Are classic cars really becoming more and more expensive?
04/04/2024
They have a future, promises the latest price booklet from Oldtimermarkt. For 2024, the decision was made to split the prices for classic cars and modern classics into two issues, as the sheer volume of information was beyond the scope.
Even so, the youngtimer section is 226 pages thick. It costs EUR 8.90 at the newsstand (in Germany). The specialists at Classic Data have compiled several thousand listings, a significant number of which are being printed for the first time, which is why there are no comparisons with the values from five years ago for those. All five conditions, the new price at the time and rudimentary technical data are given for each vehicle type. The catalog is supplemented by over 1000 photos and an editorial introduction describing the valuation scale and the special features of the youngtimer.
But where do you start with the Youngtimer? At the age limit of 30 years? The year 1980 was chosen to roughly draw the line, but even then it was not always clear from the outset whether a car should be included in the classic car or youngtimer award booklet. The youngest cars are just under 20 years old (built in 2005), exceptions prove the rule.
But it is always an exciting read. And you quickly learn that prices don't always go up, that even young cars can lose value compared to five years ago. Or that some once highly acclaimed youngtimers are now only growing at a leisurely pace, while diesel station wagons, for example, which were originally ignored, are suddenly making substantial gains.
The prices of young cars that were previously hardly on the radar are also particularly interesting. An Alfa Romeo 156 GTA, for example, is listed with a condition 2 value of EUR 20,400, an Audi A2 3L TDI at EUR 5,100, while a BMW Z4 M 3.2i roadster is said to cost EUR 35,500, the coupés are missing from the listings. A Ferrari 550 Maranello in good condition is said to cost EUR 123,200, while an SL350 of the R230 series is said to be available for EUR 23,300. A Seat Ibiza 1.5i Cat is expected to change hands for EUR 3700 in condition 2, and so on and so forth. Of course, the deviations from these prices that you see in advertisements and at dealerships are sometimes considerable. Ultimately, a car is worth as much as someone is prepared to pay for it. But the price booklet is always useful as an indication and as educational reading.
And to return to the question posed at the beginning, yes, prices still seem to be rising, but much less dynamically than was expected a short time ago. Cars like the Mercedes-Benz C36 AMG, whose value has risen by 84% in five years, are the exception rather than the rule. And the most exciting cases currently still have a "NEW" in the price development column. So let's look again in five years' time ...
