You Could Spend $69,995 On A C8 Corvette, Or You Could Do This...

Chevrolet’s groundbreaking sports car first appeared in 1953 as a fun little two-seater powered by a six-cylinder engine. It quickly morphed into a world-beating machine that sold on the triple pillars of performance, style, and a comparatively low purchase price. Today, the ‘Vette stands out as the single best performance-per-dollar equation in the automotive world.

If you have the means, we highly recommend picking one up.

But that doesn’t mean a discerning buyer with some money to spend doesn’t have options. The 2025 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray starts right at the $70,000 mark (or $91,000 in Canada). It offers a soul-stirring V8 engine that spins out 495 horsepower. It can do 0-60 in 2.9 seconds and cover the quarter mile in 11.2 seconds. Those are not easy figures to match by any new or used vehicle.

Still, we’ve managed to single out three potential options that we think a buyer thinking about parking a new Corvette in their garage may want to consider. As we always do when we consider these exercises, we’ve limited our picks to cars sold within the last few years and with no more than the average of 12,000 miles per year on their odometers.

Oh, and we decided we may as well throw in one or two far-out wildcard options that don't fit into our narrowly defined rules, just for the fun of it. Variety is the spice of life, right?

Option 1: Porsche 911

The Chevrolet Corvette and Porsche 911 are natural rivals. Natural and bitter, judging by the (usually but not always) level of grudging respect between the German and American fanbases. The latest Corvette ZR1 is an absolute beast that has already set five track records in the States, rankling some race-bred Porsche fans, but since it’s the base Stingray we’re dissecting in this article, we won’t be looking at high-end 911 models for our pricing comparison.

We found a smattering of 420-horsepower 911 Carrera S models from the 2017-2019 model years around our $70,000 budget (and a few more in 400-hp guise that are a few years older), but there are hundreds of post-2016 991-series Carrera and Carrera 4 (non-S) 911s that fall into our price range. You’ll get a 3.0-liter turbocharged flat-six engine with 370 horsepower and either rear or all-wheel drive. You will most certainly not be getting performance to match the 2025 Corvette, but the famed Porsche crest carries weight… and cost.

Option 2: Cadillac CTS-V

And now for something completely different. Let’s say you want a stupidly fast car, but you also want to be able to take more than a single passenger with you for the ride. Welcome to the Cadillac CTS-V. “With refinement and ferocity, the CTS-V is a button-tufted battle axe ready to cleave its rivals in two, all without spilling your morning coffee,” we proclaimed after sampling the final version of the car that was produced until 2019.

The V-badged Caddy featured a 6.2-liter V8 supercharged to the tune of 640 horses. It was borrowed from the C7 Z06, which makes this Cadillac the closest thing you’ll find to a four-door Corvette.

Option 3: Ford Mustang GT500

If your taste in cars errs on the side of excess, you may be interested to know that the Ford Mustang Shelby GT500 spun 760 horsepower and 625 pound-feet of torque to the rear wheels courtesy of a hand-built 5.2-liter supercharged V8 engine. Production of this most recent GT500 ran from 2020 through 2022, and while they didn’t produce a whole lot of them, they aren’t particularly hard to find on the second-hand market with low miles. And, fortunately for would-be Corvette buyers, they fall nicely into our budget.

In case you’re worried that the overpowered GT500 is a one-trick drag-racing pony, fear not. In the hands of a skilled driver like Randy Pobst, Ford’s fiercest Mustang can keep up with Corvettes, Porsches, and just about anything else.

Wildcard Option: Audi R8 V10

Want something a little more exotic? There are all kinds of fun ways to spend $70,000 on a car. We found plenty of enticing options, from vintage muscle cars to classic British roadsters ( a voluptuous Jaguar E-Type powered by a V12 engine sounds like a great way to part ways with some money). But in the end, we decided to highlight the Audi R8.

Not just any Audi R8, of course. We traveled back in time to the period when the German automaker was stuffing Lamborghini-based V10 engines behind the driver’s seat of the seminal R8 supercar. The second-gen model may be more advanced and quicker, but our hearts would be set on the original in its full side-bladed glory.

We wouldn’t kick a Bentley Continental GT Speed or its 616-horsepower W12 engine out of the garage, either.

Why not just buy a Corvette Stingray?

Honestly, you probably should buy a new Corvette Stingray if you’ve got $70,000 burning a hole in your pocket and have your eyes set on a sports car. We’re not going to pretend the C8 ‘Vette isn’t a world-class machine that punches way above its price point in performance and usability. But as we always like to point out in these little exercises, car companies have been producing fashionable cars for years, and a quick trip through the classifieds is never a bad thing before pulling the trigger on something new.

Have fun out there. And if you’re shopping for a car like the new Corvette or one of the alternatives we’ve presented here, well … we’re jealous.

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