Thursday 5th June 2014

Price hike: PH Blog

The £200K 360 CS has left Chris bemused; where will it end?

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A Tweet the other day in response to me saying how much I was still enjoying 512 TR ownership. It went along the lines of "I thought after the promotion you'd given them with that video last year, prices would have risen, but they haven't".

There's no denying Chris rated the CS...

I hadn't really looked at TR prices since last year, but on reacquainting myself with them, they appear to be higher. In some cases, much higher. I bought a perfect 6,000-mile car in 2009 for £54,000, and sold it a year later. There's a chap currently asking £150,000 for one showing more than double the miles. Whether he achieves that sum is another question, but within a market place currently hissing to the vapours of potential over-heating, the asking price doesn't seem unusual. I mean, £200K for a right-hand drive 360 Challenge Stradale - you have to be joking, right?

For better or worse I tend to view the market in such reactionary, emotional terms. I absorb the asking price and then decide if I think it sounds like lunacy or not - based on driving, condition, provenance, styling, significance and many other factors including the deeply scientific oh-crap-I'd-just-really-like-one-of-those. Perhaps the most interesting aspect of my current position given the volume of bubble-talk is that not everything makes me tsssk with opprobrium - in light of the exponential increase in value for some machines, there is still some value out there. For instance I noticed a post in the forums the other day about a very low miles E30 M3; people were amazed that these cars are climbing towards three figures.

Now compared to where they've been for the past two decades, that sounds crazy, but consider that in terms of pure provenance as both a drivers' car and for competition pedigree, the only thing that comes close to the E30 M3 is a Porsche 911 2.7 RS. And even its racing record pales next to the BMW's. A bad 2.7 RS is probably worth £400K now. A good one far more. A famous one is currently for sale at over a million pounds.

But for £200K? Not that good

Yes, they built 1,600 of them, whereas nearly 10 times the number of M3s left the line. But attrition and an elongated race career must have halved that number today. Viewed in those terms, a mint 25,000-mile M3 Sport Evolution (the funky 2.5 limited run model) for £85,000 looks like a steal to me. The equivalent 2.7 RS would be not far off ten times the price. In fact they look so undervalued compared to what's going on around them that I've just bought a leggier 2.5 Sport Evolution myself, so I can tell you whether it's tears or celebration a year from now. Either way, it's a dream come true for me and a hell of a car.

The Ferrari market is borderline nuts now. The F40 I used to shoot with an F50 is probably worth £200K more today than it was the day in July we filmed it. Values of F50s are leaping as are Enzos. Anything older and less geometric now commands a price that looks like it should be attached to a house in Holland Park - only it won't have an asking price because it will say POA. And you, like me, will probably punch something when you see that.

E30 rise overdue says Chris

I am constantly fascinated by the complex relationship between what we think something is worth, what the market thinks it might be worth and how that vehicle then sits with its peer group. Take the 997 GT3 RS for example - the best model line of performance cars I've driven in my professional life. The recent jump in values has taken people by surprise, but with Porsche fannying around with the 991 GT3 engine debacle and the move to electric steering and paddles, is it any wonder people are snapping up what is clearly the last car of its type to come from Stuttgart? Is £125K too much for a 3.8 RS? Not in my book.

Judged for rarity, provenance, ability and driver appeal, it's worth double that. In fact if a 360 Challenge Stradale is heading for £200K, the Porsche is worth £300K. Where does that leave the 4.0 RS? Somewhere north of that figure, not that I need reminding. Put it this way - if you plonked a 4.0 RS into a magazine end-of-year group test scenario and the judging criteria were based on interaction and speed, I think it would still beat all the 2014 competition.

And where on earth are these going?

But if a 4.0 RS is, say, £300K (not sure if they are, but give it five minutes and they might be) then why is a Carrera GT nearly the same price? One is a posh Beetle, the other is a carbon-tubbed masterpiece born of an aborted Le Mans racer. And it happens to be plain beautiful. You see what I mean? These artificial ceilings are fascinating because they seem to exist in every corner of the market - I say 'seem' because they are transient; the CGT is ripe to move up to the next price category and leave yet more headroom for the 4.0 RS to attain even sillier prices.

Is this all about to go pop? With the number of people saying that it is, and imminently, I'm inclined to disagree. Consensus in the car market tends to mean misinformation. I think it will cool a touch, but what seems to be happening is that the rarest lumps of unobtanium disappear into a world of collectors and oligarchs and the next rung down fills that empty space, but remains too valuable for any normal person and then prices begin to cool.

£400K and upwards for a 2.7 RS

Not crash, just slow - perhaps the point of a small correction and a little pain for those who bought at the absolute peak. Meantime, everyone else is still looking around for the next big thing, and I still think values of those less-obvious gems can continue to rise even if the very top of the market has slowed slightly. Even if the F40s et al continue to rise, I think it just encourages those who can't afford one to push up the values of the best substitutes - hence the silly 360CS prices may continue. So the time of the Ur Quattro, the Integrale, the Sierra Cossie, some of which have moved already, might soon come to pass.

There be danger lurking in this strategy though. When Ferrari 400s cease being comedy bangers for The Thread, you need to mark a note of caution. Or, as the buyer, be prepared to just own and enjoy the car. Because this does now feel like one of the great historical spikes in prices.

And as one seasoned player recently reminded me: enjoy the ups, and just ensure that if it does go pop, you're left with something you own outright and which can continue to savour as an enthusiast. Reckon the E30 fits that description.

Chris

[drakart]

You've bought another car?! Is it written into your contract that makes you have to do this?

Merc Gullwing prices have shot up recently too. At auction at Goodwood in 2007, one could have bought a minter for £140-170k. now they are more like £800k... It can't continue!