Classic car market -especially high end cars- under pressure by future EV transfer?

It’s a very good question. My hunch is that at some point it will matter and only really special, historically significant cars will retain the public’s interest and their value. Many say that internal combustion engine cars will become what horses are today, a mode of transportation that has lost all practical value but has retained the public’s fascination. Even if that turns out to be the case I still think it’ll apply mostly to the more special stuff. Only time will tell and for the time being the market doesn’t seem too preoccupied...

 

Counterpoint: the brass era cars still have market support.

No one alive today collects them for nostalgia’s sake. There are very few opportunities to run them, either on the street or in car events. They are, in utilitarian terms, rather worthless.

But a Stutz Bearcat is still worth a lot.

Matt

 

No worries. You can make alcohol in your bathtub. Your car will run on alcohol with minor DIY level mods.

 

Good point.
I reckon someone will be able to design some form of synthetic fuel without the pollution of gasoline. Regardless the entire push from carbon based fuel is not targeted at classic cars, racing cars and even supercars since while they might be pro rata heavy polluters, their use is minimal and I can't imagine that even collectively the worlds pre 1950 car fleet, Ferrari's and racing cars make up more than a million cars total compared to the estimated 1.05 billion cars in the world. Even with pre 1970 cars included, surely the figure becomes less than 10 million vehicles compared to 995 million cars, many of which are solely used for the daily school run and daily commute. Whatever the exact % of automobiles are classics, racers or supercars, their lack of comparative use means that while they might be an easy target, they aren't the issue.

This is going to sound socialist but what the hell, if the worlds govts spent enough on decent, clean and cheap public transport in major cities as they do on rubbish they could get most of the pointless emissions stopped, if they spent the rest on renewables and stopping people driving 3 tonne trucks to drop the kids off at school (and make the little brats walk) they would not need to ban cars anywhere. Regardless, classics aren't the point and hopefully enough well connected collectors will lobby the worlds govts to get exemptions. Rant over.

 

Gasoline for cars is not going away anytime soon globally at least. As developed countries like the US and in the EU move to renewable/electric, the developing countries like China and India will want more cars and they will be gasoline powered. There will be no net decrease and it's just a shift/moving up a rung.

 

I don’t think the original question was about availability of gasoline. I think gasoline will be available but interest in internal combustion engine cars may wane as they cease being the primary more of transportation...

 

The blue chip vintage cars mentioned in the OP are basically already in museums (private collections) and don't get driven so it won't make a difference in the future. The multi million dollar cars will not become very cheap as they are already treated as art/nice objects.

 

It’s been over 100 years since the horse has been a primary mode of transportation for the majority of the population but people still use them for sport and recreation. Will the market for classic/ collector cars contract - undoubtedly but the cream of cars will still retain a following.

 

The push towards EVs is a regulatory Social Engineering phenomenon as opposed to a Market based push. The regulatory part is political that can and is changing. The globalist Social Engineers will fight to the death the undoing of their agenda of mandating a technology into a market that is clearly rejecting it. The political winds have been changing away from the excessive regulations from Brussels and Washington, a finally completed Brexit, a second Trump term, and the yellow vest protest will force the EV movement to be market based not regulatory based.

 

Look at what just happened in Australia, a complete rejection of the Climate Change agenda.

 

Totally agree. This was the essence of my original response. The very best, historically significant cars will retain interest and value. Rest likely not so much...

 

The functional utility of older cars is decreasing dramatically. You could drive a 60's car in 80's traffic and it was still a pleasant experience. Even a 1930's car back in the 80's. With the high volume of traffic and high speeds having a break down in an urban area is not much fun. I agree the higher end cars over $200,000 are now art objects or financial instruments and will be unaffected. Classic cars in the $10,000-$80,000 will be hit the hardest and we are seeing that now with cars from the 40's and 50's that are losing dollar value along with utility value.

 

Absolutely agreed. Thank you.

Marcel Massini

 

Second-tier Picassos (and there are a LOT of Picassos-- even third-tier ones) still sell for a fair amount of money. I expect that to be the case going forward for vintage cars as well. They may not claim the eye-popping values that a 250GTO will make, but there will be an audience for a 330GT regardless of any electric car mandate or anything else.

There will be an audience for Alfas as well, and Porsches... both of which there are a lot of.

 

look at the art market and technology.

I can mount a beautiful screen on the wall and disply a monalisa or any painting I want... those paintings are in the 10s of millions or hundreds of millions of dollars...

Yet I can go to walmart and buy a screen for 249 and accomplish it...

Are the paintings worth any less because of this technology?

 

Porsche Classic have committed synthetic fuel to keep their petrol classics running through any polluting regulation.

 

"Any pollution regulation" is not possible without legislation supporting it.

The current interpretation is to ban "internal combustion engines", so the type and source of fuel would be irrelevant.

Let's hope we can get beyond this current highly divisive green craze...

Sent from my MAR-LX1M using Tapatalk

 

They still race horses and model T's

 

But not on public roads...and that makes all the difference.

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How about the companies putting Tesla motors into classics? It's another approach for any who want both old car and 'green' kudos.

 

and then also a USB stick with the sound of the original classic engines and a speaker?
I don´t like to think to this situation

 

A horrible idea. You destroy the history and you make the car much less safe due to the massive increase in weight.

 

Alcohol for the win.