Posted on 01/17/2014 1:57:48 PM PST by nascarnation
Vehicles less than 10 years old are for the socialist political/regulator class with their large incomes derived from the recirculating debt of various levels of government.
In 1965 I worked at a Summer retreat in the North Carolina mountains. We were told to not bring a car but after getting there realized it was a rule they did not enforce at all.
A couple of guys I knew bought a used car for $20. They drove it around all Summer and when they left, they just left it. It stayed for years at the maintenance yard until they finally somehow got rid of it.
There are a number of inflation calculators on the Web.
I used this one for the numbers I sent you.
http://www.bls.gov/data/inflation_calculator.htm
They are really interesting to use to compare prices.
When I was in college in 1966, an engineer could expect $10K to $12K annual salary.
An XK-E was $6300, a 289 Shelby Cobra was $4995 and a 911 was $6995.
In 1971, the owner of a Ferrari 275 GTB/4 told me he paid $14,700. Our Datsun 510 was $2,254.
The Treasury printing money by the ton robs us all.
I remember in 1974 my late wife and I thought about buying a Corvette. We were at another dealer who also handled Mercedes Benz. They had one of those Mercedes sports cars at a very high price.
I did some figures in my head and told her. If we used up the money your parents saved for you until you married (and which we had not touched) and also our savings, traded in our Oldsmobile Cutlass Surpreme and borrowed 3,000.00 we could actually buy it. We had excellent credit as her uncle owned the bank where we had fiananced the Oldsmobile, The Banker also knew his niece was a business major and would never make a bad deal.
It could actually have been a great deal if we kept it in showroom condition. We probably could have sold it in 10 wi
years with a nice profit. Maybe enough to pay a nice down payment on a nice house. She had enough sense to know it was too much of a risk. So we did not buy a Mercedes sports car. Neither did we buy a Corvette. We ended up getting a Datsun. I sometimes wish we had not played it safe tho
I’m not so sure about that particular year of Corvette would have appreciated all that well. By then, the engine was a pollution-controlled, low-compression dog (but no cats yet), and the chrome bumpers were entirely gone, replaced with first-generation plastic bumpers that would warp entirely on their own in a few years. Worse, the back one had a horrible seam down the middle, because apparently GM couldn’t make a plastic one in a single mold yet.
I’ve actually been amazed at how LOW Corvette prices have gone in the last 5 years. Anything between 1974 and the early 80’s is “meh”, and the mid-late 80’s all the way to the late 90’s are apparently too expensive for young people to own and insure, and the older people who want one get a new, trouble-free or “classic” (pre-74 and better-yet pre-71) model.
Yes we had been thinking of a corvette but it was the Mercedes which we would have had to invest all our money to get. In the end there was no real choice. She was not going to let me buy the Mercedes.
If she had and we had kept it like new, it might have appreciated faster than interest on our savings.
Since we bought a new house a couple of years later we probably made the right move. We had only been in the house for 3 years when I lost her.
You could just about not lose in buying and selling real estate back then. I sold the house for not quite double what I had paid 3 years previously. We did get a bargain on it to start with as we bought it from our assistant pastor who was moving to a church in Mississippi as their main pastor. He needed the money to buy a house there.
I think the 74 to early 80s are basically lousy performers, with smog depleted engines. Then when EFI systems came along, the horsepower started coming back.
And that really seems to apply to a lot of different brands, it was a real low point for the fun-to-drive market as a whole.
Wow. No wonder we’re in economic morass if this isn’t common knowledge.
Simple math (ranges): Minimum wage of say $8/hr for 120 hours part-time work = $960. Add a few hundred for tips (for the lucky ones) and you’re at $1260. Presume shared-dwelling, Rent = $2-400, food = $3-400, cell phone = $50-100, that’s $550-900 right there. Add Utilities, education expenses and/or clothing that leaves what, between $3-500 for a car, plus gas, assuming the rent is in the target area, assuming their mother or public school taught them how to at least heat Top Ramen vs. 7 days/week eating out....
A base model 2014 Ford Focus is $17,000 with payments at 5% of $315, plus insurance of say $150 for a 20 y/o male with one ticket (correct me if I’m in left field).
Regardless, it’s roughly 1/3 Gross Income. Again, GROSS income.
I was making $9/hr back in ‘86 and could barely afford the new car I had to buy to keep my job, as it was the only car on credit I could by without any credit and $500 down. I wasn’t eating Ramen, but then again my wage was almost triple minimum at the time, plus Mileage allowance.
Used cars today? Those that are in that need and responsible enough to save to pay cash do alright, but eat Top Ramen when they break cause they don’t know even basic auto repair.
Oh...let’s not forget that Cash for Clunkers removed how many thousands of affordable automobiles from access to the youthful & working poor to middle-class?
But let’s give credit to Generation Why-ners that do actively participate in the economy and eat Top Ramen just for the status symbol of using their iPhone while driving a Volkswagen, etc...
“If she had and we had kept it like new, it might have appreciated faster than interest on our savings.”
If it was a 450SL, they didn’t appreciate as much as you might think. Trust me on this, I have two of the later versions of this car. Occasionally, we see on our boards 70’/80’s SL’s with 3,000-15,000 miles for sale...and they don’t fetch more than low 30’s tops. Basically, there are still a lot of them around in pretty good shape and only so many buyers.
Now, the EARLIER versions of this car, the 60’s-very early 70’s “W113” models...different story. They are brutally expensive to restore buy even a beater is getting 20K now.
“Oh...let’s not forget that Cash for Clunkers removed how many thousands of affordable automobiles from access to the youthful & working poor to middle-class?”
Cash for Clunkers left a hole in the market that still exists to a degree. I have a friend who makes good pocket money buying, repairing, and selling reliable transpo. You would think that young people who have time on their hands with part time work would have plenty of time left to work on cars. Apparently not!
They're waiting for Obama Cars to supplement the Obama Phones - of course the cars will be equipped with Blue Tooth so they can use the phones hands-off for safety.
How about surviving until 2016?
Heh. Sort of like AC did -- eventually -- up here.
My Dad never would have dreamed of ordering AC in a car [let alone the house]. You just don't need it up North!
But in 1970, my Grandmother in Florida gave Mom her used Dodge Coronet with air and Dad never drove the other car again. All subsequent vehicles were air-equipped.
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