by Mike Gulett –
I believe we are seeing an appreciation of values of many makes and models of collector cars based on auctions such as Mecom (on their TV show) and the daily Bring a Trailer on-line auctions, plus others. I have not analyzed detailed data but I believe there have been several records set for certain makes and models over the past year.
A venture capital investor that I worked with many years ago said to me that “the price (of selling or buying a company) is right when both sides are a little unhappy.” I do not know if this is true in the collector car world but it could help explain why we are seeing these rising price trends.
But why are prices going up now? I don’t know for sure but it seems like the economy is strong and collector car lovers are taking advantage of low interest rates and a strong stock market. Really it may be because people with money want those collector cars, whether they are old ones or newer ones. They are willing to be a “little unhappy” with the price to own that special car.
This trend in collector car value appreciation, however, is not evident in the latest issue of the 2022 Sports Car Market Pocket Price Guide.
I would not want to be responsible for creating and publishing a list of current values for a few thousand models of collector cars. This is one of the most difficult jobs I can think of – and it is always guaranteed to be wrong in many collector’s eyes.
I value the Sports Car Market Guide not just because of the price listings but because of the other valuable information they provide for each of the collector car models they list. Such as: the number made of each model, the years of each model, their opinion on investment grade ranking of A, B, C, D or F and median percent change.
This is all useful information when one is deciding to buy or sell a collector car. Or, if we are just exploring ideas for a new collector car acquisition – you can’t have too much information.
Since 2016 Sports Car Market has published the median prices of cars sold at auction. These median prices include prices for cars in all conditions, so they must be taken in that context.
I notice that they still do not list a car close to my heart – the AC Cobra Mk IV! This is an important over site, which I hope will be corrected soon. After all they eventually did include the Apollo GT after years of my pointing out the absence.
Below I compare the Sports Car Market Pocket Price Guide median prices, from 2018 through the new 2022 price guide, for some of my favorite cars with the percent change from ’21 to ’22.
Click on the image below for a larger view of my Sports Car Market Pocket Price Guide comparison.
A zero change from one year to the next is likely because there were no public sales that year so they keep the value the same as the previous year.
What do you see here? Are there any trends? Some of these models have experienced a drop in value and some have increased. Why is that?
Let us know what you think in the Comments.
If these vehicle are a true art form I think Giorgetto Giugiaro still has the winner.
AA Lancaster
The Iso Grifo is also by Giugiaro.
With the lockdown of the last two years nearly over, and a strong economy, I only see values of classic cars going up in the short term foreseeable future. Similarly, I went to the New York Boat Show last month, as I have been doing for the last 40 years, and it was the smallest NY Boat Show I have ever attended, with many boat brands not present such as Viking, Tiara, Hatteras, and many others as well. When I cornered a vendor on this he told me the show was 1/3 smaller than in previous years because there was no sense for a boat manufacturer to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on a display, when they could not keep up with current demand, and had back orders for a year’s worth of customers. He told me if you even want an outboard motor, be prepared for a wait of a year. With remote work and self-isolation requirements, boating became the perfect hobby for those who had some extra cash. I never thought in my lifetime I would ever see a boating boom – the last time I saw one was in the bull run in the 1980s, until the stock market crashed in October 1987. What I am trying to say in a longwinded way, is that barring more future terrible foreign events, we are entering the new Roaring Twenties with a pent-up demand, and car values will continue to rise.
Glenn in Brooklyn, NY..