The end of vintage sports car bargains?

Need login to read.

 

That worked.

I get really frustrated at how many cars that are now possibly forever out of my grasp. I would love to have a Diablo but I’m afraid that ship has sailed. Things will slow down again though. They always do.

 

The Era of Buying Top Sports Cars Cheaply Seems to Be Over
Because of depreciation, buyers could once get high-end cars at a fraction of their original cost. No longer.

Give this article
The 1988 Porsche 911 Turbo has held its value remarkably well, with not a single turbo vintage depreciating in value, and some surging in price.
The 1988 Porsche 911 Turbo has held its value remarkably well, with not a single turbo vintage depreciating in value, and some surging in price.Credit...National Motor Museum/Heritage Images/Getty Images

By Rob Sass
Published June 30, 2022
Updated July 1, 2022
Henry N. Manney III, an automotive journalist best known for his extensive writing in Road & Track magazine, bought a Ferrari 250 GTO in the late 1960s. One of just 36 ever built, the car was Ferrari’s $18,000 top-of-the-line sports/racing car in 1962. When the cars first rolled off the line, Enzo Ferrari, the company founder, had to personally approve every buyer.

But less than a decade later, when Mr. Manney bought his GTO, he paid less than a third of its original cost. Today, the car might be worth over $60 million, with a 1963 model selling for $70 million in 2018.

With that purchase, Mr. Manney, who died in 1988, became somewhat of a legend, a folk hero and role model for people of ordinary means who were able to buy and enjoy truly special cars through the miracle of depreciation. It’s a pastime in which rank-and-file car enthusiasts might no longer be able to participate today.
ADVERTISEMENT
Continue reading the main story

For the time being, depreciation cycles for high-end sports cars are clearly doing something unusual. In the past, these cars would shed a large percentage of their values soon after sale. From there, it was a long slog to the bottom of the depreciation curve, where cars would often languish for years, sometimes decades, before nostalgia-driven interest drove values up again. Collectors would tend to take notice only when a car’s value had regained its original price.
Image
Enthusiasts could once buy aspirational cars for pennies on the dollar; today, models like the Ferrari 360 Modena are following a much shallower depreciation curve than their predecessors.
Enthusiasts could once buy aspirational cars for pennies on the dollar; today, models like the Ferrari 360 Modena are following a much shallower depreciation curve than their predecessors. Credit...National Motor Museum/Heritage Images/Getty Images

But recently, depreciation curves seem to have gotten far more shallow, and appreciation appears to be happening much sooner than it did in the past. That may spell an end for today’s middle-class who dream of buying aspirational cars for pennies on the dollar.

“Sometime around the mid-2010s, the paradigm shifted around high-end sports cars,” said John Wiley, manager of valuation analytics for Hagerty, the classic-car insurer. “Whereas cars like the 2005 Ford GT, 2005 Porsche Carrera GT and 2003 BMW Z8 had all experienced some modest depreciation after five years, the next generation of high-end, limited-production sports cars like the McLaren P1, the new Ford GT and Porsche 918 Spyder had all appreciated after five years.”
ADVERTISEMENT
Continue reading the main story

Art Mason, a commercial airline pilot who lives in Pennsylvania, had his own dreams of Ferrari ownership. While his dreams were not as lofty as Mr. Manney’s, he nonetheless bought a 1982 Ferrari 308 GTSi, complete with a warranty, for $35,500 in 2008.

In a Digital World, These Drivers Like Their Analog Cars
June 30, 2022

A Wealth of Car Shows Around the Country
June 30, 2022
“That price was a bit more than half of what the car cost new, and 308s had been available in that price range for close to 20 years,” he said. “For a kid from West Philly who spent his youth pushing his nose against showroom windows, the notion of owning any Ferrari was a big deal.”

Mr. Mason sold the Ferrari about 10 years ago for $36,000, but today, that 308 might be pushing $100,000, or a third more than its original list price.

The idea of owning any Ferrari at half the new price or less is fading quickly. An early 2000s 360 Modena with a manual transmission is already about $25,000 more expensive than its original price, of about $150,000. That Ferrari’s depreciation trajectory has been nothing like that of its ancestor, the 308.

“So many people are willing to pay significantly more for cars than collectors had been in the past,” Mr. Mason said. “As much as I loved being a Ferrari owner, it just doesn’t hold that much appeal for me at the prices that the cars are bringing now. A lot of these cars are just being shoved into big collections and being hidden away. It seems like proof that enthusiasts like me aren’t buying these cars anymore.”

Neil Gellman, a St. Louis-based real estate agent, had wanted a Porsche 911 Turbo for most of his life.

About eight years ago, he realized that 911 Turbos from the early 2000s had become conspicuously, and almost unbelievably, cheap. He bought a 2001 model with 39,000 miles on it for $36,000.
ADVERTISEMENT
Continue reading the main story

“The car cost well over $100,000 new,” Mr. Gellman said. “I couldn’t believe that for under $40,000, I could buy a barely-used 911 Turbo, for what was essentially the price of a new Camry.”
Today, that car’s value is already approaching its original sale price. In hindsight, Mr. Gellman realizes that he bought his car at the bottom of the depreciation curve. “I never expected the car to go up in value that much, that quickly. I might have held on to it,” he said.

Typically, Mr. Wiley of Hagerty noted, cars like used Porsche 911 Turbos would hit bottom and then stay there for a while.

“Up until around 2011, a 911 Turbo from the 1980s could still be bought for less than half of its original price,” he said.

Now, new 911 Turbos are selling for over their original price, and not a single existing model seems to be depreciating. Some 911s of certain vintages, are, in fact, appreciating quite rapidly, particularly those with manual transmissions, Mr. Wiley said.

“It’s difficult to come up with a precise explanation,” he said. “The cars have certainly gotten more expensive, and people may be using and valuing them differently, putting fewer miles on them, and perhaps there is also the realization that we are nearing the end of the pure internal combustion era of the automobile, and that these cars will be regarded as quite special in the future.”
Image
The earliest vintage models of the Gallardo, Lamborghini’s best-selling car, now fetch prices over $100,000.
The earliest vintage models of the Gallardo, Lamborghini’s best-selling car, now fetch prices over $100,000.Credit...J. Emilio Flores/Getty Images

ADVERTISEMENT
Continue reading the main story

Lamborghinis are also rising in value. The Gallardo was the company’s best-selling car, with over 14,000 sold from 2008 to 2018. It was a huge number for a boutique manufacturer, which had crafted approximately 30,000 cars in total before the Gallardo came out. Around 2019, the earliest vintage Gallardos had hit bottom in the $80,000 range, about half their original cost. Today, those cars are priced over $100,000, with rare manual transmission Gallardos selling for over $200,000.
There is also the current supply-and-demand based reality.

Many of the new sports cars that are produced in smaller numbers are actually starting out at prices significantly higher than the actual selling price. Recently, Mr. Mason, the Pennsylvania-based pilot and former Ferrari owner, bought a new Porsche 718 Spyder.

“I might have been the last ordinary person to buy one at the list price, and I never would have paid a premium, but from what I understand, people are paying upward of $30,000 over M.S.R.P. to get one. While a buyer under those circumstances might not recoup that additional dealer markup down the road, I don’t expect my car to depreciate much, ever.”

 

I hope everybody realizes "vintage cars" are old cars. You can spin it however you like, but these cars are 40-50-60 years old. If you're a driver, it can cost you a lot of money to keep one of these cars on the road, as in $3 to $5 a mile.

 

Owning and driving a Diablo is a special experience. The last time the later best Diablos (30th Ann excluded) were under $100k was when I was looking in 2013. I wanted a Roadster, and there was alot of '97-'98s in the $70-$80k bracket for high mileage cars with some needs but ran decent.

 

LOL, more than that alot of times, and will get worse.

 

Lotus Espirts are still affordable if you have $50k, which is a true exotic.

 

sounds like a "this time it's different"..............article

 

The cars still get the depreciation curve, but the difference now is that the dollar to buy the car is -also- depreciating -- so the value looks stable.

We all have the "shoulda coulda" cars in our past. In my case, a local had a ragged white Countach for sale in the 60K range back in 2007 or so, but at the time there was no way I could swing 60K. Who knew that they'd be stupid expensive later?

 

You know Lotus is Brit, right?

Wanna hear a bad Brit joke?

How come the British never made any computers?

They couldn’t figure out how to make them leak oil.


Sent from my iPhone using FerrariChat.com mobile app

 

I had a 1984 lotus turbo esprit in the 90’s. Sold it in 2001 when we bought a new house, later had a Porsche Carerra 4C, but then came a downturn in the economy at the same time the kids were starting college, so off it went. Once the kids were done, I finally got what I really always wanted. A 1995 Ferrari F355 Spider. I got with 40k mikes because of two reasons; 1) I’m not rich and 2) I knew I would drive it. I put about 3-4k miles on it and I love it. I bought it at the low end 3 years ago and it has appreciated. Don’t care. I’m keeping it. Maintenance is a little pricey but I knew that going in.
Cheers


Sent from my iPhone using FerrariChat

 

Which is why most "enthusiasts" should actually buy a real vintage car...

Like an alfa gtv... Or mga.

 

The market ebbs and flows, always has and always will. Right now, the market is pretty wild. It's been here before.

"For the time being, depreciation cycles for high-end sports cars are clearly doing something unusual. In the past, these cars would shed a large percentage of their values soon after sale. From there, it was a long slog to the bottom of the depreciation curve, where cars would often languish for years, sometimes decades, before nostalgia-driven interest drove values up again. Collectors would tend to take notice only when a car’s value had regained its original price."

I think the appreciation of manual transmission cars will stay for this reason, unfortunately.

But cars like the 360 Modena F1, which some 8,800 cars were built in six years will fall back to where they were once the market adjusts again.

 

And, let's face it, the market for ALL cars is showing little-to-no depreciation. Some lightly-used cars have even appreciated (my sister's Volvo, for example). So what we're seeing for sports-cars really isn't that odd.

What remains to be seen is whether cars that traded at these higher prices will hold their value over time.

 

Get back to me within the next year or two with the SP 500 back down to below 2500 or 2000 ...toys liquidated with a huge car price crash.Then take your pick at 50% ( or more !) off current levels.

Yes i'm dreaming but history does repeat itself eventually and trees do not grow to the sky right?

 

Although not “vintage”..I have an idea…consider a Maserati!?

Grab a low mileage 2008-2010 GT from $20-35K…best bang for your buck.

Or consider a 1957-1965 3500GT from $100-220K. Beautiful and still under appreciated, wonderful cars really, seems achievable for some.

 

Layoffs are on the horizon...then foreclosed homes...then liquidation of toys.

I'm waiting for murcielago sv

 

"An early 2000s 360 Modena with a manual transmission is already about $25,000 more expensive than its original price, of about $150,000"

All the comparisons don't take inflation into account, it's baffling. That 360 was a 260K car in today's money.

 

Here is a calculator to help:

https://www.in2013dollars.com/us/inflation/1999?amount=1

 

Face it. Most of these earlier exotic cars were poop on a platter. Sure they looked wonderful, made cool sounds etc..but over all..as a car, they were awful.

The Ferrari 308/328 was a great car. You could actually use it daily. A Diablo or Testarossa..not so much. Even a Rolls was a chore to own. Oil leaks..ridiculous electrics etc.

These old exotics..are full of nitpickie little problems that would drive most people nuts. And most of the newer generation simply will not put up with it.

Parts supplies are drying up..weeks or.months of down time are the norm..etc. sorry folks times are changing.

 

I have over 25 years direct experience with Diablos(3), your facts to not correlate, yes, as long as they are regularly driven, maintenance is no more than a Toyota!

If they sit, especially unused for years, they are not happy, but, neither is a Toyota (I let a Supra sit for 2+ years, needed head gaskets).

The biggest issue with "daily driving" a Diablo is the time spent sharing the car with others, at gas stations, parking lots, at traffic lights, etc...that's the number one reason daily driving is not the best idea. Other issues are earlier Diablos did not have a lift system so some entrances are problematic and can be frustrating.

But, let me be clear, "oil leaks" "electrics problems", none. One idea on 'oil leaks' is modern synthetic oils are "too fine" (at the molecular level) and will leak out of a Diablo's engine (head gaskets, spark plugs, sump, etc), I have had that experience myself. You must use period correct semi-synthetic engine oil and then, no issues.