Used Car of the Day: 1997 Lotus Elise

by Tim Healey

Published: December 1st, 2022

A bit late with UCOTD today, as I had other duties in the morning, but I'm making up for it with this unique choice: A 1997 Lotus Elise.

An S1 in Azure Blue, this baby has just 80K miles on the clock despite being a quarter-century old. It's been legally imported and has all the proper docs, including the U.K. title.

There's not much more to say, other than the price is $30K.

Oh, and it's right-hand drive. Go check it out.

[Images: Seller]

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Tim Healey

Tim Healey grew up around the auto-parts business and has always had a love for cars — his parents joke his first word was “‘Vette”. Despite this, he wanted to pursue a career in sports writing but he ended up falling semi-accidentally into the automotive-journalism industry, first at Consumer Guide Automotive and later at Web2Carz.com. He also worked as an industry analyst at Mintel Group and freelanced for About.com, CarFax, Vehix.com, High Gear Media, Torque News, FutureCar.com, Cars.com, among others, and of course Vertical Scope sites such as AutoGuide.com, Off-Road.com, and HybridCars.com. He’s an urbanite and as such, doesn’t need a daily driver, but if he had one, it would be compact, sporty, and have a manual transmission.

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Comments

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4 of 11 comments

ToolGuy on Dec 01, 2022

This chassis might make a good starting point for an electric roadster.

1 Reply
- Analoggrotto on Dec 02, 2022
  
  Indeed it was....
  
  1
- AZFelix on Dec 02, 2022
  
  Include some red underwear and a built in flamethrower system and I would buy one.
  
  Like
Fred on Dec 02, 2022

I thought about trading my Elan for an Elise. I set a price of $25,000 but they never quite made it that low, except for some wrecked cars. I'm still happily driving the Elan

Like Reply
- Analoggrotto on Dec 02, 2022
  
  I know a guy who picked up an S2 with a salvage title for around that price. Hang onto the Elan, it's too good.
  
  Like
- 28-Cars-Later on Dec 05, 2022
  
  The S2000 defies all known laws of finance.
  
  Like

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