I've had the R for a few months and I'm 26. To be honest I consider the car to be a grown up "hot hatch". I would want this car even if i was in my 40s along w/ my S4. In my search for my next daily driver I wanted something that was turbo and AWD. With those 2 things said, the first thing that came to my mind was a Subaru WRX/STI but the thought of seeing high school kids driving it everywhere was a turn off - So that's one of the main reasons I got the R, not to mention the interior spanks the hell out of the subaru and to me its 10x more comfy. It's a much better daily driver for my type of use.
100% agree with you as I traded my 13 sti hatch for R.