T Break thread 2023

[Gerard C]

Originally Posted by VIVA GT

But for a road car to sell for around 24 times of its original purchase price 30 odd years later (and around 5 times more than one has sold before) is a bit of a shock!

Fully agreed, its a real shock. Moons ago I made an extensive search into the specialised adds and found strange things, like cars/bikes not existing but just adverted to keep the market prices insanely high. Down here its illegal but who cares? It does not come from real enthousiasts those are speculators.

As Duddha says one part of this market is like the art one.

[Mike Harte]

I don't know whether any of you watch the TV programme Bangers and Cash which is about a vehicle and memorabilia auction firm up in North Yorkshire, but they are constantly amazed at the prices that are achieved for the sale of any "hot" Ford, whether it be a Sierra, Fiesta or Escort etc. no matter what state it is in.

They just get sold for really silly money, and unfortunately some of them are just parked up in private warehouses by the new owners to "preserve" them for the future.

[VIVA GT]

I completely agree with the comments that cars should be enjoyed by driving them and can fully understand how, as the 'values' of the cars increases, the risks of damage, or worse still, being ambushed & the car stolen would severely reduce the enjoyment factor. This is what I meant about the price of the car moving them away from the true enthusiasts (who would enjoy owning & using the car) and just onto investors whose only enjoyment comes from seeing the value of their investment increasing.

[Lancsbreaker]

According to the auctioneer on the day the winning bidder on the RS500 was an online bidder from Dubai, so it might well be small change for them.....


I was equally bemused by X reg Mini Cooper Sport, one family owned, reputedly serviced and MOT'd every year, but with only 734 miles on the clock - 200 or so of which had been added in the last couple of years. Hammer price of £24500. What do you do with it, apart from hanging it on the wall?

[Lancsbreaker]

On an entirely different topic, MSUK are starting to make a big thing of all Clubs having to have a Club Safeguarding Officer, who must be licenced by MSUK and must be Disclosure and Barring Service checked.


Does anybody else think this is some sort of "gold-plating", except perhaps for those clubs involved in say junior karting, where there are likely to be a lot of under-age yougsters around? MSUK have a team of 3 in the Safeguarding unit!

[morninggents]

Originally Posted by Mike Harte

I don't know whether any of you watch the TV programme Bangers and Cash which is about a vehicle and memorabilia auction firm up in North Yorkshire, but they are constantly amazed at the prices that are achieved for the sale of any "hot" Ford, whether it be a Sierra, Fiesta or Escort etc. no matter what state it is in. They just get sold for really silly money, and unfortunately some of them are just parked up in private warehouses by the new owners to "preserve" them for the future.

That's been the case for years, Mike. Unfortunately.


By the way, Bangers and Cash/Derek Matthewson were in the news yesterday for other reasons!

[morninggents]

Originally Posted by Lancsbreaker

On an entirely different topic, MSUK are starting to make a big thing of all Clubs having to have a Club Safeguarding Officer, who must be licenced by MSUK and must be Disclosure and Barring Service checked. Does anybody else think this is some sort of "gold-plating", except perhaps for those clubs involved in say junior karting, where there are likely to be a lot of under-age yougsters around? MSUK have a team of 3 in the Safeguarding unit!

What great use of licence holders' money.

[midgetman]

Originally Posted by Lancsbreaker

According to the auctioneer on the day the winning bidder on the RS500 was an online bidder from Dubai, so it might well be small change for them.....


I was equally bemused by X reg Mini Cooper Sport, one family owned, reputedly serviced and MOT'd every year, but with only 734 miles on the clock - 200 or so of which had been added in the last couple of years. Hammer price of £24500. What do you do with it, apart from hanging it on the wall?

There must have been someone else prepared to pay *nearly* as much, of course. The under-bidder must be well minted too.

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[Gerard C]

I'm always suspicious when during auctions there are phone bidders. If you're show off oriented why would you buy an old Ford for crazy money? Apart from real enthousiasts, an RS 500 is not really interesting imo. Genuine or not.

[GORDON STREETER]

Don't let us forget the loss that took place at the end of the 80s in the "classic car" market. I had a musician customer that "against my advice at he time" bought a couple of Aston Martin cars at the top whack.
He kept them in a shed under cover for a year and as he wanted to move house he tried to sell them. After a lot of tyre kickers and people effing him about he eventually sold them for almost 100k less than what he paid for them. That was a good investment then !!

[grantp]

Looking at the values or costs of enthusiast encouraged cars can be very puzzling.

The Cossie is extreme, in my opinion, but people will pay similarly silly prices for some old nail or previously (badly) refurbished "thing" that was, allegedly, once owned by some sort of celebrity.

And then there is the Restomod arena.

The Redux BMW M3 would be an example. It was originally advertised as £330k but must be more than that by now. And from memory you may have to provide an original car to start off with.

The special builds of Mk 1 Escorts, Opel Mantas and Chevette HSRs probably start at over £150k and head towards £250k.

Even the regular car market is becoming disproportionate.

30 years ago (just to pick an era) a typical "family" car (expectations of what that was then may vary) probably cost about half a typical family "breadwinner"'s annual income. Now, if one is thinking electric future, it may be more like a whole year of income.

Something, considering the budgets of the masses, will have to give way.

It may not be the amount of cash those in Dubai have to play with, so a top end silly market may well persist in glorious isolation.

[andy97]

Originally Posted by grantp

Even the regular car market is becoming disproportionate.

30 years ago (just to pick an era) a typical "family" car (expectations of what that was then may vary) probably cost about half a typical family "breadwinner"'s annual income. Now, if one is thinking electric future, it may be more like a whole year of income.

Something, considering the budgets of the masses, will have to give way.

It may not be the amount of cash those in Dubai have to play with, so a top end silly market may well persist in glorious isolation.

But look at houses.
When I bought my first house my Father was appalled that I had a 25 year mortgage at 3x my (sole) annual income. And that was for a house in Yeovil.
Now people are taking out mortgages at 4 or 5 times joint incomes for up to 40 years.

[VIVA GT]

Originally Posted by midgetman

There must have been someone else prepared to pay *nearly* as much, of course. The under-bidder must be well minted too.

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Yes, although the prices have been slowly creeping up over the past few years, it's an interesting scenario how 'all of a sudden', an RS500 has such a high value. There appears to have been a bit of Cosworth interest at this auction, there were a couple of Escorts that sold for around £65k each, and a Sapphire 4x4 for £109k (although another made *only*£31K).
One theory I've heard is that someone wants to set up a car museum in Dubai and that's where these high priced cars are headed. Time will tell.

[GORDON STREETER]

I think the classic car market is just like stocks n shares, if you can't afford to loose you can't afford to buy.
For us "normal" people who "try" and play the field is a lot different to some people who can afford to lose a million quid like they are just buying a pint!

[Gerard C]

Originally Posted by GORDON STREETER

I think the classic car market is just like stocks n shares, if you can't afford to loose you can't afford to buy.

Well said.

[grantp]

Originally Posted by GORDON STREETER

...play the field is a lot different to some people who can afford to lose a million quid like they are just buying a pint!

Especially if it is not really their money they are playing with.

[grantp]

Originally Posted by andy97

But look at houses.
When I bought my first house my Father was appalled that I had a 25 year mortgage at 3x my (sole) annual income. And that was for a house in Yeovil.
Now people are taking out mortgages at 4 or 5 times joint incomes for up to 40 years.

It's almost impossible to run a direct comparison across decades since so much can change in a short time these days.

However, if we look at the basic absolute necessities that people might demand for their comfort zone we could consider Maslow's triangle to be representative.

So food, shelter and security make the 3 core components.

I'm not sure where "travel" fits into that, but we might simply apportion an amount across all 3 categories.

In recent times we in the west in general, but UK in particular seems to have been pushing shelter into "property ownership" and reducing the perceived value of food and security in favour of shelter by making it an "investment".

In the modern world "shelter" implies bricks and mortar in the UK, other construction methods elsewhere in the world.

Either way one should consider that war, earthquakes, weather patterns and simply age of a structure can eliminate the investment value and so eliminate the shelter benefit it offers.

One might consider, therefore, that the focus on shelter (as investment rather than protection) has weakened the spending on food and security. That may not be a good outcome in the medium to long term, especially for an "advanced" economy.

And then there is Energy ...

Still, so long as there are people around who can afford to buy trinkets at oddly high prices I suppose we should not worry too much ... should we?

[GORDON STREETER]

Unfortunately some people have far too much money and on a whim will outbid somebody just for the hell of it. Then it sits for a year or so in a centrally heated garage just to show to their friends. So most of us won't even get a look in.
As we know it happens in auctions for just about anything and with internet bidding from all over the world it only made it worse.
A very good friend of mine that helped finance my racing has several road cars that have registration numbers in an ascending 2 figuration like X2 X3 etc. I wont say what they are but he wanted one more to make up the set. He saw that it was coming up for auction and put in a bid of £50k that was immediately upped to £100k ! my friend dropped out after a couple more attempts and after that a certain "someone" came in with £500k bids against 3 other people. That certain person eventually paid several million for it !!

[Gerard C]

£ 50k for a registration number is already quite a lot imo. Whatever the car. 50k, 500k, one or several millions makes no difference. A good idea for your friend, let him sell one or several numbers and buy cars with the money…

[andy97]

Amidst all the hype over the RS500 I thought this was cheap (and yes I know it isn’t a real FRP), wish I had realised.
https://www.silverstoneauctions.com/...57&pn=1&pp=100

[midgetman]

My boss used to say "When you have so much money, it isn't about the cash but keeping score."

He was right

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[Eric Falce]

Originally Posted by GORDON STREETER

I think the classic car market is just like stocks n shares, if you can't afford to loose you can't afford to buy.
For us "normal" people who "try" and play the field is a lot different to some people who can afford to lose a million quid like they are just buying a pint!

Way back around the time when Maggie gave over to the grey man, I had just i received my XK150 from Bob Winkelman in the states, was offered £33,000 as was, decided I wanted to keep it and renovate it, 6 months later interest rates went up to 15%, couldn't get £13 k for it, decided to keep it and enjoy it, really have done a lot of fun milage with it and don't regret it.

[MGDavid]

Originally Posted by andy97

Amidst all the hype over the RS500 I thought this was cheap (and yes I know it isn’t a real FRP), wish I had realised.
https://www.silverstoneauctions.com/...57&pn=1&pp=100

In similar vein if I'd escaped from Delta's stall a halfhour earlier I might now be the owner of this one:
https://www.silverstoneauctions.com/...77&pn=1&pp=100
Bargain! (or must be summat wrong with it)

[grantp]

Originally Posted by MGDavid

In similar vein if I'd escaped from Delta's stall a halfhour earlier I might now be the owner of this one:
https://www.silverstoneauctions.com/...77&pn=1&pp=100
Bargain! (or must be summat wrong with it)

The vendor seems to have got the cost of the recent prep work back from the sale.

Not a bad little toy at the price by the looks of it.

[andy97]

Originally Posted by MGDavid

In similar vein if I'd escaped from Delta's stall a halfhour earlier I might now be the owner of this one:
https://www.silverstoneauctions.com/...77&pn=1&pp=100
Bargain! (or must be summat wrong with it)

Yes, looks like an absolute bargain as well.
Elise’s are going up in value and not difficult to source parts for, even if there is “summat wrong with it”. Cheapest one otherwise is probably somewhere around £12k for a Cat N and £15k for an ok one.