mx5cartalk.com

I am curious as to the fairly sudden rise in price of the NA MX5. In a scan of every car listed on carsales in the last 365 days, the mean price is shown to be ~$6300. When this is reduced to 180 days the mean becomes $6500. Drop it down to 60 however and it jumps up to $7300 with the current online mean being $8,100.

Is there any reason? Is the market going to continue to rise once the new MX-5 is launched and summer rolls around?

Good cond NA6 are getting harder to find. Junk has pretty much been parted out leaving only good stuff. Good stuff is always in more demand?

Price distortion caused by the forces of supply and demand does not define product quality.

Sounds more like the overpriced ones are still sitting unsold.

I bought my first road going car (not my first car) in 1997. It was a 1977 Holden Torana. Factory V8, 4.2 4speed. I paid $2500, and it was exactly 20 years old, and was not considered particularly cool or collectable. The same car now would command more than $20k. I sold the exact same model to a collector for $18,000 in 2007, only 10 years after I bought the first one.

A 1993 NA6 is now 22 years old, and has the hall marks of a collectable cool car. As they become more scarce, the price will rise. The Mx5 has attracted a following of young people who are 'stancing' them, modifying them, and rolling them off the side of mountains, all of which will help scarcity. Some of these people will become successful in middle career and will want to buy the toy of their youth, and the price will rise.

That's my prediction!

project.r.racing wrote:Sounds more like the overpriced ones are still sitting unsold.

Nope the data doesn't include outliers. It is based on the price at which point the cars were removed from carsales.

Does removed mean sold?

I'd say it's just demand going up.


They've become very popular with young people thanks to being cheapish, and being featured on a few of those Youtube shows.

They've stayed popular with the older set who want an MGB but without the necessary RACV membership.

And the biggest change in the past year or so has been that the early NAs are now eligible for club registration (being over 25 years old)


Those things have all increased the demand, while the supply has stayed mostly the same.
In reality, the supply has likely dropped since so many young kids are buying them and hacking them to pieces to fit stupid sized wheels etc so they cna be famous on a blog nobody reads.

llmoose wrote:Drop it down to 60 [days]... Is there any reason?

Part of it is the usual end of Autumn being of Winter [lack of] supply issue.

llmoose wrote:

project.r.racing wrote:Sounds more like the overpriced ones are still sitting unsold.

Nope the data doesn't include outliers. It is based on the price at which point the cars were removed from carsales.

How are you getting this data? I haven't been able to find a link to anything like it in Carsales.

Geeeez I overpaid!
I paid $24,000 for my NA.
Oh wait that was over 22 years ago!

I am sceptical about the numbers- a mean of NA's at currently $8100? So what are the stats behind this and how many in the group- spread of years etc. Incidentally "mean" doesn't really tell us much without more info. An old boss of mine used to say that the average depth of the lake was 3 feet but you could drown in the middle. Whilst the MX5 is a great little car- far better than any MGB or Healey in terms of function its still a very long way from being a classic and collectable esp modified cars which most "purists" are very wary of. It also pretty clear that there is really no shortage of MX5s and seemingly so for MGB's as well. PRR has a got a point as well- you ask whatever you like i.e. inflated prices but getting it is far harder.

Pretty pointless navel gazing.
The only relevant price is what you buy, or sell your NA for.

I work in the motor trade and the info comes from carsales themselves and is not a publicly accessible tool.

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