- Nate Kuhn
Nate's Powerball Dream Garage
In our Everyday Driver writer’s series of dream garages, all of our writing staff are sharing our particular dream garages. Now, any of my friends will tell you that this is among my all time favorite conversations. I call it “the game” - usually starting with criteria (price caps, a list of requirements/constraints/etc)... But for this round for myself and the rest of our writers are keeping it pretty simple: 5 car dream garage with money nor upkeep/maintenance cost in mind. We are assuming we have the money to buy these vehicles as well as the money to keep them perfectly maintained.
For my entry of this “game” I have to put SOME guidelines on myself. Otherwise, it’s just a list of high dollar supercars that don’t have to really function. That's fun but too easy. I find that my dream garage lists are most interesting when I think of covering a lot of uses with my stable. So while I will ignore price and upkeep, I will attempt to cover anything I might want to ever do with these vehicles purchased.
SO, if I won the Powerball lottery (which averages $140 million USD jackpots) this is my 5-car dream garage that I would fill:
#1 THE SUPERCAR My personal proclivities tend to lean towards analog cars. I am not a huge fan of a suite of driver modes, digital interference, etc. I prefer traction/stability control that is easily turned completely off and ABS. That’s about it.
So, the last 10-15 years of supercars have not really done it for me in the way the prior era did. In my opinion, the Mt Everest of analog supercars end up on a short list of the early 00’s and the one that does it most for ME is the Porsche Carrera GT.
A screaming v10, open air, manual transmission with clean bodywork that looks restrained until you see the dramatic proportions in person and it's way more dramatic than you thought it would be. The reputation of this car being a handful to downright deadly is a testament to something that must be worked for not just hop in and set lap records. The car won't do it for you. The car must be driven, not ridden. I want one with every fiber of my being and this would be the “I don't’ even have to think about it” purchase with my newfound lottery winnings. I’d use it as a street car only - I have another track tool later in the list - and just something to enjoy on a nice day with open air and the race-inspired v10 soundtrack in the air. Oh, and freak out friends riding along, they're still blisteringly fast even though not the top dog anymore.
Nate-Spec: Perhaps a boring choice, but Seal Gray and lovely reddish-brown interior as pictured.
#2 THE TRACK TOY I am VERY fond of driving cars on track as a hobby. It has taught me so much and is among the most thrilling ways to pass time as I can think of. Now, my first instinct here would be to buy a Porsche 911 GT3RS or Viper ACR - two of my all time favorite production cars. However, as hardcore of a track ready car that is off the showroom floor, there are two reasons that this isn’t ideal. Firstly, those are STILL street cars - which means it’s always going to have sacrifices for outright track driving. Also, by this point I already have the aforementioned Carrera GT, and I don’t need to just keep loading up on Porsches.
My track car would actually be a Ginetta G56. It is a turn-key GT4 class race car. It would simultaneously be a TERRIFIC car to drive on open lapping track days, but also is made for a racing series that I would be able to take part in with zero changes to the car. There are faster race car classes, but as somebody who has spent quite a bit of time on track, I can say this would be PLENTY rapid without too much worry about death and/or dismemberment. I could grow into this nicely, without the difficulty of hopping in something like a LMP or F1 car.
Nate-Spec: Comes in body-in-white, I’d design my own Livery Wrap but it’d probably be mainly Eggplant Purple with Gold wheels and a gold roll cage.
#3 THE DAILY DRIVER I live in Illinois. There are not great roads to enjoy on the regular drives, so things like luxury barges make a ton of sense. However, I still prefer a GT coupe. My first instinct would be to go for a Bentley Continental GT because despite their ridiculous nature, I really just like them. However, my experience last year driving the Lexus LC500 variants made me absolutely fall in love with that car.
I almost consider this a “value” choice given the 100k-ish price considering the Bentley costs over twice as much. I love just about everything about this Lexus flagship. The 5.0l V8 engine sounds amazing, the cabin is gorgeous and a daily driver needs to just work, and the Lexus would likely never annoy me with hiccups, regardless of if I needed to pay for them or not.
Nate-Spec: Just as shown above - Nori Green Convertible with the Peanut-Butter Brown interior for perfect country-club class
#4 THE UTILITY HAULER / PLANET ROTATOR I currently don’t have much need for a truck, an off-roader or a hauler. I’m the kind of person who could EASILY get by with a Ford Maverick as their “utility truck”. I do have a trailer to haul off road toys and motorcycles, but a tow rating of 3500 lbs is more than plenty so it doesn't’ take much to cover what I NEED.
However, NEED is a useless word once I’ve hit the lotto in this scenario. Powerball payout is the perfect excuse to buy something that just makes you giggle/smile when you look at it or drive it. What's the opposite of NEED?
Want. I WANT a RAM TRX. This vehicle is one that makes ZERO sense but I just absolutely love them in all their ridiculous excess. I just think they’d be so amusing to have at my disposal. I know other trucks tow more. I know I don’t really off-road much. Doesn't matter. They are awesome and one the only full-sized trucks that I totally WANT whenever I see one. The interior is amazingly comfortable and has TONS of specialness about it, and it's wildly overpowered and excessive in a giggle-like-a-child way.
It's also one of the few FCA/Stellantis (or whatever that conglomerate calls itself when you're reading this) products that actually feels worth the price tag somehow.
Nate-Spec: Two-Tone Red/Black.
#5 THE CLASSIC CAR With 140 million, basically anything is on the table, right? My first instinct given such a huge wallet would be a Ferrari 250 GTO - which has been increasingly ridiculous in sale prices as high as 45 Million dollars.
However, while that car is ON my short list of all time favorite classic cars, I actually prefer the similar era 250 GT SWB California. A classic car is more about the looks, sounds and 6/10 cruising driving experience, so this gorgeous open top Ferrari makes more sense to me than the GTO.
One of my first favorite cars in tv or film was the short wheelbase Ferrari roadster in the 1986 film Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. I fully realize it was a replica car for the film, but it doesn’t matter. That shape, the sound and the class that comes along with this car is just the greatest thing this 5yr old had ever laid eyes on and remains unbeaten.
Nate-Spec: Resale Red with Camel interior. Sorry, not sorry.
That's the list, but...
The TRUTH is I have been daydreaming about hot cars since I was a toddler. Over the years, my taste, perspective, and aspirations have changed constantly. I spent decades in cars I genuinely LOVED, but always felt that they were a stop-gap - a sort of TEMPORARY placeholder because the next one would be better. I never felt sad about what I had, but I was always planning down the road for the next move (or three) that would steadily get better/faster/more exciting and usually more expensive.
But as you age, you get wisdom and perspective. As much as I LOVE the hypothetical list making, the truth is that for the first time in my life I feel like I OWN my dream car, and couldn't be happier. More importantly, I'm extremely CONTENT, and have all but zero plan for what comes next.
It may just be a ho-hum Corvette to some. Truth be told, I was not really into Corvettes all that much growing up. They were always cool, pretty and fast cars, but as a kid if I was going to daydream about a car - money no object - the reasonably obtainable Corvette wasn't an exciting or big enough dream. Much as a parent wouldn't DREAM that their kid would be a slightly above average student. But as we all know, when you get to an age you're actually shopping, dreams and reality often have a pretty wide chasm of a price gap.
My entire life has sculpted my preference for what I like in a car. It's a blender full of experiences, aesthetic preferences and things within reach. Ultimately, I know what I LOVE is a dedicated sports car platform (not a sporty version of a normal car). I LOVE autocross and tracking my cars so they need to be worthy in that respect. I also LOVE open air motoring on the street. Also, while I don't really like the whole experience of driving muscle cars, I become a CHILD when I have control of a manual transmission and a huge grumbling V8. There is literally no better combination of things that I love than my Corvette. It may not be a typical "DREAM" car when budget is not in order (it's not like anybody would believe me that I'd rather have it over a Carrera GT), but it's the perfect car for me, and has made dreaming about better stuff kind of pointless.
The truth I've come to realize is that so many people keep dreaming about a cool car down the road and they don't find something in the meantime that makes them happy. Maybe they get that Lotus/Mclaren, maybe they don't. Me? I'd rather spend the foreseeable future cackling like a child in my Corvette while they keep hoping one day they'll win the lottery to buy the thing they think they want.
Nate-Spec: 2010 C6 Grand Sport in Crystal Red Metallic with the 3LT Black Interior
THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM I am fully aware that I did not include any motorcycles in this list. There are two reasons for this.
First of all, motorcycles are (comparatively) CHEAP. It’s not much fun to think of a lottery-winning bike spree when 99% of motorcycles that ever have existed can be purchased for less than the typical option add-ons to a Porsche 911 on their website configurator. The short answer is, I’d have DOZENS of bikes if I had this kind of money, so why cloud up my car list of 5 with just one or two? My current stable of 4 would only amount to a street value of 16-18 thousand dollars TOTAL, and my cheapest dream car in the above list is a 75 thousand dollar pickup.
But mostly, I already am fortunate enough to have a close-enough within reason dream garage of motorcycles. Sure, given a huge bank roll, I might shift around a few things, but if I was told I could never change my bike stable, I’d still be MORE than content with what I currently have. I am positive one of them (perhaps two) would stay in the 5-stall dream bike garage regardless of my bank roll. Plus, that’s a different list entirely, maybe I’ll save it for another time
I write and I know things. I am also the resident motorcycle expert at Everyday Driver - check out the Cycle Report - www.thecyclereport.com - on our YouTube channel. The views and opinions expressed here are my own and may not align with the founders of Everyday Driver.
