2018 MARKET

THE CLASSIC CAR MARKET IS UNDENIABLY HEALTHY – BUT WHERE TO NEXT WITH VALUES IN THE FACE OF A BUNCH OF IMPONDERABLES?

YOU CAN ASK Nostradamus, Madame Zenda or your mate who has picked five Melbourne Cup winners and get answers as reliable as any as to where t he market for Aussie enthusiast cars is headed.

The process of assembling a Guide like t his involves look ing at a lot of cars t hat have been of fered for sa le plus t he ones t hat did sell and tr y ing to analyse contradictions t hat can be bewildering.

We have seen during t he past t wo years a burst of activ it y in t he upper reaches of t he collector vehicle market, culminating in the f irst documented sa le above $1 million for an Aussie-made, road-spec muscle car.

The natura l reaction of vendors might be to push t heir cars onto t he market wit h ask ing prices well above rea lit y. Buyers in response might suggest t hat t he bloke wit h t he car for sa le was ‘dreaming’ but they might a lso rush the market to secure t he ‘car of t heir dreams’ before someone else does.

For a top end ‘boom’ to work its way through to the lower levels, conditions need to be quite specific. There needs to be an impending shortage of vehicles or a lot of unallocated cash. Neit her seems to apply at t he time t his is being written in t he winter of 2018.

Borrowings against home equit y has traditiona lly f unded ‘recreationa l’ motor vehicle sa les and accompanied an upward spira l in residentia l propert y prices. That market is current ly ta k ing a breather and anyone who doesn’t need to sell t heir house is going to stay put until better times return. That means fewer requests to mortgage prov iders for a re-draw and less pressure on t he vehicle market.

What you can do of course is cash in a recent model that is suffering terminal depreciation and use t he proceeds to f und something older, more interesting and t hat isn’t going to lose va lue faster t han last Friday’s la mb roast.

Cars that are 30-40 years old and in sound mechanical condition still manage remarkably well when asked to accept t he role of reg ular transport. The only major downside will be t he absence of air-conditioning or a/c t hat doesn’t work ver y well that will make commuting during the summer months a sweat y experience. Some possibilities?

Ford buyers tend to v iew XE and XF Falcons as secondtier because t hey mostly come wit h si x-cylinder engines. However, t hat a lloy head si x, especia lly when hooked to a four-speed manual ‘box and wit h a ll-disc bra kes still make for a practica l and enjoyable sport y sedan. Looking to t he ot her side of t he fence, $10,000 will easily f und a late-1990s Holden Calais or Statesman.

In t he four-cylinder market we’ve looked t his time at Ford’s Capri and the 1970s Gemini which both offer good buying. In t he mid-size market t here are si x-cylinder Cortinas and Toranas and from outside the mainstream, Nissan’s Skyline Silhouette.

Certainly some food for thought while waiting to see where t he latest Aussie car va lue rollercoaster will ta ke us.