It’s not too often you find a compact coupe as the car of choice for an older adult who’s kept it under wraps all these years. Mercury Grand Marquis, Toyota Camrys, Ford Tauruses – those are the usual survivor-grade cars we find in our grandparents’ garages. This 1996 Eagle Talon ESi may not be the preferred hot ticket of DSMs with turbocharged engines and all-wheel drive, but it does have only 12,100 miles and is likely one of the nicest ones left. Find it here on eBay with a Buy-It-Now of $9,750 and bidding well short of that at the moment.
The seller claims the car belongs to his brother-in-law who is a bit older and is in a precarious health situation. The Talon was his pride and joy, and it shows given the largely stock condition and clean bodywork. While not tremendously valuable, it is difficult to find one of these cars in preserved condition given how many young drivers flocked to them once they hit the secondhand market. The wheels aren’t factory-correct, but perhaps it’s on a set of seasonal change-overs.
The lower-tier spec may turn off some potential buyers, as the Talon comes with the base engine and an automatic transmission. The interior remains in excellent condition, but again, there’s no leather seating here – just basic gray cloth with a very 90s pattern inset in the buckets. If I were a collector of mothballed Japanese cars, I might be in the running for a specimen like this, but even so, I’d still hold out for the top-shelf trim if I were interested in seeing a return on my investment.
The seller notes he has flushed the gas tank and installed a new fuel pump and battery. To be honest, even with the mileage as low as it is, I would simply use this car as a daily. It will never appreciate hugely if it sits in your garage in a car bubble, so I’d at least like to get some enjoyment out of dailying a near-new example of a classic 90s tuner car. While not everyone may agree with me on that assessment, we’d love to hear how you’d use this timewarp Talon.
My sister had the TSi AWD model of this vintage or thereabout, in white. It was a total blast to toss around, but if I remember correctly, it was nothing but trouble. Lots of major, expensive things went wrong.
10k!!!
Even VERY clean AWD Turbo models don’t come close to that kind of money.
Having spent 10 or so years in the DSM scene, this base model is really not desired. But props to the owner for keeping it clean!
those are chrome hubcaps
The odometer doesn’t line up the way it should???
You guys with your “odometer doesn’t line up” concerns crack me up.
I had a 5 speed TSI black and it was a fun little car. I was going to work one morning and a 70 Camaro pulled alongside at a stop light and wanted a go, well that Talon made him look silly as a goose. I did run the car up in mph on the interstate one day until it started feeling very uncomfortable with the front end getting light I shut it down at 140 mph. Good car never had a single problem with it. When I was done with it I sold it to a kid who did A LOT to the car got that poor little engine up to like 500 hp with a much bigger turbo and nitrous! I bet that 0 to 100 mph was just plain NASTY!!!