The early Neons are good cars and there's still tons of them in yards for cheap parts, plus they had 2 door coupes and also had special versions setup to basically road race and rally. They have their issues like any other car but most of them are cheap and easy to fix.
I got my lil sisters 95 high line coupe in 05 when she upgraded to a Charger rt. Had about 140k on it then, has 175k now, doesn't smoke, gets good mpg, and is surprisingly fun to drive even with the auto.
So far I put a 02 sensor in it, replaced the radiator, the water pump and timing belt, the crank sensor, and the cam sensor, plus the rear main seal at about 160k
The rest of this stuff happened over time and I did as they came up. The most expensive thing was the rear main as I didn't want to do it in my driveway in January many years ago so I found a shop that did it for 300 all in.
I finally need to do the front brakes as the inside of the passenger rotor is chewed up and will need replaced, a new rotor is 25 and probably way cheaper from u pull it.
Been happy with it so far and if it gets totaled tomorrow I've gotten my money out a it and won't feel bad like I would with the Dart. There is still a loyal following for all generations and a really good web forum very similar to here that is very helpful and has all kinds of info and mods for them.