Will engine and trans costs hurt value?

[Geronimo]

I wonder if as we see the costs for 915 and 3/3.2L rebuilds threaten to eat 40-60% the value of the car if this will begin to hurt the over all value of used 911's?

Is the average G-body buyer comfortable with potentially having to spend $20-40K on a car with a market value of $30-60K

I wonder this because of my personal experience, having a car with more into it than it will ever be worth. Mine isn't an investment, but nobody wants to throw away 10's of thousands of dollars. So I wonder if this might hurt the market value of Air-cooled cars in that 30-60K range currently.

[Matt Monson]

Nope. Other way around. It’s part of how we got here. They reached the point where a ton of them needed engine rebuilds. Suddenly all these $10-15K SCs needed $10-15K in engine work. That made nice low mileage ones that didn’t need it or nice higher mileage ones that had already had it worth more. It’s a cycle.

I remember 15 years ago when people thought you were out of your mind if you spent $10K rebuilding a 356 engine. It’s part of why so many aren’t numbers matching andhave 912 engines in them. But the guys who built them and restored them and spent $40-50K over ten years of ownership eventually came even and are now ahead.

[ShopCat]

Originally Posted by Matt Monson

Nope. Other way around. It’s part of how we got here. They reached the point where a ton of them needed engine rebuilds. Suddenly all these $10-15K SCs needed $10-15K in engine work. That made nice low mileage ones that didn’t need it or nice higher mileage ones that had already had it worth more. It’s a cycle.

I remember 15 years ago when people thought you were out of your mind if you spent $10K rebuilding a 356 engine. It’s part of why so many aren’t numbers matching andhave 912 engines in them. But the guys who built them and restored them and spent $40-50K over ten years of ownership eventually came even and are now ahead.

Disagree about that being how we got here. There is no rule that hobbies have to break even... just ask all the guys who keep pouring money into old Citroens. Plenty of guys will be "upside down" when their cars need rebuilds in the future.

[Matt Monson]

Originally Posted by ShopCat

Disagree about that being how we got here. There is no rule that hobbies have to break even... just ask all the guys who keep pouring money into old Citroens. Plenty of guys will be "upside down" when their cars need rebuilds in the future.

Who said it was a rule? It also required interest in the cars. There are plenty of Marques like the Citroen where enthusiasts do it for the love knowing they’ll “lose” money. The fact that the conditions exist for this to happen with Porsches doesn’t mean a single thing for any other car.

[creaturecat]

this scenario? you gotta plan on keeping it/driving it/enjoying it.
or plan on taking a loss.
with exception given for rare valuable examples.
folks that can handle the operation themselves? that's a different scenario, to a large degree.
IMHO YMMV

[ficke]

Cars with "needs" engine and trans work will suffer in the market as the buyers get more educated to the true cost of fixing these things, on the flip side, done cars , low mileage cars will be pushed higher as the buyers learn about these costs.

[Geronimo]

I am starting to see a separation already, clean low mile cars are shooting up, while driver high mile cars are stagnant or falling slightly.

I figure my high mile, repaint car is 50% of what I paid for it now and falling.

I think people looking at high miles knowing it may need $30-40K to get right and still be a high mile car worth maybe $40-50K will walk away from these cars, which could hold their values down a bit.

Unless you're a shop doing a full six figure build, those are a category unto themselves.

creature Even DIY'er are looking at $8-10K for a top end rebuild. I have given up on making the car fun, at this point I will settle for not broken. LOL