Have you seen the latest eBay add?? 940

[Jordan940]

Now guys! How are we all? The pubs are ever so close and I can’t wait!!! What do we all value a stone mint 940 at? I bought my 1996 for £1200 it’s full service history, two keys and fobs and a single key 1 owner from new and just ticked over at 73300 miles. There’s a add been put up on eBay for 1998 on 80+K for £6,500!!! That’s a fortune in my eyes?? Can’t believe it.

[griston64]

Originally Posted by Jordan940

Now guys! How are we all? The pubs are ever so close and I can’t wait!!! What do we all value a stone mint 940 at? I bought my 1996 for £1200 it’s full service history, two keys and fobs and a single key 1 owner from new and just ticked over at 73300 miles. There’s a add been put up on eBay for 1998 on 80+K for £6,500!!! That’s a fortune in my eyes?? Can’t believe it.

It's called taking the p*ss ! Or hope some idiot with too much money comes along

[XC90Mk1]

Originally Posted by Jordan940

Now guys! How are we all? The pubs are ever so close and I can’t wait!!! What do we all value a stone mint 940 at? I bought my 1996 for £1200 it’s full service history, two keys and fobs and a single key 1 owner from new and just ticked over at 73300 miles. There’s a add been put up on eBay for 1998 on 80+K for £6,500!!! That’s a fortune in my eyes?? Can’t believe it.

There are pods advertised at that. I saw several at beginning of lock down and not one has sold

[john.wigley]

I've always had a 'yen' for these cars, but can anyone explain the significance of the 'Polar' badging? Was it a 'limited edition' or something specific to the Japanese market? I agree that it does seem an awful lot of money for the car, perhaps the dealer subscribes to the 'if you don't ask, you don't get' school of thought.

Regards, John.

[AllHailKingVolvo]

I bought my ‘96 at 75k for around a grand last year (including train fare from Dorset to Norfolk and fuel back it came in at just over £1200 as I recall), and after a polish it’s as mint an example as I’ve seen. Needed a few minor bits doing (cat back exhaust mainly) but other than that has been a dream to own. I feel I paid what it was worth and have been very happy with it.

The examples for sale for £4K+ are ridiculous. These are great cars but not collectible or vanishingly rare. At the end of the day, they will sell for what they’re worth, and I doubt very much that anyone considers a ‘98 940, however mint, to be worth £6500.

[MiniNinjaRob]

I always wonder why people say these prices are ridiculous. It matters not one bit what you paid for yours, that has no bearing on what it’s worth now or what another one is worth.
A car is worth what someone is willing to pay for it. That’s it. If people are paying £4k then they are worth that. Maybe not to you, but no one is forcing you to buy one at that price.
I very very much doubt that those people saying “I only paid £1k, that price is daft” would be willing to sell theirs for £1k again when they could easily get multiples of that......

[deeman940]

Well said Rob....couldn't of put it better.
A few yrs ago an E36 M3 was 4.5k more like 15k now
The R32 skyline GTR i sold for 6k 10 yrs ago now worth 50k etc etc
It appears these cars have more than just a following from petrolheads looking for a cheap rwd 300bhp car. Prices are definitely creeping up...

[AllHailKingVolvo]

Originally Posted by MiniNinjaRob

I always wonder why people say these prices are ridiculous. It matters not one bit what you paid for yours, that has no bearing on what it’s worth now or what another one is worth.
A car is worth what someone is willing to pay for it. That’s it. If people are paying £4k then they are worth that. Maybe not to you, but no one is forcing you to buy one at that price.
I very very much doubt that those people saying “I only paid £1k, that price is daft” would be willing to sell theirs for £1k again when they could easily get multiples of that......

I agree that nobody is forcing anyone to buy a 940 for £4K now, but in my opinion (just an opinion!) the problem with people hyping prices like this is it creates a false market shift which, before long, WILL force people to pay that sort of money for a half decent example, as every toerag with something on SORN at the back of the garage will have a shufty at eBay, jump to the conclusion that they’re sitting on a goldmine and follow suit with the asking prices, as will everyone else. Leading the bull by the nose, so to speak. The 240 market in recent years is a good example-its almost impossible to buy even a misery spec MOT failure for £2500, much less an up together example. Very few cars seem to be changing hands as a result.

The upshot is that it takes decent, useable, non-rare cars out of the reach of the average DIY mechanic driver (such as most of us lot), drives up parts prices, stagnates the market and, ultimately, takes more and more of these cars off the road...either to be stashed away under a tarp as an “investment” or gathering dust with a big ticket on it whilst everyone buys something else.

Maybe I’m wrong...I have two beautiful 940s that cost me less than £1500 for the pair, and there genuinely seems like no better time to own these cars in all senses, so perhaps I should be grateful and stop carping about rising prices 😂

[Forrest]

I absolutely agree with AllHailKingVolvo’s comments but will add a couple more observations having recently been vaguely in the market for a new-to-me 940 or 960.

Many examples are now finding their way into the hands of dreamer traders. And are then sticking around and not selling. Traders typically want to at least double their money. So, if they buy a decent car for £2k - £3k they will then list it for £5k - £7k. More bizarrely, some are buying tired examples for under £1k doing a few dubious-quality repairs and then listing them for £5k - £7k. There have been examples of both in threads on here recently. The general upward shift in prices that this artificial market creates is certainly in evidence.

However, on a more positive note it is encouraging people to hang on to the cars they already have and spend time and money keeping them on the road. It certainly did with me. My 273k mile 940 Wentworth is now running beautifully again thanks to a series of DIY repairs followed by having a new complete exhaust system fitted. If decent replacements were readily available under £2.5k I would not have spent the best part of £1k keeping the one I’ve owned since 1999 on the road. But since the market at the moment is ridiculous, the effort and expense seemed worthwhile.

Markets like this go in cycles. I remember about 20 years ago modern classics were becoming unaffordable. Then the market crashed. It will again. No bull run ever lasts forever.

[Laird Scooby]

Originally Posted by Forrest

Markets like this go in cycles. I remember about 20 years ago modern classics were becoming unaffordable. Then the market crashed. It will again. No bull run ever lasts forever.

While that's true, even when the market for modern classics crashed, they were still a higher value than they had been when the trend first started. Granted many big investors got bitten hard in the wallet area because they'd bought top price cars at the zenith of the price curve as it was at the time and then the values dropped. However the prices have steadily increased in the meantime to the point they were when this current price rise trend started.

As they say on the ads, the value of investments can go down as well as up. As it stands at the moment, i doubt the prices will ever drop below what they were at the start of this current price hike and after this upwards blip will settle to something just above what they were about 12-18 months ago.

Look back over the decades and you'll see a similar pattern across classic car prices during the 70s, 80s, 90s 00s and even the past decade, just with different cars obviously.