Appreciation – For Cars It’s more than Looks

Owning a car is about mobility its true. Get in and drive where ever there is some tarmac (or a track if you’re in an SUV). Yet, being people the object can’t just be functional. It has to stir emotions in us. Maybe even say something about who we are as an owner. So cars have also taken on form, beauty, desirability, originality. And so they transcend function and purpose and become items that can actually become more valuable than when first purchased; I’m talking motor vehicle value appreciation.
I am yet to own a car that has appreciated… mainly because I have bought cars and put kms/miles on them – but also because I haven’t kept the particular cars I have owned long enough to see signals in the market that told me any of my cars would gain in value. I, like many believed that nearly all cars started off shiny and optimal and they rolled down hill in value after that – or even off a cliff in some cases (Subaru SVX comes to mind, which a friend of mine once owned and struggled even to trade in on a new car)..
Lately however and I am talking in the last decade, a strange change has permeated through the motoring landscape with appreciation of cars becoming both more widespread and more unusual.Why? Well I think there are 3 factors, all of which I have not researched at all… but facts have a way of ruining speculation so lets speculate away.

1. Fear and opportunity – People are scared of the fact that internal combustion engine cars are about to become the mechanical equivalent of dinosaurs.. Wiped out by a surge of desperation to save the planet.
I am all for saving our planet but I have seen research that says motor cars are like about 40th on the list of climate change impacting objects. Yet, this has lead to this trend of being seen to be green. It’s also lead to wise heads identifying that grabbing and hanging on to ICE cars just might be a ticket to a wealthier future once there are no more coming out of the factories of Asia, Europe and America (if your car is made elsewhere, no offence but no one notices). I believe there are some 1.45 billion cars in the world… wait 1,400,000,000 cars!!!!! Mitchell owns most of them – but seriously that is a heck of a lot of cars for there to be a “shortage of supply” isn’t it? I mean that’s enough for one car for every 5th person.
Don’t you love statistics.. they can make anything sound anyway you like… but clearly not everyone on the planet can own a car (which is sad but I am not doing a charity plug here). So speculation about the extinction of ICE cars is reason 1.

2. Covid. Wait because I know you are thinking.. can we please not use COVID to explain another thing that has changed our planet. But.. Covid shut down factories, halted supply chains and made waiting for a new car unbearable for most. So people went looking for a second hand car instead – thus creating a new demand and supply imbalance for used cars.. Most cars increased in value over the 2 year COVID period – and even today some 2 years later, used car values are still relatively higher than they were for the previous decades. It makes sense because people could at least touch, feel and bargain for a car sitting in front of them instead of buying out of the catalogue, dropping down a deposit and then waiting.. and waiting… and waiting.. and waiting… and getting their wills in order and pre-booking their convalescent home….yes it took forever it seemed.
This then showed the wider community that perhaps used cars did have a value of more worth than had been considered previously and so now perhaps people are less willing to lose out on selling their used car than they once were… of course not every single car has had amazing appreciation – but I attach the top 10 “affordable and once reasonably priced” cars that have seen a colossal appreciation in value over recent years… (courtesy of some publication on google).

3. Reputation and sentimentality. Yep. They might be hunks of metal but as car folk sweat, bleed and cry over our babies. We park them safely. Keep them covered up and warm. Polish them until the turd is shiny, week in, week out. We give them names. We give them plastic surgery (or should they be composite or carbon fibre surgery). We emboss them, we sticker them, we paint or wrap them… oh and every now and again we drive them. In all that interaction, care and attention we become attached. After all when we go somewhere in them we create a memory, so they become part of the TV show of our own life… So if you got a crappy Volkswagen as your first car as an 17/18 year old, something in you might jut yearn to have one of those cars again 20-30 years later. Of if you saw a movie in your teens with a shiny car driven by the cool hero, you might yearn to have that feeling of awe again. These are the things that have driven car appreciation to a new level.

So with the speculation all but done, how might you capitalise on this I hear you say..(someone, please….). Well, being the expert I am, with the plethora of research behind me to quote – I am going to go with… not quite sure. Certainly picking a car that you know is low in volume should statistically improve your chances of that car being worth more in the future. Picking a model that was the pick of both its own series and its market segment should also be a good chance.. so pick a HSV Commodore rather than an Executive version if you catch my meaning.. but it is not always true… If you look at Porsche, the Flagship car is really the 911 Turbo (Turbo S) yet the GT3RS and GT3 are the cars that are most desired and which have had crazy appreciation since the 992 was revealed and went on sale.
Choose a car that is in good mechanical and aesthetic condition. Pretty stupid to state otherwise but obviously those things indicate the state of the vehicle… Yes of course you can re-build/restore the car and so you might go poking around for a barn find or an old lady with a Ford XY GTHO that was only driven to the shops on Sundays (whilst being chased by 3 Police Cars pursuing the cloud of smoke and rubber left on the road). For most though I think the idea of less work is more appealing.

Maybe the car you have right now is destined to appreciate and be a lovely nugget of gold in the future… Check out the manufacturer numbers and what is happening with them now in terms of selling on sites like CarSales and CARWOW. But don’t get too obsessed unless you plan to make a serious venture out of it. Remember they are a mode of transport, an object that can be a pleasure to drive to somewhere special or to nowhere remarkable at all. The joy, in my opinion, is not whether you have made a good purchase or made money – but whether you get joy from owning the car (and everything that goes with it). After all we are car lovers first and foremost.