You think of going for a luxury 4X4, but everyone else including your wife has one. Certainly a Five Series would do, but it’s a bit underwhelming and you have all your hair so an E-Class won’t do. The A6 is always there, but honestly, who really cares? The A6 does have a very interesting stepbrother though. Enter the Audi A7 Sportback.

 The 3-litre, turbo diesel model I got produces 180kW, this is a dark and sinister vehicle and both models will get you to 100km/h in roughly six seconds. It comes with Quattro four-wheel drive and a seven speed S tronic gearbox and lots of the bodywork, including the 20” alloys is done in high tech aluminum. So it’s very high tech and the engineering is faultless, so you can tell people how far ahead of the curve you are.

Problem is people don’t like you as it is because you keep telling them to recycle and you make them print on both sides of the paper, which is coincidentally why you would opt for the turbo diesel model as it saves several trees by using only seven litres of diesel per 100km and you can get almost 1000km out of a full tank.

Question is, will it get you noticed? In a word, it is breathtaking, almost achingly beautiful. I caught myself staring at it several times and it’s the rear, three quarter view that gets me. It’s wide, low and purposefully angry. The front end with its huge grille is a bit drab, but the rest of the car more than makes up for it. In profile it screams half price Aston Martin Rapide and the wide rear makes me want to join the mafia. I love the frameless doors as they create a sense of occasion as you enter or exit the vehicle, but its that Bauhaus rear end with huge, electric hatch that steals the show. Boot space is slightly compromised in favour of fantastic styling so we let that slide also.

It handles well, but it doesn’t communicate like a Jaguar XF, its only real rival in my opinion. The Jag is better balanced and looks just as good, if not better and you can fit three people in the back of the English cat. The Audi is labeled a four-door coupe, which is in it self a contradiction, but it also limits rear space with regard to headroom due to its sloping “coupe” roofline and general disregard for practicality.

It shows the world you are exclusive so you don’t need to seat five. You don’t need luggage space because you travel light and you buy what you need when you get there because you have money. You simply must have money if you drive a four seater car that costs R717 000 before options. This is then my only issue with a car at this price point. The options list really should not be this long. The interior looks and feels fantastic, as is the case with all Audis, but when I press the navigation button, something needs to happen after I paid a R15 000 installment.

The adaptive dampers and air suspension which help you customize the ride quality and handling is a nifty feature, but I’ll rather default that to “dynamic” and get a CD shuttle or USB port instead and then I’ll use the change for the sunroof. It really is terrible how you need to pay extra for things when an entry level luxury car, something like a Lexus IS250 comes with everything standard.

At the end of the day the A7 will outrun, outstyle and outclass the Lexus, but you’ll always wonder exactly how much the depreciation on that Jaguar XF really matters.