Are you going to be bashing or racing or both? If racing, make sure there are enough vehicles similar to yours in your area to make a class. That was my first mistake. I bought a Jammin' CRT .5, took it out to the local track and NOBODY else had one. They offered to let me run with gas truck, but that class was dead here too.
I ended up buying a used Kyosho roller locally, and have been running 1/8 buggy with that. I love it and incidentally the bigger cars are MUCH easier to drive than the 1/12 scale cars on the big tracks.
Good luck with whatever you end up getting.