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Junkyard Gem: 2015 Mitsubishi Mirage Hatchback

Remember the front-wheel-drive Dodge and Plymouth Colts (not to mention the Plymouth Champ and Eagle Summit) of the late 1970s through the middle 1990s? Those were Mitsubishi Mirages, and you could buy them here with Mitsubishi badging from 1985 through 2002. Then, for the 2014 model year, the Mirage returned to North America, as the cheapest new car you could buy here. Now, barely a half-decade later, I'm seeing significant quantities of these Mirages in the car graveyards I frequent. Here's a pretty clean '15 in a yard located within sight of Pikes Peak in Colorado. I began seeing the current generation of Fiat 500 in the cheap U-Wrench yards when those cars hit about six or seven years of age, and the same goes for the Sebring-based Chrysler 200s. The Mirage beats that dubious distinction by a year or two. Really, the only shorter showroom-to-junkyard average interval I've witnessed in my 38 years of junkyard crawling was achieved by the genuinely miserable early Hyundai Excels, which started to be discarded in quantity when they hit about age four; I recall seeing dozens of them in Southern California yards with 25,000 miles on the clock and hardly any interior wear-and-tear. Even the Yugo did better (and this is why I remain amazed by the generally high quality of Hyundai products starting in the early-to-mid 1990s; Hyundai gets my personal "Most Improved Automaker" award for that achievement). That said, I don't agree with the legions of my car-writer colleagues who love to trash the humble Mirage. I reviewed the 2014 Mirage, and then— just because I feel such affection for cheap commuter-mobiles— went back and wrote up the 2017 Mirage GT. These cars aren't much fun to drive, they have decidedly low-rent interiors, and you don't look like a serious car expert when the masses see you behind the wheel of one. And yet, if you're 22 years old in your first "real" job and you'll get canned if you're late even once, choosing a new car with a strong warranty, with non-ball-busting credit terms and a somewhat lower monthly payment than those other subcompacts that provide more road feel when you're at the limit of the performance envelope, you know, when you're trail-braking for a late pass on your favorite two-lane freeway offrampÂ… well, the Mirage looks like a pretty good deal on a transportation appliance.

Mitsubishi prices 2014 Outlander from $22,995*

Mitsubishi will gladly sell you a 2014 Outlander ES for $22,995, excluding an $835 destination fee. Buyers can step up to the middle-tier Outlander SE for $23,795, or around $200 less than last year. That stack of cash will net you 18-inch aluminum wheels, a 6.1-inch LCD information display, dual-zone climate control and other goodies. Somewhat more impressively, Mitsubishi has cut the price tag for the Outlander GT by $800. That machine will run you $27,795, and throws in a more potent V6 engine, the company's Super All-Wheel Control system and HID headlamps.
The 2014 Outlander bows with an all-new exterior design, and base models receive a 166-horsepowr 2.4-liter four-cylinder paired with a continuously variable transmission and an all-wheel-drive system. That driveline is good for 24 miles per gallon city and 29 mpg highway. Check out the full pricing press release below and our own Jonathon Ramsey's first drive here.

Subprime financing on the rise in new car sales, leasing too

We all remember the financial crisis that began several years back. At its core was a splurge of subprime lending for housing loans. The housing bubble burst, triggering a collapse of the mortgage-backed securities market. Apparently, those types of loans still exist in the automotive industry, and the market share for these types of "nonprime, subprime, and deep subprime," loans has grown 13.6 percent compared to the third quarter a year ago.
According to an Automotive News report, high-risk lending expanded to 24.8 percent of total loans in Q3, up from 21.9 percent for this time last year. As this level increased, average credit scores of borrowers dropped to 755, down from 763 a year ago. In that time, the average financing amount increased $90 per vehicle, to $25,963.
At 818, Volvo maintains the highest per-owner credit score, while Mitsubishi has the lowest, at 694. The highest rate of borrowers was at Toyota, with 14 percent of the market, followed by Ford with 13.1 percent and Chevrolet at 11.1.