Start with what the Daewoo Royale is: a 4-door sedan with 1.9 , built from 1972 to 1993, as the oil crises and the first emissions rules rewired the industry. What it meant takes a little longer.
The background
The Daewoo Royale is a series of mid-size cars that was produced by Daewoo in South Korea from 1983, being replaced by the Daewoo Prince in 1991, although production of the top-line Daewoo Imperial continued until 1993. The Royale's predecessor was launched in 1972 by General Motors Korea (GMK) as the Rekord, becoming the Saehan Rekord in 1976 when Saehan Motors replaced GMK, until production ended in 1978. This car was a version of the German Opel Rekord D. The second generation Saehan Rekord was a development of the Opel Rekord E.
Production began in 1978, along with the Saehan Royale. The Royale was the Rekord E bodyshell with the front grafted on from the Opel Senator A. The Saehan Royale became the Daewoo Royale in 1983, with Saehan Rekord being discontinued and incorporated into the Royale lineup as the Daewoo Royale XQ. In 1989, the flagship Daewoo Imperial was introduced, based on the standard Royale. While Royale production (excepting taxis) ended in 1991, Imperials continued until 1993, being replaced by the Daewoo Arcadia.
The engineering
The engine is 1.9 . Drive goes through a 4-speed manual / 3-speed automatic. The layout matters: a front engine drives the rear wheels, the classic proportion — long bonnet, cabin set back — that most people picture when they picture a sports saloon or a grand tourer. These are manufacturer figures carried by Wikipedia and Wikidata, not road-test measurements.
Where it sits
In the Daewoo line-up the Daewoo Royale has a clear place: it handed the line to the Daewoo Arcadia (replaced Imperial) / Daewoo Prince (replaced Royale); the factory was Bupyeong, South Korea. The cars a buyer would have weighed it against include the Renault 5, the Volkswagen Passat, the Lancia Stratos. Its Daewoo stablemates include the Daewoo Honker 2000 and the Daewoo Arcadia.
Owning one today
There is no federal ownership record for the Daewoo Royale — it predates the complaint database or was never sold in the United States — so MotorJury publishes no running-cost figure for it. For a car of this age the price is set by the collector market and the condition of the individual example, not by a formula.