I’ve been playing through the career but it seems almost impossible to upgrade any of the cars. When I buy them they are already about to be over the limit (I buy a car for c class, and it’s already at 500). Is there something I’m missing?
FM5 Game FAQ: I tried upgrading the car I bought in Career which made it illegal. What’s the point of upgrading?
When you buy a car through the career, it auto upgrades it for the top of that class.
To upgrade yourself, you can go to the upgrade menu and remove all the upgrades. (Use what used to be the back button on Xbox 360) and there is an option to restore factory settings. Another option is to look at the cars that the game recommends and then back out to the menu and go into Buy Car and find the car you want. This way you purchase a car stock and can pick the upgrades you want.
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Yes you can do what PPiDrive mentioned which is a great way of setting up your cars. Another option is find the Top tuners for the class you are looking for make sure you have the funds and tokens in your account and then buy their tune for the class of car that you want. You then have a choice either, save the tune to your save file or download the tune right away. Hint: View Leaderboards for not only the time they finished the circuit or whatever, but also for what car was used in that class.
See you at the Track!
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I did a lot of the approach NightStryder suggests. Almost every car started with a car buy and tune buy for its body-type career.
When you load a tune before you’ve raced the car, you never get the pop-up asking you to “like” the tune, the way you do with a paint. Try to remember, if you like it after a few races: go to My Cars - get in car - choose Upgrade - Load Tune - My Tunes - pick the tune and choose “Like” to give your tuner their due.
Once the garage started building, I started spreadsheets to track 'em (and to log their winnings: I drive every car enough to “pay for itself” on the track). ManteoMax has some great spreadsheet tools that I discovered later on; they were a great help because he lists things like body type (which career it’s used in), car pack, stock class/points, etc.
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I used a more long winded approach. In career I looked at which cars were eligible and what class it auto upgraded to. I did not buy the car though. I backed out yo the buy cars menu and bought the car there and upgraded and tuned myself and then went back in to career mode.
They should give you the option to auto or manual upgrade from within career mode.
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I have been doing it this way also. I don’t like the way the game auto selects for you to make it full for the class.
It’s not entirely too bad, the game just doesn’t pick the important handling upgrades (the ones that are adjustable) in favor of a couple more PI in lower level engine upgrades…
I dont mean that it’s a bad thing, but for me I like to make the upgrades to the car myself for two reason. First, I think doing it yourself is some of the fun of the game. And second, I like to max out as much of the handling upgrades as I can, then do drivetrain.
This is how I do it, too.
Yes I do that too great tip for beginners 
I just buy what I like and set it up with mostly handling upgrades and weight reduction. That works on most tracks that are shorter and twisty. Keeping your speed up and getting a good drive off of a corner can be much better that straight line speed. For larger tracks with longer straights you might want to go with a build that has more horsepower upgrades. I think the drivatars are all built for speed and they don’t handle that great. I have seen one drivatar hit the brakes in a VW Sciroco and the back end went way up in the air on Yas Marina circuit. The thing looked like it was jacked up and looked like it handled like a boat. I never do the autoupgrade option at all. If you are having trouble with a track in career try it out in rivals mode. Try a couple different builds and tunes and see what your best time is then try it in career again. Sometimes that practice in rivals especially if you are following a good ghost can show you a couple of better lines to try. There are of course some cars that are very close to top pi in their class even in stock form. For those you might not be able to put to many upgrades on. They may be suited better for an upper class where you have more room to put on more upgrades. So it all comes down to your build/tune philosophy, driving style, car and track you are running on. Do you go for weight reduction and grip or full on raw power and speed?
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