Reply With QuoteTotally agree and the re-launch will inevitably renew interest in the modelOriginally Posted by Foxy100
I'm willing to give you some style advice in exchange for that lovely Seiko you brought along to the Christmas GTG. Of course you already have the shirt nailed!
Totally agree and the re-launch will inevitably renew interest in the model
Left-field nomination!
Brand new Land Rover Defender, wrap it in a bubble bag and store. Name your price in 2025
Lancia Delta Integrale
My favourite ever cars from the Turbo right up to the Evo2 and then the special editions. But for investment purposes i wouldnt go for one of the Evo's or Special editions, they already have people asking high prices for them and they have gone unsold for quit a while now, yeah the odd one might sell for a high price but very rarely. In my opinion the one to buy would be an 8v or 16v. The Delta Turbo and HF4WD are rarer than the Integrales but dont hold the same significance as the Integrales so wont fetch big money in the future.
Good call David.
Left-field nomination!
Brand new Land Rover Defender, wrap it in a bubble bag and store. Name your price in 2025
Bmw's never seem to do very well!!??
Have you seen the price of E30 M3's, E28 M5's, M1's, Z1's, 635CSI, M6's,2002Tii turbos, E46 CSL's, Alpina B10's to name a few recently...
^^^ yes, but compared to for example the porsche equivalents they dont do anything like as well. 964RS V e30 M3 (even an immaculate sport Evo, which a client of mine cant shift at 92K at the moment)
I'm not saying they dont appreciate, but they are rarely the best performers compared to what you could have bought for the money. E36 M3 V even a base 993 C2, never mind a turbo/ RS or a GT2!
Midas ?
either a pre-facelift impreza or an impreza 22B,you will just about get a 22Bfor under £25,000 and you will get a superb pre-facelift for under £7,000
Great suggestions guys, thanks! Personally, I'm a long time fan of a car that's out of the left field (American slang?): the Porsche 914. Prices of these are all over the place. I can find them listed under 10K (...makes you wonder why...) up to 130K in Germany! And for the latter, we're not talking about the 914-6 here.
Porsche never built a bad car. Perhaps this one lacks the iconic look of the 911, but don't forget that Porsche built bundles of these in the early 70s. Afaik (and I stand to be corrected): in the years that the 911 and 914 were built side by side, the 914 outsold the 911. The 914-4 sharea the engine with a VW: the 411/412. Together more than 500,000 of these engines + gearboxes were built. That makes sourcing parts a lot easier - and cheaper, because of the VW stamp on the boxes.
I am used to Triumph and Jaguar prices. It amazes me that parts prices for the 914 are 60% of the Triumph prices, and less than 50% of the Jag prices!
Both gunman and b11ocx came with an intersting point of view. The 30 year 'twist' is a good one, I can relate to that so it's good to have a close look at the 80s and 90s specimen! The Peugeot 205 GTI crossed my mind, but a lot of these are trashed! Or perhaps back to the Saab 99 Turbo. And then there was that odd Mercedes 190 with the Cosworth engine! Enough to scan the classifieds!
I am aware that there are no technical boundaries: every car can be brought up to any level in the workshop. Concours condition even. But I would become a 'thief of my own wallet' (translated Dutch expression) when I allow myself to put the car up the ramps when there are paying customers waiting for their car to be fixed!
To be continued - and please keep posting your ideas about this matter!
Menno
AgreeLeft-field nomination!
Brand new Land Rover Defender, wrap it in a bubble bag and store. Name your price in 2025unless the deal to produce outside eu proceeds then might not be so clear cut
205 GTI here are already 10k for a good one. 912 are a good bet if you can get one from the US. I personally feel integrales have gone as far as they are going to go - maintenance costs are really against that one with them being pretty fragile and them needing engine out for a lot of things (ever looked where the starter motor is?!) A lot of collectors I deal with are disposing of these for this reason and feel the same.
What I think is really interesting are cars that are perhaps 1-3K and will maybe only be 2-6K in 10 years time - Corrado VR6, golf 3 VR6, Golf 4 anniversary, MK2 scirocco, E30 325, E34 535 or 540, Audi coupe Quattro, Audi 80 S2, honda CRX MK1, Civic Type R EP3, Integra DC2, 106 Rallye/ GTI, 306 Rallye/ GTI, Citroen BX GTI, AX GT/ GTI, .. spend your 25K on these and I'm fairly sure the value would double at least!
Last edited by Taff; 18th January 2015 at 23:17.
I've been looking at the sub £10k market recently and I've been surprised by the highs:
Ford mk1 Escorts, Mk3 Cortinas, Mk 1 Capris
and the lows:
Bmw Z3, Audi 80, Ford XR2
It looks like every dog has it's day when it comes to "classic" cars, it's a question of not buying at the peak. It seems like the cars of my early driving years have increased in value - roughly 10x the prices I was paying in the '80s, whereas the later 90's cars are still somewhere behind.
I have my eye on a couple 2 seater sport coupe models right now.....
Im a 30 something now and my first car was a 205 GTi. I've always missed that car so when I had the space i bought one. That was roughly 2 years ago. I paid £1000 for a 1.6 with a stack of history, relatively solid, good running order long MOT. After a few months I started sorting a few little niggles which has spiralled into a full nut and bolt rebuild to factory standard (and I really do mean every nut and bolt removed, blasted and replated).
Prices are all over the place. You can still pick a drivable snotter up for around £1k if you are brave (or stupid) via eBay but we are also now seeing more cars appearing for £6k+ If they are in the kind of condition where you wouldn't need to put a spanner near them. The kind of car the average thirty something could hoon around a B road at the weekend pretending he is 18 again.
There was something like 40,000 of these cars sold in the UK but there are less than 1000 1.9s left on the road and less than 800 1.6s. Being a favourite of the boy racer for a period of its life saw the death of many. There is also no indication of how many of those still have original XU series engines as well as many will be converted to GTi6 or Mi16 which seems to hurt the value. Despite the rising values you will still see the odd car being broken so numbers will continue to drop which can only be good for people like me. It's a car that seems to strike a chord with so many people. I honestly can't go anywhere without someone recounting a fond memory about one.
Before the restoration. It was already pretty clean.
Last edited by mowflow; 18th January 2015 at 23:48.
I was asking myself the same question twelve months ago, I even sold some watches to fund it!
10000 miles later and I couldn't be happier, I can work on it myself and all it has needed is two new rear tyres :)
In 10 years time I doubt I will be able to afford one again, so buy now and get some use out of it.
How about Mercedes? 1990s SLs must be a good bet to increase in value. Also 1st gen SLKs & CLKs and AMG engined variants like C36, C43 & E55.
Alternatively BMW 8 series looks undervalued as does Z3M.
Other possibilities; XJR, Alfa GTV & Spider, Fiat Coupe, Porsche 968.
Really? Owned my Integrale for a number of years now and the only time i've removed the engine..was to rebuild it, the starter motor is bolted onto the gearbox at the back of the engine like alot of tranverse mounted engines, a pain to get at..yes, but no more difficult than alot of cars..As for fragile can't say i've found it myself, if well maintained and serviced it has given excellent service, and once you have the contacts ( that'll be the same for most classic cars ) parts and knowledge are easy to find..
Simple tastes
Vauxhall Chevette HSR (V rare)
lotus Sunbeam
Renault 5 Turbo 2
alfasud 1.5Ti
Truimph TR6
VW Porsche
Tickford Capri
Escort 1800
Porsche 928GT
lotus Excel SE
Fantastic wee cars. My first car was a 309 Gti. Haven't seen one in years. Would be interesting to know how many of them are still going about.Im a 30 something now and my first car was a 205 GTi. I've always missed that car so when I had the space i bought one. That was roughly 2 years ago. I paid £1000 for a 1.6 with a stack of history, relatively solid, good running order long MOT. After a few months I started sorting a few little niggles which has spiralled into a full nut and bolt rebuild to factory standard (and I really do mean every nut and bolt removed, blasted and replated).
Prices are all over the place. You can still pick a drivable snotter up for around £1k if you are brave (or stupid) via eBay but we are also now seeing more cars appearing for £6k+ If they are in the kind of condition where you wouldn't need to put a spanner near them. The kind of car the average thirty something could hoon around a B road at the weekend pretending he is 18 again.
There was something like 40,000 of these cars sold in the UK but there are less than 1000 1.9s left on the road and less than 800 1.6s. Being a favourite of the boy racer for a period of its life saw the death of many. There is also no indication of how many of those still have original XU series engines as well as many will be converted to GTi6 or Mi16 which seems to hurt the value. Despite the rising values you will still see the odd car being broken so numbers will continue to drop which can only be good for people like me. It's a car that seems to strike a chord with so many people. I honestly can't go anywhere without someone recounting a fond memory about one.
Before the restoration. It was already pretty clean.
Fantastic car Barry - I'm looking forward to getting a two seater sports when the children are a little older. They don't really lend themselves to baby seats!I was asking myself the same question twelve months ago, I even sold some watches to fund it!
10000 miles later and I couldn't be happier, I can work on it myself and all it has needed is two new rear tyres :)
In 10 years time I doubt I will be able to afford one again, so buy now and get some use out of it.
Not quite the same thing, but last year a bought a rust free 1989 Mk1 MR2 as a "in theory" depreciation proof daily.
So far so good, very reliable maintenance parts are cheap.
Dodge Viper?
60s Mustang? or mint Chevy C10 or the like? Pick up for peanuts (well... under 10k for a C10) and should think they can only go up in price...
Always loved Vipers though, beast of a car... Just importing a mint C10 truck from USA, all in for 5K.
Here's what I would buy:
105 series Alfa prior to 1979.
Alfa Romeo GTV6.
Alfa SZ (hard to find at that level now, but fingers crossed)
BMW Z3M with S54 engine.
Audi Quattro 20V.
BMW M3 CS (note the absence of the 'L'. That ship has sailed, but these are little known.)
Lotus Europa.
Lotus Elan +2S.
Lotus Esprit S1 or GT3.
Lancia Fulvia S1 Rallye (must be Rallye)
Lancia 1600HF Lusso.
Fiat OSCA 1500.
BMC Mini Moke.
Land Rover S1.
Bentley Continental (1990's version)
Maserati Merak SS
Porsche 928 Series 1
I could go for a lot longer….
Decent 309 GTI's are getting hard to find, the old man wanted one in the 90's but cost lead him to a diesel model, about 6 or 7 years ago he had the bug and bought a GTI then wanted a lower mileage, better spec one so bought an auto model, which he then sold to his dad as they wanted a car that was auto and cheap as a second car, then they sold it now there are only 4 left on the road in the UK.
He now wants another and a Cortina 1600E, he's after a good one without paying stupid money for the 1600E.
My tip is the Subaru Impreza Turbo from the mid-90s. These are now cheap as chips and in the hands of boy-racers and chavs, which means that most of them will end up written-off or scrapped. The car has a great competition pedigree and is associated with 2 Brits who were World Rally champs - Colin McRae & Richard Burns. If you can find a good, unmodified example (preferable a WRX Sti import) now is the time to buy. You could probably get 5 good ones for your £25K.
I know that the boy-racer/chav image will put people off, but both the Mini Cooper and the RS Escorts had the same problem years ago and prices on these have sky-rocketed.
http://www.cheshireclassiccars.co.uk...ru-impreza-22b
These are already firmly in the classic camp, I was arguing more for the boggo Sti models.
Having been checking various classic car prices for several years on a daily basis, I decided seven months ago that this was worth a punt.
A very late registered (1993) S4. It is one of 77 UK cars that were registered during '92 and '93 after the S4 had ceased production in '91. This particular car also featured in the July 2014 issue of Classic Cars (it had been tested shortly before we bought it).
You could look at classic range rovers too. Some of these are fetching big money. You're out of proper suffix A territory - the first run of chassis nos - but late 2 doors or soft dash cars are getting there.
Whatever you buy it needs to be perfect. When the time to sell comes you don't want to be messing about with a flaky example if you want top dollar. But that means your use has to be restricted to good weather and occasionally. Sadly you need low miles too in this country.
I too am struggling to see how the market can sustain itself. Very ordinary cars (very nice examples mind) are fetching silly money. £10k for a mini clubman estate anyone?
You can buy a 2002 Merc CL500 for £3k and that's a lot of car for not much money but may not be a good investment.
V12 4 seat Ferraris are out of luck too. 456 and 612 are good value. I'd love a manual 456 but I'm scared about the running costs. £30k to buy but ££ to run.
Nice. Was that pictured at Chatham dockyard?Having been checking various classic car prices for several years on a daily basis, I decided seven months ago that this was worth a punt.
A very late registered (1993) S4. It is one of 77 UK cars that were registered during '92 and '93 after the S4 had ceased production in '91. This particular car also featured in the July 2014 issue of Classic Cars (it had been tested shortly before we bought it).
Until this day, I regret the fact that I turned down one of these... BMW 2000.
3 yrs ago I had the opportunity to buy a fantastic specimen (like the one on the pic) for 4000 euros / a little over 3000 gbp...
Despite that, a BMW 1602 or 2002 is high on my list! And after all these years with Swedish and British cars, it's time to consider a German car, I think.
Menno
Last edited by thieuster; 19th January 2015 at 19:54.
There's one available in Argentina, I hear..
I'm likely to be backing R109 Mercedes SL's this year. The earlier model has gone up steadily, and the number of good R109's is dropping away, so I'm hoping I'll get a few years gentle motoring at zero depreciation, and possibly some appreciation. May be a year or two early, but I suspect it's about right. For reference, can buy a 60000 mile R109 with the 3.2 litre engine for around £7k with all the extras and great history. Equivalent spec in the previous version goes for £15k, with 120000 on the clock.
Good money for something that may have cost the original owner £70k!
My first car was a 309 gti,very rare now,but if you can find one they are generally cheaper than the 205 ,which was my next car
Well if classic is classic, then I'll toss in a 1970 Buick GS 455 Stage I.
Nice, but I need the same amount of money to buy shares from an oil company (true, their shares are at a low at the moment - right moment to get aboard, I think)
M.
456s are amazingly "cheap" and they look great. Running costs must be horrific though, I think I remember reading a few years ago that a replacement engine from Ferrari would cost £60k!
Older 4 seat Ferraris seem to have come up in value recently so maybe the 456 has good potential for the future once desirability outweighs the running costs.
Last edited by watchcollector1; 19th January 2015 at 21:07.
Love these things, my shot a few I found in the wild.
True although Ferrari engines are pretty strong. It's electrics, bodywork and anything surrounding the engine you have to worry about.
Rusty headlamp pods are a particular 456 weak point
Not in the same league price wise but surely unmolested low mileage mk1 mx5's will start to look attractive investments soon.
I might be slightly biased but TVR Chimaera's and Griffith's can only go one way
Breakers?
Apparently 72 on the road according to howmanyleft.com
I miss the Ford Racing Puma I once had. Took a bit of maintenance even at 5 years old due to corrosion and Sticking brake Pistons. Not a quick car, but a blast when up to speed. And the wide arches made all the difference visually. They seem to be around £5-7k but I'm sure good ones will climb from here. Sacrilege to some, but I've always wondered how one would drive with over 200bhp from something like a Honda Type R engine...
Ant
My favourite car I owned? A Rover BRM. Now that's got some potential to increase in value. It was such a great little thing.
If I had to choose a car to increase in value though, there are some great suggestions above. A very early Land Rover would be my punt if it was to be stored away. If it was for fun too, a good 996 would be hard to beat.
I'm always surprised by how little the late 70s Mercedes SLC fetch (my Father has one of these). Beautiful car to look and rare to see on the roads these days, and can be picked up for less then 5K. For example http://www.historics.co.uk/buying/au...nz-450slc.aspx sold for less than 6K - a fine looking car that surely will appreciate in value.
If you want a car that will be a serious investment that will appreciate most in value, the best bets are those that are of interest to American buyers. And the US market like their own cars.
You can't go wrong with a classic Mustang from 1964 - 1970. The more original the better. They are a great car to own too. Rust free examples ar not difficult to find, and all, and I mean ALL, parts are readily available and reasonably priced.
They're more reliable than you'd think, they only go to the breakers when people can't drive them ;-)
Sideways!
Ditto the comment about buying a brand new heritage defender and mothballing it for 15ish years.
Seen a few Pumas over the years that have had Cosworth engines and the 4x4 running gear fitted into them. Would imagine they'd be quite fun to drive.
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