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1979 Oldsmobile Ninety-Eight Regency Coupe: A Pristine Time Capsule
I miss traditional luxury. What is luxury today? A Range Rover? Grand Wagoneer with glass roof and multiple TVs in the headrests? Rolls-Royce Phantom? Ah, but once upon a time, folks with middle-class budgets but high aspirations could get something far superior. Like a Ninety-Eight Regency.
Oh sure, it had, depending on your luck or your friendly local Oldsmobile dealer’s due diligence, perhaps indifferent assembly, weak paint, and glorious gadgets that might not necessarily, you know, work. But they did have presence.
And in 1979, you could still get many domestic vehicles in both coupe and sedan form—a nice bonus. Today, you’re lucky if you can even find a sedan. For those who don’t want a 4×4 pickup or SUV or potato-shaped crossover, you are out of luck when it comes to many manufacturers.
But in the final year of the ’70s, you were spoiled for choice. And that was just in your local Olds dealer’s showroom! Want a coupe or sedan? No problem. The Ninety-Eight Regency sedan and coupe were the top of the line, unless you preferred the swanky front-wheel drive Toronado personal luxury coupe.
And thanks to the corporate-wide downsizing for the 1977 model year, these biggest, Broughamiest Oldses were still a rather tidy package to drive, park, and enjoy while still retaining lots of stretch-out room inside and trunk space out back.
As the ’79 Oldsmobile brochure extolled: “Uncommon luxury in a beautifully engineered automobile. You should expect much of Oldsmobile’s most luxurious series. And Regency does not disappoint.
“The interior room within the Regency Coupe, for example, is more than generous, with impressive head- and legroom, front and rear. The inviting loose-cushion-look seats are specially padded, contouring them for a fit and feel much like your favorite easy chair.”
Of course, today, everything has to have firm, sometimes uncomfortable bucket seats in a cavelike environment with Boring Black or Gloomy Gray interior. And I ask, why? Because the new manufacturers are cheap? Or because 2025 car customers don’t care? Why can’t we get a marvelous, cushy blue interior like this anymore?
I miss vast color choices, coupes, sedans, and ultimately, the entire Oldsmobile division. They were so very popular in my metropolitan area when I was growing up.
And that’s why I was so happy when my friend Jayson Coombes spotted this car on October 26th at the second annual Buick Olds Pontiac Cadillac show held in Grapevine, Texas. If this car looks showroom new, that is because it basically is.
This Regency has only 2,100 miles on it. And it was sold new at the same dealer Jayson’s mom bought a new ’83 Cutlass from, back when coupes, sedans, and GM were still most popular.
I loved the colors, too. This Regency is painted in pretty, but perhaps somewhat boringly named, Light Blue Metallic, with a matching full vinyl top and interior.
This is basically as close as you’re going to get to a brand-new 1979 Regency Coupe in 2025. It was just stunning.
For 1979, all Oldsmobile Ninety-Eights came standard with a 350-cubic inch V-8 with four-barrel carburetor and automatic transmission, as befitting Oldses’ top-of-the-line model.
A 350 diesel V-8 and a 403 gasoline V-8 were optionally available. And while slightly less flossy Ninety-Eight LS coupe and sedan were offered for luxury car bargain hunters, the Regency was the top version, with its much more sumptuous floating-pillow seating and other finery.
The Regency coupe had a base price of $7,875 (about $34,690 today), a curb weight of 3,946 pounds, and 26,965 were produced. The Regency sedan was far more popular despite its slightly higher asking price of $8,063 ($35,500); 91,862 were sold for the ’79 model year.
But it’s likely that few of those 26K-odd Regency coupes are as nice as this example now! It was a pleasure to see this car through Jayson’s photos. It could only have been topped by seeing it in person.
And I still pine for a new luxury Oldsmobile coupe or sedan such as this, though that day will likely never come.
In my 20s I acquired my parents’ 1978 Delta 88 coupe that they bought new with a factory two-tone paintjob and “sports” wheels. Of all the cars I’ve owned that’s perhaps the one that I would most like back. Spacious and comfortable and sharp in appearance. By this time the V-8 was anemic compared to 8-10 years earlier, but it would still burn rubber, and it would hit nearly 50 mph shifting from 1st to 2nd and bury the 85 mph speedo shifting from 2nd to 3rd. Many epic road trips and sunny afternoon/evening cruises. What a great car!
During the Malay era from the in the mid to late 70s to the mid to late 80s, American cars were not built well. The quality control was horrible. It was a crapshoot if a person got a good car or a bad car right off the showroom. I know too well. I haven’t owned a new American car since my 83 Camaro. The transmission went bad with 250 miles on it. It had other issues too. I traded in a perfectly good Toyota Corolla for the car. I should’ve kept that car, but I saw this red beauty and had to have it. I sold it about what I paid for it, but I learned my lesson. I would be totally hesitant to buy a new American car even now.
Malaise era…. Lost in translation.
Stunning car, Thomas – our family had a 1979 Pontiac Parisienne (Vancouver, BC) and although not a Regency Brougham with a ‘real’ Olds-made engine (ours had the Chev 305), it was a dream. I’d sit in the car, parked in the carport, plug in a Steely Dan or Supertramp cassette into the newly installed aftermarket stereo with FOUR speakers, and be enraptured for hours!
Funny how even then U.S. and Canada pricing was wacky – our base model Parisienne with just A/C, was $9500 CA. I remember that price explicitly, because to a 14 year old, that was a lot of money!