Series bubble burst?
Are prices for older Land Rovers starting to return to earth? Just lately, whenever two or more Land Rover enthusiasts have gathered together the conversation has quickly turned to the seemingly insane prices being demanded for not-very-good vehicles. Series III values in particular seem to have doubled (and more) which is all very well if you already own one, but not such good news for young enthusiasts in particular. I know of a young lad who has been trying to pick up a halfway solid old Series III as a rolling restoration project and become very disillusioned with going to view vehicles (invariably described as “good condition for the year”) which are almost beyond help, yet priced at what a tatty but roadworthy Ninety would have fetched a couple of years ago.
I have been saying for ages that we we’re looking at a speculative bubble that would burst sooner or later. Over the last few weeks I have started to get the impression that some of the froth has come off the market, with a handful of usable coil-sprung vehicles turning up at under the £3000 mark, and project Series IIIS (like the one pictured above) that aren’t broken in the middle for under a grand.
I suspect that some of the specialist dealers that have popped up recently trying to shift unremarkable vehicles for five-figure sums are going to get their fingers burned. I recently had a customer bring me a One Ten Station Wagon purchased from one such dealer for £12,000, with a chassis like a patchwork quilt and big holes in the footwells. I hope I don’t see too many more like that. That sort of thing tends to put people off owning Land Rovers, and where would I be then?