The long version

The first wave of buyers paid a premium just to skip the waitlist, and plenty of those cars turned over within a year once the dealer-markup money dried up, visible in a value chart already down almost 20 percent from launch, a normal-car curve rather than a collectible one. What is left is a fairly settled ownership base: people who wanted a manual hatchback that tracks well on a Saturday and survives a commute the other six days. Endangered Stick is the operative badge; Honda keeps a manual around here specifically for buyers who will use it, and they do use it.