Same problem here. I bought TDU 2 from Gamersgate and got TDU 1 for $5.00.
Start with $200,000 and rent a car, but no matter which car I rent, I end up half the time without enough money to buy a house and, even if I have enough for the house, there is never enough money to buy my first car.
My TDU 1 also came pre-patched to 1.66A and it won't let me online - says there is a new patch and sends me to none.com.
It is Amazon and Gamersgate, so obviously a problem with the digital version provided to those companies by Atari.
Hopefully, someone finds a fix for this. TDU 2 is a great leap up from TDU 1, so I'm not going to waste too much time trying to get this to work - but a fix would be great.