mainly cos they make em before they sell em!

sounds trite but to a degree its true....

the build year is a pretty movable feast, dont forget some other countries have registration changes in mid year eriods and they want new model out for hte new reg (used to be august in the UK for example).

it also partly becasue it takes a while to retool a line so they wil build a load, park em up to cover demand then retool and start production so they pick convenient time of year...

you will also find 'weird' cars with bits that were only on earlier models (or later) officially jsut due to the fact that stock bins get used out so a new part may be used (they aint going to order in load of the old ones) or because they had x thousand parts left...)

also dont forget same car introduced in different territorys at different dates..

me i would rather have the 95 and avoid the obdII misery but each to his own...