Weekend Car/Possible Investment - What’s best?

Vita

Vita

Vita

Soldato
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Late night / hi all-

Recently I’ve been thinking of purchasing a second car as a weekend/investment kind of thing.

My job consists of driving and I drive an EV (boo). I haven’t been in-to cars for a long time but I keep my tabs on prices/market.

I wanted some advice as I want best bang for buck value but my gripe is this: long term ownership costs, would it outweigh the profit? It would be garaged and driven probably less than 2k miles a year at the most.

I’d ideally keep it between 5-8 years I think, a few factors depend on ownership but it’s a rough estimate.

I’ll keep it simple I have these cars in mind and they’re very different from one another.

GTR R35 any version. But it seems 2nd Gen (DBA) is the one to go for in terms of value for money?

Some sort of exotic 2 seater, Gallardo/R8/Raari of some sort.

Or

A Honda S2000/Lotus Elise of some sort.

Again very different spectrums. I feel the cheaper option is probably the safest.

Again I have no experience of these cars but judging by some members having owned/have these I thought I’d ask.

Thanks in advance.
 
outside a few edge cases you'll almost never make money when you factor in ownership and running costs.

You might get close to breaking even though if you're lucky.

Old and/or interesting cars come with higher maintenance costs if you actually want to use it unforuntaly.

Do it because you want to have a cool car, not because you want to make money on it i'd say.
 
A lot of the good (and mediocre) cars have already increased massively in price.

Best bet, get something that you can have fun in that won't lose lots of money.
 
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Subaru Impreza's
Mitsubishi Evo's
Toyota Supra
Mazda Rx7
Nissan Skylines
Honda NSX

Some of the newer Toyota GR first production runs if you get allocation could get you a few k quick profit( Yaris / Supra GR where a good example of this) Talk about a New Celica GR coming
 
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Just thought i'd add a bit as ive got more time now.

I had a 2005 Subaru impreza STI which i sold in 2015, i got £8200 for it, same car today is worth around 15-16k with the 80k i had on the clock.

So on the face of it i've lost tones of money but i think at best i'd have broken even on it..

I'll do some rough maths over the last 9 years if i'd have kept it:

Tax at around £300ish i think a year is £2,700
Mot every year at 54 is nearly 500
servicing every year if you do it all yourself, call it an average of 300 but that might be light as you'd need almost 2 cam belt changes in that time with water pumps etc? another 2700 if DIY, a lot more if doing it at a garage.
couple of sets of tyres at 700 a pop, 1400
insurance, i live in the sticks but it'd still be 300 a year for me, maybe more now as my boring estate car is almost that much, so another 2700 at very least.
so that's £10,000 in running costs for 9 years before i've even put any petrol in to drive it anywhere and nothings broken or gone wrong, with an older car is unlikely.

So depends how you look at it, even with a car that's doubled in value you're still a few grand down on the deal over the course of 9 years. But if you've got the spare cash to leave 'invested' in something like that it's not a bad way to go if it brings your a lot of enjoyment.
 
sovietspybob said:
Just thought i'd add a bit as ive got more time now.

I had a 2005 Subaru impreza STI which i sold in 2015, i got £8200 for it, same car today is worth around 15-16k with the 80k i had on the clock.

So on the face of it i've lost tones of money but i think at best i'd have broken even on it..

I'll do some rough maths over the last 9 years if i'd have kept it:

Tax at around £300ish i think a year is £2,700
Mot every year at 54 is nearly 500
servicing every year if you do it all yourself, call it an average of 300 but that might be light as you'd need almost 2 cam belt changes in that time with water pumps etc? another 2700 if DIY, a lot more if doing it at a garage.
couple of sets of tyres at 700 a pop, 1400
insurance, i live in the sticks but it'd still be 300 a year for me, maybe more now as my boring estate car is almost that much, so another 2700 at very least.
so that's £10,000 in running costs for 9 years before i've even put any petrol in to drive it anywhere and nothings broken or gone wrong, with an older car is unlikely.

So depends how you look at it, even with a car that's doubled in value you're still a few grand down on the deal over the course of 9 years. But if you've got the spare cash to leave 'invested' in something like that it's not a bad way to go if it brings your a lot of enjoyment.
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Valid Points i Had an 06 Hawkeye and TAX on them is circa £600 a year.

However if its a care of parking a car up in secure storage hoping it increases then limited running costs (NO TAX / MOT)
 
Vita said:
GTR R35 any version. But it seems 2nd Gen (DBA) is the one to go for in terms of value for money?
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At least as things stand R35/36 not an investment and with occasional use if sitting around a lot, especially outside, will probably end up costing a fortune in disks and pads, etc.
 
There’s always noise about cars becoming eligible for US import at 25 years old, but I’m not sure why you’d import a RHD version of a car to the states when there’s plenty of LHD options across Europe.

As has been said above, you’re not going to make money on a modern classic, especially if you’re factoring in running costs. Minimal depreciation whilst enjoying a cool car is absolutely possible.

I had a S2000, part exchanged it on my 911 for £10k (pretty much what I bought it for). Whilst values for the very best examples have gone up, if you take inflation into account, there hasn’t been a wild increase in your average car.

It’s a fun journey, and depending on your budget, there’s a whole load to choose from! Where my 997 has really come into its own (also garaged) is that it doesn’t mind being laid up for a couple of months. It’ll start on the money and drive off just the same as it was left. More exotic cars might not have that luxury. I think I would have come a cropper with a TVR with lack of use.
 
I'd imagine a modern TVR like a T350 or Tuscan wouldn't lose money, but their prices are already riding high and only getting higher.

Elsie's never seem to drop in value and I can't see an Exige doing so either.
 
Unless you're buying a collectable car, no car is an appreciating asset - it is simply a liability.

Vita said:
GTR R35 any version. But it seems 2nd Gen (DBA) is the one to go for in terms of value for money?

Some sort of exotic 2 seater, Gallardo/R8/Raari of some sort.

Or

A Honda S2000/Lotus Elise of some sort.
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These are cars that depreciate in winter and rise in summer. You could, theoretically, buy one in winter from someone eager to shift it, then sell it firmly in summer for a bit of profit. However, sports and super car prices are generally coming down YoY due to the diminishing demand and the surplus of cars hitting the market as the pandemic purchased weekend car is parted with. The high interest rates are also putting off the majority of the market's finance buyers, which counts for a majority of the market.

A highly desirable/depreciation-proof car, like an Elise/some 911s/more, you will overall get back what you paid for it provided you don't increase the mileage too much. Of course, that defeats the purpose of buying a weekend toy as it sounds like you want to drive it (and you should drive it!).

As a former owner of two S2000s (sold the previous one Jan 2024), I wouldn't recommend going near them as an investment/anti-depreciation car. Whilst they are appreciating in price, the cost of parts has sky rocketed. Engines are now nearly as much as a whole car used to be 5 years ago. With even the 2009 models hitting the 15 year mark, it is going to cost you some money at some point despite their reputable and well renowned reliability.

I bought one that needed a fair chunk of work; bought it in winter and sold it in winter. I made a tiny profit by the skin of my arse but did all of the repairs myself. If you were adding on labour costs, I'd have been in the red by a mile. Probably could've gotten a bit more in summer but it still wouldn't have come close to offsetting the labour costs.
 
I think the ship has sailed on this sort of thing, if you already have a desirable car its probably already at the peak of its value.

I have had an R34 GTR for the last 10 years, its a 2001 so modern enough to be reliable, drive nice and comfortable to use. I bought it for £30k, its now worth about £100k, thats covered all the maintenance, insurnace, petrol and still leaves me with an easy £50k profit.

It will be eligable to go to the USA in 2026 as it will be 25 years old, the americans are desperate for them as it was never sold there and has been popularised by the fast and the furious films and Paul Walker, also being a product of Japan they only made right hand drive versions so they dont have a choice.
 
Thank you for all the replies. It makes sense to get what I’d be happy with. Sadly, I am of those who reads the negatives online more than the positives and struggle to decide what is a good bang for buck buy/less risk.

I’ve never owned a roadster of any sort so it may be the way I’d go with this purchase.
 
julianhj said:
TVRs have a reputation for a reason. Some are good, some are a bit of a nightmare. I had one of the latter (a Griffith). When it worked it was amazing, but it let me down every couple of months.
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Conversely I have a Chimaera and it hasn't broken down once. Admittedly it's not a daily driver though. Most factory issues were down to cost savings / compromises and any issues will probably have been sorted by now. A lot will come down to how well a specific example has been maintained.

Any 20+ year old sports car isn't going to be cheap to run, particularly anything from a low volume manufacturer.

Private sellers are struggling to sell at the moment so it's a buyers market.

I'd say a TVR is a car you'd have to specifically want though. Specialists are few and far between and you have to be willing to put up with some of the quirks and compromises. Not sure about the investment potential either. Aside from the Sagaris they're pretty undervalued IMO, but the market dictates values.

I'd say a 996 911 would be a good bet if you are only looking at investment potential . Prices are low at the moment, but you'd need a good, clean low mileage example for potential investment material. Because of the low prices, a lot of them will also have been maintained on a shoestring budget.

Most of the cars that are now worth a fortune were either already expensive, or the owners were lucky. If future values could be accurately predicted people would be buying flowers of them up and putting them in a barn.

My general advice though would be just buy a car you like and can afford to run and use it. The car itself is probably unlikely to depreciate much if it's already getting on a bit, so buy it, enjoy it and if you can sell it at something around the price you paid or more, it's a bonus.
 
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When I looked at this a decade ago I decided on an Elise, on to my second now partly due to how well the first retained value. I bought a brand new factory build and I’m pretty happy how much it’s still worth… Tax is a fair amount, but servicing and maintenance, insurance etc are surprisingly reasonable. It’s also an event every time. Nothing else drives as well that I’ve tried so far…
 
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