C4's price's dropping!!!!!!!!!!!!

[KCBH]

I looked at the Black/Black 96 LT-1 tonight. 90k miles and it looked the part.
The guy who owned it was cool, he didnt get upset when I told him I wanted something a little more sweet.

Looking for my 1st vette is kinda fun. If I keep this up I might find one before summer starts. Haha.

KCBH

 

[ProEMTPFF]

Pro I gotta agree with the last 2 responses. This car sounds like a sweetheart and if possible I would keep it. I would hate to see you part with such a low mile Vette as it would be hard to get back later in life. I have sold cars that I wish now I had kept. Just my .02

Its kinda like selling a member of the family. I was 16 years old when my father brought the car hone all shiney and new. It still looks like it did back then except for the ZR-1 wheels on her now. There is no pressure from the wife to sell.....yet. I know one day with the options on it, milage and the paint it will be worth more than now. The question is how do you put a price on or what is the worth of a family member?

 

[MoeJr]

Pro I don't think there is a price you can put on that Vette. If the Wife is not pressuring you to sell it I would hang on to it. It has been in your family since new and probably has alot of sentimental value. Hold on to it at all costs.

 

[rwpeders]

If you look at the production numbers of the later model C4's made in the 90's they are pretty low compared to the C3 and C5 numbers. These C4's were around 22,000 units or so a year. I think GM cranked out about 35,000 units a year of the C5 after 97 and the Sharks were huge numbers in the 1970's, bigger than the C5 for sure. So, when buyers are out looking for "late model" C4's there is not the inventory out there of C5's or C3's. And if a C4 buyer is looking for a certain colour with a certain transmission that is low mileage etc etc and well maintained then "the chase" gets a little more difficult.

I just wonder if the much lower production numbers of the late model C4's will one day help to firm up the prices. I plan on keeping mine a long time so I don't really think of prices. I do notice up here though, that C4 prices for low mileage late model Convertibles are holding up pretty well and it may be because there are not a lot of them around.....C4 convertible production was pretty low in the 90's. Anyway, I just thought I'd toss the C4 production numbers out to see what you guys thought.

Friend of mine just bought a really nice mint low mileage stick 1987 red convertible C4 and he loves it....and that's why he bought it. And he had to look for a while to find it.

You are right about the production numbers. The Corvette Black Book shows '96 production as 17,167 Coups and only 4,369 Convertibles.

 

[Roadster Guy]

only 4369 Convertibles 1n 1996...

Yeah rw, and only about 30% of those maybe were LT4's...don't have my Black Book in front of me but it was close to that percent. So there are not too many LT4 Convertibles around. Even less to choose from if certain things like exterior/interior colours and options are important to a buyer.

 

[Mad-Mic]

yeah i dated one straight from st petersburg for 2 years sheez i miss dating international chicks :L

"corvette-litas.com ? where you get online and find your future wife, another corvette lover?

sorta like they do with russian chicks"

That really wouldn't be a bad thing. I married one of those Russian Brides (see image)--we were married for 6 years--then divorced last year--now she's 26 and we're heavily dating--> she just wants to be able to still drive the 'vette I'm sure.

 

[kingman]

Can't take those pic's!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

For some reason when l see babes in vette threads, my favorite two things with babes coming first, sorry, my mind goes blank.

Forget the numbers because it all comes down to price and availability in the area where you live. If you have a stock vette in top condition, it will sell period.

It's hard to sell a vette for a decent amount of money if the mileage is over 55,000 miles no matter if it is 1 year old or 10 years old. Only the C1, C2 and some C3's can get away with higher mileage.

Alan

 

[black86roadster]

What about NADA prices

Are the NADA folks accurate?


I looked up my 86 convertible pace car

I was pretty happy to see $13,500 for what they called a "20 footer"..

and they figured the car should have at least 120K miles on it....

mine has 70K miles so I am gonna go with the NADA folks....

I am seeing some scary low prices being tosssed around this thread..

I am for sure keeping mine!!!

 

[kingman]

Forget the books!!!!!!!!!!

HI

All the little books are is guides for the people who have no idea what the market prices are.

They can give you an idea and that is stretching it into Disneyland, or Tomorrowland.

Treat all of the little so called books just guides, that's it period.

There are many books that wholesalers use, new car dealers use, used car dealers use and what the bank uses.

In reality non of them make any sense because the price's vary greatly across the states and from north to south and the time of the year.

Each area has their own hot cars and colors and on the other hand their lemons.

The only way to have an accurate value of a used car is to see the prices at a recent auction that does not allow unlicensed dealer into it. They publish what sold and at what price besides the details of the car auctioned off.

This is their bible, but the cheapest prices is when a car is traded in period, to a dealer that doesn't handle that line or doesn't want to handle that car. This car goes straight to the auction and they only look to make $500 per car. Of course sometimes they make a lot more. That is not the rule.

Keep away from any auction that you are able to bid on yourself except auctions that you have to prequalify like Kruse and Barrett Jacksons.

Now this is my opinion, but you can go to the bank with it. Again this is my opinion.

 

[MoeJr]

I use a guide called CPI. It tracks auctions around the country and averages the prices into "fair,good and excellent". I have found it to be quite a good guide especially since it is geared toward the specialty and unique car market.

 

[kingman]

Specialty Book

Hi

That is in a sub class and is great to have but in the everyday life of the wholesaler the tale of the auction is the bible.

But it is only good in the area in which you buy and sell. If you looked at auction books in different parts of the country the prices will vary sometimes a little and of course sometimes a lot.

When you buy a vette it's best to only buy it from the person who had it last to see how he cared for it. Now this is for your own personel use and not for resale.

Alan

 

[kingman]

C4's versus C5's

Hi
By comparison the C4 has not really dropped in value compared with the C5's. The C5's are tanking at a faster rate.

The 2002 C5's with mileage in the 30,000 range are now going at auction in the $25,000 area and below, but not by much. So think about how much a 97/98 are really worth.

The difference between a 95/96 C4 is probably only $5,000 with lower mileage and better condition.

If you want to cry look at the C5 for sale forum. They are fooling themselves or they believe a sucker is born every day.

Alan

 

[Rain]

exactly why I just bought a C5 - prices are crazy low if you shop around enough..

 

[tnovot]

Regets ....Later I had a 69 L88, pasted everything but a gas station... anyone want to guess what it is worth now. I sold it in 77 for $3200.00 ....Bob Yates

Bob (and others) -
Don't be too sorrowful - think about this:
When talking about what cars of the past have been sold for, you have to take into account the rate of inflation and/or alternate investments.
Even an investment of moderate risk/benefits should double every 11 years. That means if you could have stashed the proceeds, $3200 would have doubled 2 1/2 times to equal approx $19,200.
Remember this would have been a moderate return. The right stock and bond combination could have easily redoubled even that return.
The problem is that 20 and 30 years ago, not many of us could have stashed what was then a relatively large amount of money.
In 1968 I traded in a '61 roadster (instead of being able to afford to keep it at the time) for a new Camaro Rally Sport and got $1700 for it. Hell, it was a good deal at the time - almost 1/2 of the price of the new car!
What would that same $1700 invested in the stock market in '68 be worth today? I don't even want to know but I'd be willing to bet it's close to or even more than the cost of a frame-off '61 Corvette. So much for "what if's".
Terry

 

[photovette]

I don't know about the rest of you, but a Corvette is what I saved and invested for; it's the payoff of all my hard work.

 

[kingman]

Numbers,numbers and numbers!

Hi

Not to change the topic but if you invested your money in the stock market you would probably would have lost a good chunk of it. Everything looks good on paper and that's all it's worth, paper.

If you had stocks when the market dropped like a rock and still had it when the market recovered you would probably be only 26% better then at it's low. It's all numbers like the price of gasoline.

Crude dropped over $15 a barrel and your high test dropped only .10 a gallon. Now if crude drops another $15 a barrel you would save another .10 a gallon. Let's keep it going now, crude drops to zero, then you would save .40 a barrel.
At the high in the North-East l was paying $2.29 gal which is cheap, so when crude drops to zero l would still be paying $1.91 a gallon.

Now does that make any sense?

Ok, back to the origianal topic, forget the war stories because at the present time and that's all we are discussing now, price's are very soft until you walk into a dealer and then wham! Is this guy trying to get rich off you.

Not really, he has an overhead, advertising, rent, labor, detailing, maybe new tires and brakes and misc other things, salesmen's commission and profit to pay for everything. So if he picks up a vette (any year) for lets say $20,000 he has to put out on the lot for $32,000 and that covers some kind of warrantee. Maybe he will try to hit you for some meaningless extras plus an extended warrantee. This is business, so when you buy a car through the papers keep all of this in mind.

Sometimes it is worth it to go through a dealer at least you have somebody to go back to and he does want to protect his reputation.

But still get a car-fax on your own to see really where the vette came from and take it for a test drive.

Not all Car dealers are so called shifty, there are a lot of honest dealers out there trying to make an honest buck.

Alan

 

[Edmond]

Gas has fallen to the $1.72 side, lowest I've seen it in years. Lowest I've ever seen it was $.89 a gallon back in 99'. I don't think I'll ever see that again!

Now is the time to buy for pretty much everything, whether it be stocks, cars, property or whatever...

Back to Corvette's, I guess how much the C5 prices are affected for the next few years could slightly depend on the C6 Z06 price. If it does what the ZR-1 did to the C4, almost no affect because of the much higher price and low production numbers, are that many people going to move to the C6 Z06? I think it would create a backwards ripple affect.

 

[Ken]

Gas has fallen to the $1.72 side...

I wish!

 

[kingman]

Where do you live???????

Edmond

Do you live in a town with a refinery? I never saw those price's on the Eastern seaboard.

Anyway the C6/06 will be priced in the area where it will be cheap for the kind of performance it will offer. It will be a seperate machine all by itself and not to be compared with the regular C6.

Now getting back to the C4's, the GS model, LT4 will be seperate from the ZR-1,
Because the ZR-1 was a performance model in limited numbers.

The Anniv models will be worth only maybe $500 to $1000 more then the regular C4's unless it has the LT4 engine. There were too many built.

What will go up is the ZR-1's because of the performance factor. All of the C4's with the Calloway and like packages will also go up until it will smarter to buy a used C6/06.

Now all of the altered C4's with aftermarket performance add-ons will drop further then the stock C4's unless the party doesn't care and all they want is performance.

But on the other hand l would rather own an 84 vette with the crossfire then a late model Ricer with 40% more horsepower.

You cannot get a bigger bang for your buck then a Corvette, any Corvette.

This is not an investment, it's a labor of love.

Most owners treat their vettes better then their spouse's, but not their dogs!

Strange as it seems.

Alan

 

[Edmond]

Edmond

Do you live in a town with a refinery? I never saw those price's on the Eastern seaboard.

Now all of the altered C4's with aftermarket performance add-ons will drop further then the stock C4's unless the party doesn't care and all they want is performance.

Alan

Alan,

I'm in the midwest. I see you're out on the east coast; I think prices there are higher for pretty much everything while the midwest seems to be a little slower.

Definitely agree with the modified cars. People don't like modified cars in general because they might not trust who did the work or may not like the exhaust system that was put on there because it's too loud or whatever.

I personally wouldn't mind buying a modified car because I know that the owner can't realistically get his money back from those mods, which I would've done myself anyway.