Are Classic Car Values Going To Go The Way Of Old Cell Phones?

I would agree with this article. While not directly mentioned, I would say the primary result supporting a trend of declining interest in classic cars is urbanization. If you are an affluent professional living in a city, you do not have the room to store and the time to maintain/use a classic car.

If you live outside of an urban core area, you can more easily find the space but can you find the time to enjoy it?

Like any other market - real estate, art, etc. - there is a trend towards bifurcation - where the best of the best of the best keeps rocketing up in value because the richest consumers want the very best while the upper middle and the middle categories stagnate.

I discount the notion that people are spurning classic cars because of repairs/maintenance because if you want something enough you will make it happen.

Classic cars are definitely a hassle to maintain and in many cases difficult to sell once you tire of them (Wayne Carini makes it seem easy but it is not!)

To confirm this trend - in NYC, there is a "country-club" of sorts called Classic Car Club Manhattan - a members only club where members share a stable of about 50 interesting cars (the middle market classic ones that are still fantastic but relatively cheap) and have social events. The NY Area autospies 009 or 00R) should check it out and do some reporting.

https://classiccarclubmanhattan.com/

https://jalopnik.com/5931196/how-two-guys-spent-1-million-on-cars-in-manhattan

This is the future of the collector car space - shared collector cars.

As someone who has bought, flipped, and sold classic cars, the market is always cyclical. In the last few years, the run up was pretty much "the sky's the limit" as far as prices went, but currently the market is getting soft. People are still buying the "right" cars, but the average Joe who wanted an old car as a weekend thing are thinning out.

That last sentence is sad but true from what I see. Most of my friends who used to dabble in old cars have sold them and are not replacing them. The main reason I hear is not enough time to enjoy them and take care of them.

If autonomous tech keeps improving, someone like my very young nephew may end up never driving a car in his life. Same thing goes for young people in urban areas that always take transit, uber, or walk or bike. Why on earth whould the next generation buy a collectable car? It would be like buying an antique horse buggy as an investment/hobby.

In a few years it's inevitable that you'll be driving your Shelby Cobra on a windy road when you'll be T-boned by a driverless Google car that looks like a Weber Grill.

Who needs that hassle?

As @MD said it is all cyclical. And generational. What is hot now? 60's / 70's muscle. Naturally aspirated mid century to the 1990's traditional sports cars V6, V8, V12. The dying breed of sports car. Go further back to earlier cars and I think most of those buyers have died off. 1910-1940's big three car, not so much, 1930's Maserati race car, still demand there. The right car for the right price. With the kids of today? Who knows what will be collectable in 10-20 years. If your memories of high school were not the cars that drove by or read about, but the phone you had. Sad.

Future classics will include the modern Shelby GT500, GT500KR, GT350, Camaro ZL1, Camaro Z28, Corvette Z06, SRT8 Challenger/Charger/300, Hellcats, and the Demon.

American muscle was quite robust during the last economic recession.

My uncle has a country place, that no-one knows about
He says it used to be a farm, before the Motor Law
Sundays I elude the ‘Eyes’, and hop the Turbine Freight
To far outside the Wire, where my white-haired uncle waits

Jump to the ground
As the Turbo slows to cross the borderline
Run like the wind
As excitement shivers up and down my spine
Down in his barn
My uncle preserved for me an old machine –
For fifty-odd years
To keep it as new has been his dearest dream
I strip away the old debris, that hides a shining car
A brilliant red Barchetta, from a better, vanished time
Fire up the willing engine, responding with a roar!
Tires spitting gravel, I commit my weekly crime…

Wind in my hair –
Shifting and drifting –
Mechanical music
Adrenalin surge –

Well-weathered leather
Hot metal and oil
The scented country air
Sunlight on chrome
The blur of the landscape
Every nerve aware
Suddenly ahead of me, across the mountainside
A gleaming alloy air-car shoots towards me, two lanes wide
I spin around with shrieking tires, to run the deadly race
Go screaming through the valley as another joins the chase

Drive like the wind
Straining the limits of machine and man
Laughing out loud
With fear and hope, I’ve got a desperate plan
At the one-lane bridge
I leave the giants stranded
At the riverside
Race back to the farm
To dream with my uncle
At the fireside…

So I am guessing you listened to Rush as well!!!

Complete with the screechy vocals that make humanity want to die. Horrid band.

I still find it funny that Rush is just as Canadian as Justin Bieber, Ryan Reynolds, and Ryan Gosling (who was in the Mickey Mouse Club with Justin Timberlake who is from Tenesee).

Sitting in my friends basement in 1986, blasting Rush out of 5' high speakers, what a flashback.

Canadians like Rush because Rush is Canadian. Rush's contribution to rock and roll is nil.

Ha ha. I posted Red Barchetta as it fits the article and the discussion. And because I know @MD would shoot it down. Glad to see other Rush fans on the thread. BTW Rush is in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and all three members are considered icons in the business who inspired other artists, Dave Grohl of Foo Fighters (another great band) just being one of many. @mre30 + @leroisF40 Right on with those comments. I was playing card with pals at lunchtime in grade 13, also in a basement of a very nice home. Easy walk back to school. Rush, Zepplin, Doors, Queen, AC/DC etc.. all turned up. Good friends, good times.