NAPLES, Florida — In the Dollar Store corner of the auto shopping mall is the wee Mitsubishi Mirage. At $17,965, it is the most affordable new car in the U.S. market.

But you had better act fast; the Mirage is about to disappear.

The 2024 model year is the last for the subcompact, leaving only one car available under $20,000 (destination included) — the $18,330 Nissan Versa. The demise of the Mirage is the latest evidence of an unaffordable U.S. car market with the average transaction price of new vehicles pushing $50K and automakers flooding the market with pricey EVs to meet government mandates. We’ll miss you, Mitsu.

In ritzy downtown Naples, I wheeled the Mirage into the National Pickleball Center’s jammed fenced parking lot. Spying an opening between hulking Cadillac Escalade and Lincoln Nautilus SUVs, I maneuvered the hatchback around a tree, between a row of tightly-packed cars and slotted into the space like a magazine into a bookshelf of encyclopedias.

I love subcompact hatchbacks and have sadly watched the Chevy Spark, Honda Fit and Ford Fiesta be let out to pasture. These pint-sized bargains were not only easy on the wallet, they were clever toys that immediately engaged customers with their brands. Heck, the Fiesta even had a performance ST version that still terrorizes autocrosses across the country.

Not Mitsu. Like the (also discontinued) Toyota Yaris, Mirage is basic transportation. The auto equivalent of Wonder bread. Tap water, vanilla ice cream, generic drug. It will get you from point A to B.

I rented the Mirage for a week in Naples, where it shuttled Mrs. Payne and me between the beach, racquet sports, shopping centers, meals.

At a stoplight on Tamiami — aka Tampa-to-Miami, aka Route 41 — I lined up next to a Porsche 911, one of many in this playground for the rich. The light turned green and the 911 disappeared. Zero to 60 mph? 3.5 seconds. The Mirage uses a different metric: Zero-to-someday.

With just 78 horsepower under the hood — half that of a $21K Toyota Corolla compact — Mirage is built for fuel sippin’, not asphalt burnin’. I swear the Mitsu was powered by a gerbil wheel, though a check under the hood revealed a 1.2-liter three-cylinder connected to a droning CVT transmission. DROOOOOOOONE! The Mitsu went down Tamiami. DROOOOONE! It went up the I-75 on ramp. DROOOOONE! It went around a 90-degree turn.

Mirage is not much more exciting standing still.

Where I was once smitten by the Spark’s big insect-eyed headlights and Fiesta’s sleek snout, Mirage is a wallflower with blocky headlights and squared-off tail. Square taillights, plastic wheel covers, not even a high rear-door latch like the Spark. Inside, the Mitsubishi was bare bones as well with standard digital infotainment display set in acres of plastic dashboard. No clever-folding Magic Seat like in the ol’ Honda Fit.

Indeed, rather than buy a new Mirage, I’d take your $17K and go to, say, a Honda pre-owned lot and buy a used (50,000 miles on the odometer) Civic Hatchback. More car, more power, more style.

Still, there’s a charm about Mitsu’s simplicity. Like putting an old LP on your home turntable instead of listening to Spotify.

I’ve been driving electric cars — Chevy Equinox EV, Tesla Model 3, VW ID.Buzz — that turn on when you tap the brake pedal. The Mirage requires that you dig into your pocket (or worse, rummage through Mrs. Payne’s bottomless purse) for a key, then turn it in the ignition to turn over the gerbil wheel — er, starter motor. A good ol’ hand brake separates the seats, which I grabbed when I leaned my 6’5” frame into the car to steady myself. The Mitsu is so basic it doesn’t even have a center console arm.

Standard is a steering wheel, emergency braking, excellent 10-year/100,000-mile drivetrain warranty and back-up camera so I could back into those tight parking spaces. However, the camera is so basic that it doesn’t follow the path of the car, so I generally craned my neck. How dependent on technology we have become.

Most cars these days come standard with a cocoon of safety systems including blind spot-assist and adaptive cruise control. With Mirage, you get basic cruise control — so basic it doesn’t tell you what speed you’ve set. I figured it out when it settled on a number in the analog gauge cluster.

Yet analog Mirage acknowledges the digital smartphone.

When we picked up the hatchback at the Fort Myers airport, my wife synched her iPhone — then started Apple CarPlay on the seven-inch screen to guide us to our hotel. No, the Apple CarPlay isn’t wireless, but it did its job.

As did Mirage. With the back seats down, we loaded our daily needs — tennis bags, towels, beach chairs — into the roomy hatchback. The gas tank was tiny. as you’d expect, but with 43 mpg highway, the 9.3-gallon tank still gets you 400 miles of range — equivalent to an electric $81K Tesla Model S but with quicker refueling times.

Once Mirage sells out, Versa will stand alone as the only new car under 20 grand. Or you can get that used Civic on the pre-owned lot.

2024 Mitsubishi Mirage

Vehicle type: Front-engine, front-wheel-drive, five-passenger hatchback

Price: $17,965, including $1,095 destination fee ($18,015 ES as tested)

Powerplant: 1.2-liter inline-3 cylinder

Power: 78 horsepower, 74 pound-feet of torque

Transmission: Continuously variable

Performance: 0-60 mph, 10.9 seconds (Car and Driver); top speed, 100 mph

Weight: 2,100 pounds

Fuel economy: EPA, 36 mpg city/43 highway/39 combined

Report card

Highs: Best non-hybrid fuel economy in USA; roomy hatch

Lows: No frills; 0-60 mph in forever

Overall: 2 stars

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