top end values

do you think its o.k to reprint his article with out MIKE'S o.k. or THE SPORT CAR MARKET?

 

I personally think the values are are reflection on the long period of steady economic growth that we have been enjoying. The number of rich people in the world has increased substantially during this period, with an concomitant effect on values. But I think these values are largely based on market sentiment rather than real worth, so that an economic downturn could see a rapid drop in values.

 

This was the question I was responding to.

 

P4 is $15M

 

Because there are so few of these top end cars and they rarely are available for sale in the marketplace, there probably is no precise way to value them. I guess one approach is to look at their relative value over time to the top price leaders. So, if a certain car used to be worth 50% of a 250 GTO's price and the GTO is now worth around $18M, then maybe a decent guess is the car is worth $9M these days.

However, as we saw with the Steve McQueen 250 GTL car, when you get two or more wealthy people bidding on a car they "must have", there is no price guideline that will apply. Certainly $2.31M for a Lusso is a lot of money.

The other factor is the relative age of certain high end cars. My personal belief is that a car's marketplace significantly changes as it gets over 50 years old. The people that remember them when they were young get too elderly and need to be replaced by a new generation of buyers that are able to share the passion for such cars. For example, the old Duesenbergs are no longer being purchased by people of that era but by younger people (like Jay Leno). You can see the same thing happening with the 1955 - 1957 Chevy cars. They escalated in value dramatically but then have faded somewhat in price over the past 5 to 10 years or so.

So, if this theory holds true for Ferraris, you might see the late 50's and early 60's models plateau in price (e.g. the 250 TdF, the 250 SWB, etc.) and see the cars 5 to 15 years newer than them take off in price (e.g. the 365 GTB/4 Daytona and the 512 BB Boxer).