est Buy

Smarts don’t always age gracefully. These cars have a lot of “tells” for mileage and age. The paint on the plastic panels gets pitted and dull, the interior fabrics fade from sun exposure, especially on the dashboard. Interior plastics get dingy. The convertible tops shrink, the hardtops delaminate, and the panoramic tops crack. Other tells include cloudy headlights, peeling paint, and missing underbody trays. A Smart that has spent its life working hard outside will not be afraid to show some wear.

If that car lives in the Midwest or East Coast there will be at least some rust on the vehicle’s rear subframe. High-mileage examples in the same regions have been seen to have crumbling rear crash bars.

There are a few ways to note high mileage. Smart steering wheels are wrapped in leather and have a matte appearance with a grippy surface when they’re new. A Smart with a lot of miles will have a slippery and shiny steering wheel. A Smart with even more miles may exhibit peeling from the leather.

Cars equipped with leather seats will also show you signs of high mileage. Smart didn’t use the best leather for these seats and the seats go through a similar wear process as the steering wheel. They start off as a sort of grippy matte look, then they get shiny, and then they start falling apart.

Other mileage “tells” include the rubber brake pedal cover, which will wear like the sole of a shoe, the footwell carpet, which will often develop holes from shoes, and the turn signal stalk, which will lose its inscriptions after years of use.

This car had none of that. The steering wheel was still mostly matte, the seats were still mostly matte, the dashboard fabrics still had their factory shimmer, and even the dash plastics looked exactly as I remembered them from 2008.

Keep in mind that I do already have two other Smarts from this generation. I drove one of them over 160,000 miles before retiring it from daily driver duty. I know how these cars age. So, I sat there in shock at how “new” this car felt. It still even had that new second-generation Smart smell that I haven’t taken a whiff of since 2013 or so. This car also had that other new Smart smell where the engine bay smells like it’s burning.

The seller even over-delivered on the mileage claim. The car actually had 27,870 miles, which is pretty neat! Still, I couldn’t believe it. That would mean the original owner purchased this car in 2009 and then drove it less than 1,900 miles a year since. I was informed that the car was set up to be towed behind a motorhome. However, even Smarts towed behind motorhomes still present with age-based wear. Instead, they have peeling paint and such but low odometer readings. I was told that the original owner of this car didn’t drive it much and rarely even took it out of the garage to hitch up to the back of the RV.

Unfortunately, the proper way to tow a Smart behind a motorhome involves disconnecting the battery so the car’s computers don’t accidentally freak out. This also kills the odometer. So, it does have more than the indicated 27,000 miles, but the real mileage is unlikely to be super high.

It’s also not super easy to roll a Smart’s odometer back. Odometer data is stored not in the instrument cluster, but on a Smart’s SAM, which is essentially the command center for all of the car’s other computers. Even if the SAM has been replaced, the new one has to be coded with the old SAM’s data.

Still, I had my doubts. I kept feeling like there had to be a catch, like a washed title or something. Finally, I found the car’s service history and I learned something fascinating. The original owner of my car purchased it from Smart Center Orange Park in December 2008. He then took the car to the dealership for service every six months, regardless of whether the car needed anything or not. He got everything done at the dealer, even simple stuff like wiper blades. Yeah, the original owner really overpaid for Smart-branded Bosch windshield wipers that you can get basically anywhere cheaper without a Smart logo.

This explained a lot. The oil in my car was shockingly clean and the coolant looked brand new. Well, that’s because the original owner changed out all of the vehicle’s fluids on a regular basis even though he never drove the car more than a few thousand miles in a year. How regular? The service records suggest that he sometimes got the oil changed twice a year. I’ll remind you that on average, he drove this thing about 1,900 miles a year.

I bought the car from the second owner, who bought it in 2022 for what the Florida DMV seems to think is $7,500 or so. According to the records, the second owner drove the car maybe 500 miles or so over the two years, but they kept up with the first owner’s commitment to getting the car checked often like a high-maintenance pet. So, my car is legitimately a cream puff museum piece, and it’s not because of anything weird, but because its first two owners cared for the little car like it was their own kid or something.

The drive home was something unexpected. I went into this thinking that okay, I’m going to get a low-mileage car and have a great time. Instead, what I got was an experience I never thought I would have. I put the top down, cranked up the stereo, and hit the road. Suddenly, I felt like that little teenager all over again. I remembered smelling the new Smart smell, looking up at the open sky, and throwing my hands into the air. Now, 16 years later I’m doing it all over again and this time the car isn’t a loaner. This became so much more than just a low-mile Smart.

My drive home was entirely uneventful. The car was pampered throughout its life and it gave no protest to driving 1,100 miles back home. However, I did learn of a few age-related quirks. The front engine mount is dying, but not because of wear. The car has sat for so long that the rubber inside of the mount is dry-rotting. Likewise, the stereo volume knob is shedding. It’s the only part of the interior made out of that rubbery plastic crap that always ages poorly. Finally, the stereo’s subwoofer is intermittent. This is a common issue that happens with these cars. I already have a spare working subwoofer and I don’t like the factory stereo headunit, so I don’t care about those two issues.

It’s great to buy a car that’s in such fine shape that my complaints are about a broken speaker rather than a gaping rust hole or some mechanical problem.

As for the drive itself, it went much easier than expected. I did drive through some bad Helene damage in southern Georgia, but my route was completely clear. My route, which took me up I-75, I-24, and I-65, avoided the worst of the hurricane’s path. I saw countless aid trucks, shredders, construction equipment, and other heavy equipment out there, so I decided to stay out of the way of the people who knew what they were doing.

The car also seemed to love the drive. At first, the engine seemed sluggish above 4,000 RPM and it was also thirsty for a Smart. My first full tank of fuel saw the car “guzzle” fuel at 32 mpg. In my experience, Smarts that never leave city environments tend to be the ones to get bad fuel economy. Their engines also almost seem to get “tight” in the higher RPM range. My solution? Drive this car fast and hard. Each tank got better than the last, even though I kept the speedometer pegged at the far end. I was doing 36 mpg through the mountains and hit 40 mpg but the time I pulled into my neighborhood last night.

Speaking of the mountains, I’m proud of the little car. Sure, the mountains in Tennessee are nothing like the Rockies, but the little 70 HP Mitsubishi mill in the rear end deserves some applause for handling it without needing to downshift. My route took me through Florida, Georgia, Tennessee, Kentucky, Indiana, and then finally home to Illinois. It was about 17 hours in total, but I stopped about 5 hours into the trip at a hotel in Atlanta for my overnight stop. The drive home on Sunday was non-stop from Atlanta until I got to my door at home.

Honestly, the trip home wasn’t much to write home about. A whole lot of nothing happened. The car didn’t register a single error on my Autel scanner and I never got a single warning light. It was just a long solo drive. Heck, the car didn’t even make the suspension noise that high-mileage Smarts exhibit.

Okay, it wasn’t entirely uneventful. I had the top down for the entire 17 hours and I’m now thoroughly convinced that convertibles are the best type of car. I had good tunes playing, wind in my face, and beautiful America passing by my open top. I just kicked back, relaxed, and pointed the front tires toward home.

Weirdly, the car also got lots of thumbs up and positive attention. I say it’s weird because there are just short of 100,000 of these cars in America. You’d think people would be used to them by now!

Smarts are fine road trip cars, too. Sure, they aren’t the most comfortable and these older ones don’t have cruise control (aftermarket units do exist), but the car will happily scoot down the road at 85 mph all day if you ask it to. The only real problem you’ll run into is when you face strong crosswinds or strong headwinds. Then, driving becomes more work than it would be with a more normal car. But it’s just more work keeping the wheel steady, not dangerous. The only time I’ve ever been blown into another lane in a Smart was several years ago when I was hit by a 60 mph gust outside of Chicago. The semi in front of me fared worse.

To be clear, there are far better vehicles if you do nothing but road trips, but don’t be afraid to stretch out that Smart’s legs. These cars will go anywhere you take them, no matter how far away that final destination is. Just be prepared to feel every crack in the road and be willing to run that engine hard. It can take it!

Honestly, the road trip was the least surprising part of this whole adventure to me. The real surprise was that this car had far exceeded my expectations. I wanted a low-mileage Smart; I wasn’t expecting something about as close to a new Smart as I’m likely to find. But that’s what I got and I’m in love. I finally got to live out my teenage dreams and now I get to continue this car’s lazy life.

It’s crazy to think how I landed myself here. Had I not sold those other cars I wouldn’t be in this position. Had I bought one of those other Smarts I would not be in this position. A lot of different holes lined up perfectly for this to happen. I don’t believe in fate, but this feels like it has to come pretty close.

So, I’m excited. You’re not done hearing about this car yet. I’m going to compare this car to my wife’s Scion iQ. I also want to do a few things here and there to make it truly mine. As for a name, I already have one picked out. This is a unicorn, right? I gave it a name that refers to my wife, the other unicorn in my life.

(Images: Author)