Category: Cars

Question – Have the prices for classic cars gone as nuts in your country as they have here in Australia?

It’s reminiscent of this old classic TV ad from Melbourne back in the early 1990’s (with thanks to Turbin!)

I’ll let you decide for yourself whether or not Madonna had lost the plot back then. But there’s a reasonable argument that sellers and buyers of classic cars – mostly buyers, IF they’re actually buying – have lost the plot right now.

I bought and sold quite a few cars between 2009 and 2015. I bought Saabs, Alfas, my beloved Subaru Brumby, a few more Saabs, and a couple of Porsches.

2009 to 2015, of course, was the GFC and post-GFC world. Times were actually tough for a lot of people, though not so tough here in Australia compared to the rest of the world. Interesting cars were relatively affordable through this period (though air-cooled Porsches were just starting their meteoric rise).

When Covid hit early in 2020, I assumed it’d be another post-GFC scenario. I assumed that people would be struggling for income and looking to sell assets in order to maintain liquidity.

How wrong was I?

The classic car market has gone completely maaaaad! And much of it makes no objective sense.

Case Study 1 – the Porsche 944.

I have a bit of experience with 944s. I looked at several of them in 2013/14, when I ended up buying a 968 ClubSport. I drove nearly all versions – a pre-85 model, a 944 turbo, and a few 944 S2’s. I came very close to buying an S2. The only ones I didn’t test drive were the 16V 944 S from 1987 and any model with an automatic transmission.

The most expensive (at the time) of the three models that I drove was the S2 at A$19,000, closely followed by the turbo at A$17,000. A pre-85 944 was under 12,000. These prices were all quite typical at the time and gave you a decent performance car for good, but not unreasonable money.

Bear in mind that air-cooled 911’s started in the A$15-$20k region back in 2014, usually for a 2.7 because that model had a troublesome reputation. A decent 3.2 911 Carrera from the 1980’s started in the high 20’s. The 944, therefore, was priced as an entry-level Porsche that an enthusiast could get into for $10-$20k rather than putting that money towards a new hatchback.

Hold that thought as we fast-forward to today.

Here’s a Porsche 944 for sale in Australia right now. It’s a 1984 model and it’s the cheapest 944 for sale on the Carsales website right now.

$25,000???

You might think $25K for a Porsche is not too bad. After all, the 944 has a reputation for being a well-balanced package. 50-50 weight distribution. It’s got a robust drivetrain. And it still looks as good in 2022 as it did in 1984.

All of this is true.

BUT (and you knew there’d be a but)….. the 944 from 1984 drives like a dog. And while the outside still looks pretty smart in a retro-cool-pop-up-headlights kinda way, the interior is pure late-70’s-to-early-80’s with all the hard plastics that implies. The 1984 model has the 8-valve engine that drives AND sounds like a tractor. It’s about as responsive as a bookkeeper on a fistful of quaaludes.

At least that one’s a 5-speed manual. The cheapest automatic Porsche 944 on Carsales right now is $35K!! Thirty-five gorillas for that 8-valve engine mated to a 3-speed automatic?????

There’s a reason why these cars were $10K or less, not-so-long ago. And it’s not that they were underappreciated.

For a Porsche 944 to be even close to the base asking prices the model’s fetching these days, it would need to be a 1985.5 model or later – that’s when they got an interior update that brought them closer to their 911 big brother – and it’d have to have the 16-valve engine that debuted with the 944S. An S, S2, or any variants of the 968 are worth considering IF you can get one at a reasonable price.

And 944 turbos? Forget it. I don’t care what sort of smoke Jeremy Clarkson blew up that car’s arse back in the Top Gear days…. it’s just a faster tractor. Eventually. After the lag.

Don’t take my word for it. Drive one for yourself.

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Case Study 2 – Alfa Romeo Sprint.

I’ve owned a couple of Sprints over the years, and had useful custody of another for around 6 months while garaging it for a mate.

You might remember me writing about this one for the US-based Hemmings magazine back in 2015 – Driving a Slow Car Fast

Well, there’s an Alfa Sprint on Carsales right now, too. It’s not just any Sprint, either. I’m about 99% sure that it’s my old Sprint. There are a couple of explainable differences between the old pictures and the new. But I’m pretty sure it’s the same car and the description seems to back that up with it’s references to Tasmania and the car going to an Alfa Club member in Melbourne (exactly my old car’s eventual path).

This is a car that I paid $1,100 for on New Year’s Eve, 2014. I sold it for not much more, a few months later, after I got the job at Koenigsegg and moved to Sweden. It’s definitely been improved since I had it, but they’re now asking $19,990 for it!!!

Now, it must be said that an Alfa Sprint is no dog. A good one is great fun to drive. It’s light, it’s revvy, and at any given moment you could hit something and it’ll fold up like a cheap card table and kill you. That adds a certain thrill-element to every drive.

BUT….. this is a Series 2 Sprint, based on the Alfa 33 chassis. The Series 1 Sprint was based on the AlfaSud chassis and had inboard brakes that lightened the steering with no adverse effects on the handling. It was a remarkably balanced car that loved being driven and it was more fun than a sack full of puppies.

And that’s why Series 2 Sprints were regularly found at $5K and under, not-so-long ago. They’re fun, but they don’t belong in the K category.

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I’m sure I could find a few more examples without too much trouble. The 968 Clubsport I paid $30K for (and sold for the same price in 2014) is now worth $130K. Those $15K 911 2.7’s are now worth $95K.

Am I reading this right? Or should I just stop being a grumpy old man and let supply and demand do their thing?

What say you? Have car prices gone as nuts where you are as they seem to have, here?

This is a bit cheap, isn’t it, Turning a Facebook challenge series into a blog post? I know. I’m sorry. But it’s been soooo long since I’ve written something here and this challenge was actually quite Swadeology-ish, so why not?

The idea is in the title – list 10 cars that changed the way you think about cars.  They’re not necessarily cars I’ve owned, though many are.  Cars have played a central role in my life so it’s fair to say that many of these are cars that have shaped my life, for better or worse (overwhelmingly for the better).

Without further ado, then…..

Jaguar XJ6

My Dad gave me a book about Jaguars when I was a young teen and it’s really the car that started this whole adventure. I used to sit and draw them in class. Even as a 13 year old kid, I loved the sweeping lines, the pure elegance of this car.  I still do.

The car that sucked me in was the 1985 Series III version with the pepperpot wheels. The Series III is shown above (sans wheels). I’d be happy with any of the XJ6 versions and I’m very keen on bastardising it with a modern V8 engine transplant.

I’ve owned a later version – a 1995 XJR – but mine didn’t have the same beautiful proportions as this one, nor the same elegant interior. The original XJ6, whether it be Series I, II or III, was a car that was designed right from the first drawing.

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EH Holden

The EH Holden. It’s the only Australian car on the list and – to be honest – it doesn’t really look like the one in this picture. The car in the picture is quite heavily modified. It’s an EH the way I’d like it to look if I owned one.

I didn’t discover European cars until my late teens / early 20s. They were always for wealthier families back in the 80s. Middle class Aussies bought Australian or Japanese. For a teenage Aussie boy, it was either Ford or Holden. No Jap Crap back in those days, thanks.

The EH was my favourite classic Holden. I’ve shown the sedan here, but it looked quite nice in wagon form, too.

Sadly, I never got to own one (and likely never will). It’s quite pretty for an Australian car, though, and when modded the right way, it moved pretty quickly, too.

That’s probably the way this car most influenced my thinking, actually – the idea of mods. Most of my friends had this type of car back in the early 90’s and it was at this time that I first starting learning about ways you could modify your car to make it go quicker. I wouldn’t apply that knowledge until later in life, but the learning process was a big part of the passion-curve for me.

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Citroen DS

I saw my first Citroen DS (in person) in the late 1980s, thanks to a friend’s uncle. I was still a Holden-loving, long-haired, louty Australian kid at the time and I thought the DS was the strangest looking thing I’d ever seen – and not necessarily in a complimentary sense. I wouldn’t have been seen dead in it.

But how times change.

Today, like everyone else, I think it’s one of the most beautiful cars ever designed. It’s quintessentially French with its dedication to gorgeous form and its nutty suspension.

The world is a much better place for its existence. To paraphrase Richard Hammond – I want one more than I want my next breath. In fact, I have a not-so-secret goal to tour France in one of these. One day.

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Alfa Romeo GTV6

I was still in that long-haired lout stage when I first encountered the Alfa GTV6. A mate bought one when they were still quite new – he did quite well for himself designing the original HSV logo for Holden in the late 1980’s.

The GTV6 was EPIC compared to the cars the rest of us teenage dirtbags were driving at the time. The looks, the sound, the whole package. It kickstarted my Alfa dreams, which continue to this day.

It’s also one of the cars that set the bar for how passionate cars should make the enthusiast buyer feel, which has been a guiding principle for my whole automotive life.

The photo shows my own GTV6, which I was lucky enough to own for a year or so. I sold it because the only way I could wear a helmet during a track day was to have the sunroof open!

I miss it. Driving this car with it’s V6 Busso engine screaming was a proper event!

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Saab 9000 Turbo

This car was the beginning of my Saab obsession. A friend owned one back in the early 1990s.

Again, context is important. We were all young 20-somethings who’d only ever driven Holdens, Fords and Toyotas. To see something this fast, with a turbocharger, leather interior, full digital climate control, glass electric sunroof, amazing stereo, and all the rest – it was like a damn space ship.

Throw in the interesting Saab background and I was rather hooked.

It took around 10 years after my first exposure to the 9000 before I got a Saab of my own and it wasn’t nearly as sophisticated (an early 70’s Saab 99E with the old Triumph engine) but I felt like the king of the world.

Later on I’d own a bunch of Saabs, build a rather successful website about them, and fulfill a dream of working in the motoring industry – with Saab. It all started here, with the Saab 9000 Turbo – a car that quite literally changed my life.

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Saab 99 Turbo

This is still the Saab model I love the most. To me, the snub nose of the 99 suits the car’s proportions better than the longer 900 nose. It just looks tougher. And the 99T is full of wonderful 1970’s Swedish kitsch – centralised seatbelt buckles, those weird window winders, weird headrests, inca wheels(!), that ‘extra’ button and much more.

Pictured above (and looking rather sorry for itself) is my marble white 99T, built in December 1978 and rarely seen as a three-door in this colour. It had a funky green velour interior and even though it made just 145hp from its 8-valve turbo 2.0, it felt incredibly special. I can only imagine what driving one new must have been like back in the day.

I’ve rarely loved another Saab as much as I loved this one. The 1991 Saab 900 LPT I owned in Sweden in 2011 would run it a close second. But this was my first turbo Saab and it was special. I’d also gladly take it in two-door form.

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Range Rover Evoque

OK. Hear me out.

It’s November 2010 and I’m at the LA Auto Show as a guest of Saab Automobile, which is about to launch the Saab 9-4x. I’m also there to interview with Victor Muller, Knut Simonsson and Jan-Ake Jonsson for the job I’d take with Saab in 2011. For the first time, I’m compelled to start thinking like someone in the automotive industry rather than just as an enthusiast blogger.

The Evoque was also making its debut and the waves it made amongst the Saab guys were obvious. They were all very keen to see it and when they did, every last one of them pronounced this car to be a winner. They pointed out not just the styling, but also the very high standard of equipment and fit/finish.

I was pretty tribal back then and wasn’t too keen on looking at anything but Saabs, but I tagged along for the sake of getting myself an education. And I did. The Evoque experience had me looking at other brands objectively to see what they did and why they were successful. It was a massive learning experience so while I’d never be interested in an Evoque myself, it definitely changed the way I critically assess the various aspects of an automobile.

The Saab guys were right, too. The Evoque’s been a massive hit for JLR. (And if I can put my tribal hat back on, just imagine what a decently funded Saab could have done with the original 9X idea based on the success of this. Bloody GM!)

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Porsche 968 ClubSport

Pictured above is the Porsche 968 Clubsport I owned back in 2014.

It was modestly equipped, looked sporty, is said to very reliable (I didn’t own mine long enough) and is an extremely capable, well-balanced car. This car’s ceiling was well above mine as a driver, so beautifully engineered it is.

It was also as boring as a Hoover Dam full of beige paint.

I don’t have anything specifically bad to say about this car. It had oodles of capability but absolutely zero personality. I guess you could say that it DID shape my thinking about cars because it made me love Italian and French cars sooooo much more.

(For what it’s worth, I still love the Porsche 928 and 911. I’m not sure about any other P cars, though).

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Subaru Brumby

The little car that could….. the Subaru Brumby

This car taught me the joy inherent in simplicity.

I usually don’t keep for cars very long but I had the Brumby for three or four years and it was a joy to own. It was as slow as a wet week but incredibly practical.  It got things done, punched above its weight and has absolutely no frills.

It’s car I’d own again in a heartbeat (as long as it had power steering fitted).

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Koenigsegg One:1

The One:1 is automotive insanity writ large. It is the king, the queen, the jack and the joker in the deck. It’s the main course and there’s no room left for dessert. The dog’s bollocks. It’s everything your six-year-old self wanted in a car and much, much more.

Koenigsegg was/is a very human-oriented car company. The mission is every bit as important as the bottom line – a car that’s the embodiment of the Koenigsegg team’s ingenuity, determination, persistence, and engineering innovation.  The One:1 is the most extreme expression of that mission.

I’ve been a passenger in nearly every Koenigsegg model and I’ve driven the CCR, CCX, Agera RS and Regera.

Nothing comes close to the One:1 for raw power and sheer visceral vibrance. This car has some sort of insane voodoo going on. It’s hard to explain – but instantly felt. I’ve been in an Agera RS at over 300km/h. I’ve driven the Regera at around 300km/h. Both of these cars are technically quicker than the One:1 but neither of them are as savage.

What the One:1 taught me about cars/life – go to the extremes to achieve your vision. Go the extra mile. Do the extra thing. Stay awake another hour. Do that extra set. Most of the things we can imagine ARE possible.

After publishing what has turned out to be Part 1 of the 2017 Automotive Bucket List, last week, a few people pointed me towards cars that made me extend my thinking a little. The first two are both cars that I’ve thought about in the past and by rights, they should form part of my thinking today, too.

To recap last week’s potential purchases:

• Mini Cooper S JCW
• Jaguar XKR
• Maserati GranTourismo
• Porsche 911 (996)
• Alfa Romeo 156 GTA
• Morgan 3-Wheeler

The Mini and the 911 are the clubhouse leaders as we turn for the back nine (of which there won’t be nine, but hopefully you get what I mean!).

To the continuation, then…..

Ford Focus RS

The juvenile delinquent option. Almost irresistible on a certain level. And downright stupid on another.

The car I’d be looking at is the second generation Focus RS. Most examples sell for under 200,000 SEK here in Sweden but there are a few that creep over. All examples sold in Sweden were 2010 models. Most of them are white but there are a couple of green ones, for those feeling a little more lairy.

The Ford Focus RS uses a 2.5 litre, inline 5 cylinder engine sourced from Volvo that produces 300-odd horsepower. It’s a popular tuner model, too, with typical outputs of over 400hp. All of that power is sent to the front wheels, via a Quaife LSD. It’ll do 0-100 in about 6 seconds, so it’s proper fast. It’s got 4 seats and the rears even fold down to give you cargo space.

It’s a little practical and quite mad. It was a massive success for Ford and the new model’s going gangbusters, too.

I’ve driven a couple of regular Focuses (Focii??) and while they’re quite pedestrian under the hood, the chassis is really well sorted. Even the garden variety version was fun to drive when pushed around the winding roads in Tasmania’s north (my thanks to the Tasmanian taxpayers for the Focus in our car pool at Mt Nelson campus a few years ago).

I can only imagine how much fun an RS model must be.

The downsides….

I’m 47 now. Shouldn’t I be acting my age? This is a Ford Focus RS in green. It looks like it was built for a 7-year-old, not a 47-year-old.

Secondly, I’m not sure if I could handle the rather plain interior. Yes, it’s got really nice Recaro seats but have a look at that dashboard. This is why you pay bargain-basement prices for top-floor performance with the RS. It understandable. I’m just not sure I want to live with it.

And finally….. I’m just not sure I could cough up that much money for a Ford.

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Volkswagen Karmann Ghia

At the other end of both the elegance and performance spectra is the beautiful Volkswagen Karmann Ghia (Type 14).

Every car company, no matter how ordinary or boxy it’s general design history, has at least one eye-catcher somewhere in its history. Volvo has the P1800, BMW has the 507, Mercedes has the 300SL.

Volkswagen’s history isn’t dull, by any means, but the Karmann Ghia is – for my money – the definitive standout.

The bodywork by Karmann is gorgeous but the engine by Volkswagen leaves a little to be desired. Maximum output from the factory is only around 50hp. Thankfully, plenty of owners have upgraded their engines to get a little more poke out of them. Yes, I know this is a cruiser and not a racer, but still….

Examples start under €10K for a fixer-upper and you can get decent runners for €15-20K. The sky’s the limit from there. Both the white model, above, and the green one, below, are for sale for around €20K.

The downside – apart from the sluggish performance, the Karmann would definitely be restricted to summer duties (as would the Morgan in Part 1).

But oh, what a beautiful summer it would be!

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Porsche Cayman S

The Coxster!

I’d be restricted to early year S models but the Cayman S has long been on my mind.

The S model produces 295hp and with its mid-engined setup, is a beautifully balanced car. It’s widely believed that Porsche restrict output on the Cayman to ensure that it doesn’t out-perform the 911, which it *could* do if equipped with similar output because of it’s inherently better balance.

The styling of the Coxster can be polarising due to that dip at the back, but I love it.

It’d cost a little more than I want to spend (ideally) but prices are pretty stable and your money is buying you both Porsche quality and Porsche performance.

Downside – would I get bored? I’ve had a good performance Porsche once before and it was so solid and capable that it bored me to tears. I like a car that needs to be loved a little, wrestled with. I’m not sure about the Cayman.

Downside 2 – finding one in a colour other than silver or black can be a challenge. In fact, if you look at Autoscout24 for Caymans under €25,000, ALL of them are silver, grey or black. Hmmmm.

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Saab 9-7x

OK, I’m kidding. Even I can’t manage to put up a facade for this one. BUT….

There are a number of them available in Europe for amounts into the early 20,000’s. The top-price goes to an Aero in the Netherlands with the big 400hp Corvette engine under the hood.

I’ve actually driven a 9-7x in Detroit back in 2010 and the ride was pretty comfortable. It’s got plenty of space, and……

No, Steven!!

This one’s a 4.2 litre 6-cylinder version (291hp) with some custom paintwork and it’s selling for just €6,500.

Hmmmm. No. Still.

Life has been a little bit unconventional since I last published an automotive bucket list back in 2014:

I’ve taken a new job, which I absolutely love, but it’s a job that came with a 30% pay cut compared to my old job. I’ve moved half way around the world. I’ve formally separated from my wife and the relative financial security that that relationship allowed. I’ve bought an apartment here in Angelholm, which means I’m not only tied to a mortgage again, but I’m down to one parking space, too.

Given those changed circumstances, one can hopefully understand why automotive dreams have been a little bit lower on my list of priorities over the last few years.

I’m still a car guy, though, and there are still cars I’d like to own before I pop my clogs (or… before the ownership of gasoline powered cars is banned completely, whichever comes first). Therefore, another automotive bucket list is very much in order.

As is tradition, I will first list the cars on my last bucket list, so we can track how it’s changed. The 2014 bucket list comprised the following:

• Jaguar XJ6 with V8 conversion
• Alfa Romeo Sprint with 16V conversion
• Saab 9-5 Aero SportCombi
• Lancia Fulvia 1.3S
• RenaultSport Megane
• Alpine A110
• Saab Sonett III

Can we tick anything off that list? Why yes, we can!

I didn’t get a Jaguar XJ6 with a V8 conversion, but….. I did manage to get something a whole lot better. In May 2016, I bought a 1995 Jaguar XJR with a supercharged straight-6 and all the usual Jaguar appointments (except cruise control!! Who specs one of these cars without cruise control???!).

I didn’t get a Saab 9-5 Aero SportCombi, but….. I did buy a 2003 Saab 9-5 Vector SportCombi. That feels close enough to me. I’ve still got it, actually. It’s very comfortable and very practical, but I’m getting a tad bored with it. Change may (or may not) be in the wind.

I managed to tick the RenaultSport Megane off my list, too. I bought one soon after I moved to Sweden, in 2015. I’d been after an RS Megane for a few years before I actually bought one and when it comes to driving, the car didn’t disappoint. It’s a little road rocket and the performance is still impressive, even today. What was disappointing, though, was the interior. It felt too cheap and tacky, even with full leather Recaros.

I’m going to remove the Alfa Sprint from the list, for two very good reasons. 1) Sprints cost way more than I think they’re worth here in Europe. And 2) the idea of doing a conversion just won’t work in my current circumstances. It’d still be a great car to own, but it’s not for me at this time.

The Alpine A110 is also removed due to cost and impracticality. I’m surprised that it hasn’t ridden on the coattails of the Porsche 911 and doubled in price over the last three years. The upper end has risen a little in that time, but you can still get what looks like a good one for around €60,000 here in Europe. That’s still a lot more than I’ve got to spend, however, especially on an indulgence.

I can’t bring myself to remove the Lancia Fulvia or the Saab Sonett from the list but I won’t write them up again here, today.

(drumroll……)

The 2017 Automotive Bucket List

As alluded to earlier, the circumstances under which I write this list have changed since its last incarnation. In 2014, I was still in Hobart with a job paying around $100K a year and the house all-but paid off. The world was my automotive oyster. Those circumstances have changed in every way. I have a mortgage once again, and I’m earning less than I was before.

The dim ray of light on the horizon is that I should come into some cash soon, when the house settlement is completed. There’s no real incentive to pay off the flat here in Sweden (interest rates are near zero and interest is tax deductible anyway) so this presents an opportunity to indulge my car habit – just a little.

The criteria are as follows:

• The theoretical budget is somewhere between €25,000 and €30,000. That’s an upper limit. A lot of the cars I’m considering are way less than that.
• The car would be used as both a summer and winter car. Storing a car here can be an expensive pain in the butt, so unless it presents an exceptional case that justifies winter storage, it’ll need to be a daily driver.
• The car should be compelling in at least one area, whether it be styling, interior, handling, historical importance, or that most important of all attributes – character.

To the list, then…..

Mini Cooper S – John Cooper Works

I had a chance to drive a JCW Mini recently. It wasn’t the one I’m thinking of buying. It was a series 2 Mini (R56) wheras the one I’m thinking picking up is the earlier R53 model from 2001-2006.

The R56 was super impressive in its finish and the way it drove. It’s proper-quick for a small car and it handles beautifully. The only critique I can offer is that it’s too……. German. Like my Porsche 968 CS from a few years ago, the R56 JCW Mini is so technically capable that I found myself a little uninspired by its competence.

I like to wrestle with a car. The Germans are fantastic at designing/building great machines, but they tend to leave me wanting in terms of the man/machine connection. A car has to have some personality and humility about it if it’s going to be engaging – and a Mini should always be engaging.

An aside – I drove a 2017 Mini Countryman a few months ago and it was more sterile than a heart surgeon’s operating theatre. Avoid. /aside.

Last year, I took a brief test drive in an R53 Mini Cooper S from the early 2000’s. I think it was a 2005 model. It had 160hp and razor sharp steering. It was a lot of fun. Almost perfect, in fact. I didn’t buy that car because the seller was very dodgy and the car had a big scratch down the side. It was a nice first dab of the toe into the Mini world, but I have to admit that a little more power would be welcome.

That’s where the John Cooper Works option comes in. Mini sold the Cooper S at that time with a JCW option that offered various bits and pieces, most important among them a power upgrade to 199hp. That R53 chassis with 40 extra horses sounds like more fun than a sack full of puppies. A proper little go-kart.

The other thing I like about the R53 model is that it came with a standard, old school DIN radio. From about 2005-onwards there’s this zombie period when car companies used integrated radios that tried to look pretty but are now just hard to use and even harder to replace. Give me a proper Bluetooth audio experience or an old school DIN radio that I can replace with a head unit of my choice, please.

So, a JCW is firmly on the radar and if I’m honest, it’s the car from this list that I’ll most likely buy in the near term.

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Jaguar XKR

Jaguar first made the XKR in the late 1990’s. That car looks like a giant rubbish bubble as a coupe, but it’s extremely elegant as a convertible. It’s a strange thing. Night and day.

Please excuse the terrible photos….

That’s NOT the XKR I’m thinking of, however.

The XKR I’d like to consider is the more recent model, the predecessor to the current sporty Jaguar coupe – the F Type. This is the XKR sold from 2006 to 2014, which looks like this….

The early versions of this car (i.e. the one I could (maybe) afford) have a supercharged V8 of some 4.2 litres that produces nearly 420hp. They’re quick, they’re exceptionally good looking and they’re very comfortable.

I’ve enjoyed one Jaguar experience. I’d like to enjoy another. The XJR saloon was a wonderful car but I did feel like I’d retired prematurely. This muscly coupe is a bit more my style.

XKRs for sale in Sweden are beyond my price range at the moment BUT there are XKRs for sale in Germany at the mid-20K € mark. It’s a contender.

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Maserati GranTourismo

OK, this one is out of my price range. But just look at it!!

The car above is currently for sale in Germany for €45,000 and that’s waaaaaaay more than I’ve ever spent on a car. Especially on a car that will continue to depreciate. It’s completely foolish to even contemplate, but also uttely compelling.

The Maserati GranTourismo, like the XKR, is a muscle-bound coupe packing a 405hp V8 and an exhaust note that’ll make you giggle all the way home.

As the name suggests, it’s a GT car. A long-distance tripper. That’s something I’d love to make use of while I’m living here in Europe. There are thousands of roads that I’d love to explore here. The Maserati has just the right blend of style, comfort and power to make those road trips even more memorable.

It’s on this list because it’s a bucket list. A goal. Hopefully, they’ll come down in price a little more and I can aim for one in a few years.

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Porsche 911

The one that got away…..

Back in 2014, I bought a Porsche 968 ClubSport. It was an amazing car and it was the most expensive car I’d ever bought, at A$30,000. If I’d stretched another $10K, I could have bought a really nice air-cooled 911. And of course, air-cooled 911’s that cost $40K in Australia in 2014 are now selling for $90K or more.

Que sera sera.

You can still get into a 911 for under €30,000, however. It’s the ugly duckling of the family: the 996.

The 996 is not the best looking 911 in history. In fact, it’s probably the worst looking 911 in history. But it’s still not a BAD looking car.

This is a 996….

That car is bog-standard, in boring silver and with the horrible runny-egg headlamps.

This is also a 996….

It’s a Carrera 4S with 320hp. And it’s much nicer to look at, wouldn’t you agree?

I can almost hear my mate Mats having a coronary over this because I haven’t mentioned the IMS bearing yet. YES, there are things you have to be wary of with the 996, but there are PLENTY of them for sale in Germany under the 30K mark and many of them claim to have had the IMS bearing upgraded. It’s a matter of checking them out.

There are a lot of things to consider with the 996. The IMS bearing is the just the beginning. It’s not got the nicest interior, for example, and I place a lot of importance on the interior of a car.

But it’s still a 911. And that means something in terms of driver enjoyment and satisfaction.

No, I’m not a big fan of German cars. Not at all. But I’d make an exception for a 911.

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Alfa Romeo 156 GTA Wagon

There HAS to be an Alfa on this list somewhere, right? The world would be out of balance, otherwise.

The Alfa 156 GTA is a hairy-chested beast of a car. It has that beautiful Busso V6 in its final iteration, making 250hp and still sounding as amazing as they day Guiseppe Busso first fired it up.

I’ve driven a 156 GTA sedan in Australia and it was extremely comfortable and agile for a front-wheel-drive performance sedan. It had exactly the right mix of beauty and fun. And it’s an Alfa. I’ve got a massive soft spot for Alfas, as many of you will know.

Why the wagon? Why not?

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Morgan 3-Wheeler

I will definitely own a JCW Mini at some stage. That’s one of two cars on this list that I will definitely buy at some point in the future.

The other is the Morgan 3-Wheeler.

If you wanted to pick a car from this list that won’t lose value, you’d pick the Morgan. They’re also totally impractical and therefore hard to sell, but they DO hold their value.

The Morgan 3-wheeler is, in legal terms, a motorcycle. And it’s about as close to a real motorcycle as I will ever get. It has two skinny tyres on the front and one proper-sized tyre on the back. It’s powered by an 82hp V2 air-cooled engine made by S&S Motors in Wisconsin.

It’s completely impractical, but it’s also simple, elegant, and at just 550kg, extremely light. That’s a recipe for FUN and if you check out all the videos online, that’s exactly where the 3-Wheeler excels.

I will have one, one day.

Enjoy the video.

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I only started writing out my automotive bucket list 5 or so years ago. I’d owned a lot of Saabs in the years that I was writing about them and my attention started to wander.

I bought my first Alfa 33. I bought an MX-5. I bought a few more Saabs and then, when the Muller-era at Saab came to an end, I turned my attention to all-things-but-Saab. I’ve been watching classic car prices ever since and for the most part, I didn’t see prices as being overly intimidating.

I remember some time around 2012, I could have bought a very nice looking Ferrari 308 GT4 (the unloved Dino) in a dark-ish blue with a cream interior for $37,000. Looking back, that seems quite unbelievable now. I didn’t have the money at the time. I could have accessed the money, but we were in the final stages of paying off our mortgage and it went against the grain to pull so much money out of the loan for such an indulgence. If only I’d foreseen the way prices would rise for such cars.

There must be a few of you out there who have been watching classic cars for longer than I have, though. Maybe you can tell me whether what we’re seeing now is extraordinary, a ‘new normal’ or simply a return to how things used to be.

Not being a long-term observer, I have to think the current conditions reflect a post-GFC world where those of a certain age who were fortunate enough to hold on to their money through the GFC now want to indulge in some reclaimed youth and take advantage of a hot market for a fun asset class – classic cars.

The headlines started four or five years ago with crazy auction prices for various classics, the most notable being variants of the Ferrari 250 family, a 7-figure car in basic form and one that now reaches 8 figures with monotonous regularity.

The other headline classic has been the air-cooled Porsche 911. I could have bought a mid-80’s 3.2 Carrera for around A$35,000 three years ago. A similar car sold at auction in Melbourne last week for $100,000.

None of that is news, though. We’ve all watched Ferraris go bonkers and I’ve written plenty about 911’s in the last 18-24 months.

What follows is a new level of lunacy.

I have my Saab 9-5 Combi here in Sweden but I was looking for something a little older, a little more engaging and fun to drive during the summer. Out of curiosity, I decided to take a look at the Alfa Romeo Sprint. I figured it might be a cheap fall-back option if needed. It felt like pretty sound logic to me. I bought a Sprint on Christmas Eve 2014 back in Tasmania for just A$1,100 so a Sprint here in Europe should be quite within my meagre fun-car budget.

What I saw on mobile.de and carandclassic.co.uk nearly made my throw my Mac through a window!

Let’s start with a comparative bargain in Portugal, a 1984 Sprint selling for £5000.

Here’s a 1988 Sprint in Italy selling for £7800.

The car that takes the cake is this 1987 Alfa Sprint at £15,500 – and that’s for a car with “just a few minor car parking dents”.

There’s something important to note as you ponder those prices – bearing in mind that the most expensive one is a full 30 times the price I paid for my Sprint nearly 18 months ago.

That particular generation of Sprint is not even the good one.

I’ve had one Sprint of my own in recent years and I babysat another Sprint for my mate Gavin the year before. They were both Sprints, but they were quite different. Gavin’s early Sprint was the more desirable Alfasud Sprint, based on the chassis of the Alfasud with its inboard brakes. My Sprint, like the ones listed above, was the Alfa Sprint and it was based on the Alfa 33 chassis.

The earlier Alfasud Sprint feels much lighter because of the inboard brakes and while it’s a little harder to work on, it’s a lot more fun to drive. Examples of this model are being offered for £11,000, £13,500 and £14,950 on carandclassic.co.uk right now.

So the earlier, ‘better’ model is seeing higher average prices asked but it’s the later model that’s seeing the highest maximum price being asked at the moment (and one should remember that a price asked is not a price received, but still….). And ALL of those prices are AT LEAST 10-times and up to 30-times what I paid for my Sprint back in Australia.

My Sprint was by no means perfect but it was great, inexpensive fun. I even wrote about it for Hemmings magazine in the US.

Gavin’s Sprint (right) was even more fun and I almost bought it when he put it up for sale but he’d invested more money than I wanted to spend and I didn’t want to bargain a friend down to what I could afford at the time. But damn, I loved that car!

The point of all this…..

The Alfasud Sprint and Alfa Sprint are great, fun cars AT A CERTAIN PRICE. At a certain price you can be subjective and accept potential losses. You laugh at the car’s foibles and call them endearing. You don’t mind their slow pace up hills because you feel like you’re going flat-out in a 1970’s go-kart made from Coke cans held together with cable ties. The Sprint has charm by the bucket load …… at a certain price.

Once you get to 10-times or 30-times that price, you’d feel compelled to be a bit more objective, wouldn’t you?

Well, the sad fact is that at £14,950 the Sprint is complete rubbish. It’s not old enough to be charming at that price and by any modern standards, the Sprint is uncomfortable, unsafe, under-equipped and downright slow. Cuteness is all that’s left at that money and 15-thousand quid can buy a hell of a lot of cute.

And yet people are asking these crazy prices and seeing as there are so many of them being offered for serious money, you have to assume that sellers are getting a fair proportion of what they’re asking for.

My advice – either identify something that hasn’t hit the speculator’s radar yet, or save your money and wait for the next GFC. It can’t be too far away with some of the idiocy that’s on display right now.

I read a story on Petrolicious a few weeks ago that piqued my interest. It asked whether we’ve reached ‘Peak Porsche’ yet – a question to which there is no certain answer but one would have to hope that the silliness will end some time soon.

There is absolutely no doubt that the Porsche 911 is a rare and truly worthy recipient of the over-used ‘icon’ label. It has endured. No matter which model you talk about over the car’s 50+ year history, the 911 has always been elegant, reliable and in the top quartile of the performance scale for it’s generation. And that’s probably being a bit harsh.

So was it really under-valued for so long or have things gone a bit nuts over the last 3 years?

I’m really not sure, but here’s some of my personal experience.

Back in 2013 I sold my Alfa Romeo GTV6 and I was looking around for a fun car to replace it. I eventually bought my 968 Clubsport for $30,000 and that amount of money was a stretch for me. I briefly considered buying an air-cooled 911 at the time and believe it or not, I could have got one for that money. It would have most likely been an import, a less desirable 2.7 from the 1970’s or something in need of significant repair (see my vehicle value maxim) but it was possible.

The one that caught my eye the most was a UK-Import known as a Carrera Super Sport. It was for sale for $45,000 here in Australia at the time (2013).

So that was then. This is now.

The cheapest 911 in Australia right now that isn’t a) a 996, or b) a cabriolet, is a 1978 3.0 911SC going for $59,000 and it’s a UK car rather than Australian delivered. This would have been a $30,000 car back in 2013, without doubt.

The prices rise quickly from there, too.

The 2.7 model that preceded the SC used to sell for even less given that it’s perceived to be a weaker engine. It was the least desirable model back when I was looking around, regularly available in the mid-$20K range. The cheapest one I’ve found on carsales today is selling for $79,990 at a dealership in Victoria.

Then there’s the 1971 2.2 Targa that was originally Viper Green and LHD and is now Guards Red and RHD. This would have been a $20-25K car back in 2013. Not only is it a targa (go ahead, ask a purist) but RHD conversions were some of the lowest value cars back then. This one’s now offered for sale at $80,000.

Of course, there are a lot of people speculating on the Porsche they bought 5 years ago. They see the prices going nuts and they want a piece of that action. Prices have been going particularly loco on Porsches up to 1974, which is why this buyer has the temerity to ask a price that would have had people rolling in the aisles just a few short years ago.

If you don’t get it, you’re not the only one. Yes, Porsches were probably under-valued for a few years prior to the recovery from the global financial crisis. You have to bear in mind, however, that there are so many 911’s on the road. These cars were made in big numbers and they’re very reliable, meaning there are still a lot of them around compared to other high-end sports cars.

I can certainly understand them going up in price over the last few years, but I’m not sure I understand them going up by this much.

Is it a Petrolicious effect? Is it a Magnus Walker effect? Is it simply that people are placing a premium on having an air-cooled Porsche experience?

Whatever it is, the 911 is now well and truly out of my price range, which makes me a little bit sad. I’m going to keep myself as debt-free as possible so that I can take advantage the next time that prices bottom out.

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The 968CS I bought?

968’s are currently selling for between $24,000 and $39,500 but none of those are ClubSports and my guess is that none of them are going to sell quickly. That was always an issue with the 968. It’s an incredible car but few people really know about them and fewer still want to spend their hard-earned on one.

I sold mine for the same $30K I’d paid for it and I was happy with that. It might be worth a bit more now, but it hasn’t kept anywhere near pace with the growth in the 911.

I probably should have stretched myself for that Super Sport.

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And for what it’s worth, if I was looking for something right now…..

This BMW M Coupe just sold for US$15,500 at auction on Bring-a-Trailer. You won’t get one for that price in Australia (or Sweden) but it seems like a very good way to spend some fun-car money.

I’ve never been a big BMW fan but I do love me a clown shoe.

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Sooooooo……

One of the great parts about my new job is that I get to attend amazing events sometimes. The first job I did with Koenigsegg was actually a few weeks before I formally started working for them. It was mid-May when I hopped on a plane bound for Japan, to attend the Sounds of Engines event at Japan’s most celebrated racetrack – Suzuka Circuit.

There were a lot of cars on the circuit that weekend, typically they were cars that had some sort of connection to the circuit, such as a race win. There were some winning Formula 1 cars present, for example, and others that didn’t win but had been drive at the circuit in anger.

Then there was the display, with some of the most mouth watering sports cars on the planet, both old and new. Japan might have had minimal economic growth over the last few decades, but there’s still enough to go round and they really know how to look after their cars.

Click to enlarge and (hopefully) enjoy.

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