[ramonesfreak]

i think your thinking is off about guitars. i’ve been buying guitars since 1985. i’ve owned and still own many very fine instruments. none of them, even my early PRS, will appreciate much, if at all, in my lifetime....but it has nothing at all to do with changing tastes. zero. to the extent they hold their value it will be because you will no longer be able to buy a new guitar made of hardwood

the valuable, investment grade guitars were made in the 50s and early 60s....., almost nothing (there are some notable exceptions) after that would i consider “collectible” or an investment. it has nothing to do with kids interest in rock and roll declining or interest in guitars going the way of the accordion. those investment quality guitars from the 50s and 60s will always be valuable simply because of what they are and what they represent and because they are rare....so long as there are wealthy people on this planet. the guitars that are investment quality are not bought by average people like you and I, they are bought by movie stars, investment bankers and rich rock stars like john meyer (didn’t he buy every dumble amp on earth?) or obsessive musician collectors like joe bonamasa. and i don’t believe changing taste or age will impact that because there are simply so few of them that demand will always be greater than supply

other than the 50s and 60s fender, gibson, ricks, and old martins etc there’s simply no such thing as a collectible investment guitar and if you buy one thinking otherwise.....then you bought it for the wrong reason.

and i don’t know what your talking about the price being on the decline for years....huh? as for new, the prices continue to go up. my santa cruz acoustic i bought about 15 years ago for $3,200 now costs over $6,000 new. even the new american std strats have gone up. all new boutique acoustics like collings, are now priced so high i could never buy one....with an avg price of about $7k....and those 50s teles and strats keep going up and will continue to do so....

it’s like saying the value of a picasso will go down because the new generation prefers electronic art or the value of a frank lloyd wright home will decline because people prefer modern kitchens

if what your saying is that your current high end modern guitar will be worth nothing 50 years from now....well maybe but who gives a crap. i’ll have been dead for decades by then and the idea of my guitars being an investment will be totally irrelevant.....and never was relevant because all my guitars, vintage or new, were bought to be played, and were

Originally Posted by sugarwood

Careful.

I presented the following logic a while back, and some fools here mentally imploded
They sadly think there is permanent demand for "my precious"... Delusion.

I will paste some of my favorite snippets:

Give it time.
Guess what they said about Model T's in the 1950s ?
Today, you can't give one away.

Has nothing to do with production numbers or utility.
15mm T's built, yet it's easier to find a 911 for sale. Why is that?
The bottom line is that, at some point, all the people who like these cars will ALL be dead, on the proper timeline.
The are all destined for the scrap heap. Not if, but when. 50 year, 100 years, that's just details.

Production numbers don't mean squat when demand evaporates.
There are many rare stamps and coins with VERY low production numbers.
Guess what? They are worthless now. No one wants them. Demand collapsed.
Hummels used to be worth a lot of money.
Guess what? They are worthless now. No one wants them. Demand collapsed.

So yea, every one of our cars is heading to its scrap value.
Think bigger.

Timeline illustrates the logical refutation of facile assertions that "these items can only rise in value because of low production numbers and practical utility".

In our lifetimes, we've already seen demand decline for the model T, the '32 Ford, the '57 Chevy T
... and the latest segment, the 60s muscle car, as the cruise night cohort slowly migrates to nursing homes.

Slowly, and within your lifetime, you will see demand diminish as generations die off.
Eventually... You won't be able to give your "57 Chevy" away. Drive on!

Still don't get it?

Ever hear of Elvis?
Or the Elvis museum in Vegas?
Guess what, people who now go to Vegas have no idea who Elvis is.
No one cares.
Yea, Elvis museum IN VEGAS recently closed. Forever.
Make room for the new nostalgia.

Take a guess why almost every auto museum in the country is a money losing disaster.

So, you go right on thinking that your PORSCHE can only forever go up in price forever because demand will forever rise since nursing homes will soon have track days.
Oddly, anyone who has said this about their '67 Camaro is clearly a fool, yet "this time it's different" when it comes to your particular 911.

57 Chevy? If you have watched prices, there has been a clear and consistent downtrend for the last 10-15 years.
This will only continue as people who like the '57 Chevy increasingly die off. This is not a hard concept to grasp. And it's not a new idea. Generations come and go.

How long do you have to wait for demand to disappear? Until you are dead. Get it? You represent a data point of someone who is very interested in the 911E. You are not alone. But, once you (along with your entire cohort) are dead, the demand for 911E will evaporate, just like your scattered ashes. You are the demand, so you don't get to be exempt from the very forces that create the market dynamic in the first place. You will never get a 911E for dirt cheap, but your kids might, by definition.

Still don't get it?

Look at the collector guitar market. The new generation does not even identify guitars as cool. Guitars are for old dads. Dads are not cool. DJ mixing tables are the new cool. As guitar people slowly age out, the price has been on a decline for many years. The Millennials will not be propping up the vintage guitar market when they hit peak earnings years. Before electric guitars, accordions were a very popular instrument early in the last century. Guess what vintage accordion demand looks like now compared to the peak? Limited production numbers? LOL, doesn't matter when you can't even give one away.

Not everyone can grasp that nostalgia demand is a sliding window. Think bigger. Short term blips are natural variation ebbs and flows. Longer term, history will prove you wrong. They can continue thinking the Millennials will really ramp up the demand for the Duesenberg market once they hit their prime earning years.

Most 20s car guys are into hot hatch GTI/Golf, Evo, WRX, GM muscle, and truck culture.
Many others simply drive F-150's, Elantra, Focus, Civic, etc.
The freak outlier 20s kid who is into 993 does not mean much of anything.

Still don't get it?

Things evolve.
Apple sold more watches than the entire Swiss watch industry in 2017.
And smart watches are still in their nascent stages of evolution.

Kids don't think grandpa's Rolex is cool.
Nothing about grandpa is cool.
One steampunk outlier misfit does not a trend make.

Mechanical watches are another dying industry.
But, you're certainly entitled to your opinion.

Demand for generational nostalgia items decreases over time.
I am correct. When your generation dies off, the production numbers will mean squat.
Model T, '32 Ford, '57 Chevy, Tubbed '67 Camaro......all dwindling demand over decades.

Just remember there will be ZERO demand for your car once your generation is dead.
I drive my 911 a few times a week.
Drive 'em while you got 'em.

Still don't get it?

In the end, when your generation is 100% dead, demand will be much lower than it was when you were alive. Won't matter how great the car was.
Victorian furniture is infinitely higher quality than the disposable garbage sold at Bob's Discount. However, demand has evaporated for 17th & 18th century antiques.

Your generation will not die simultaneously from a large asteroid.
You will die off, slowly, one at a time. Drop by drop.
So, why is it relevant to the topic at hand?
The long term trend can manifest into the short term.

And, rest assured, the long term trend is that fewer and fewer people are lusting after a 1946 Ford Super Deluxe Coupe.
By now, they are all dead or dying. Buyers evaporate, inventory sits longer, and eventually prices reflect that.

And before the court jester says,
"But....but....but....what that gotta do with PORSCH"

A) The cycle never stops. Nothing is immune to time.
B) This is too complicated for you. Find a new discussion.

Still don't get it?
Generations move on....

https://www.hagerty.com/articles-videos/articles/2018/10/17/why-are-these-desirable-collector-cars-cooling-down

“With the Shelbys, GTO, and Challenger, it looks like values are generally tracking pretty flat, but buyer interest (which we track via quote activity) is way down for all of them,” he notes. “The number being added to insurance policies is down, and auction results have been pretty weak.” While their value is holding strong, there just aren’t a lot of new buyers entering that market.
“A lot of the '40s, '50s and early '60s domestics go along with something we've been seeing generally, that lots of '40s and '50s cars primarily appeal to buyers who are quite a bit older. Younger enthusiasts aren't taking up the mantle, so demand is shrinking. This definitely seems to be the case with the bottom spot, the Stylemaster. Values dropped quite a bit recently, and buyers don't seem to be interested in them.”
The lesson is that younger car buyers aren’t “taking up the mantle” on the older cars