NACHTBLAU

For those of you who who sell 964s I'm curious how many of them seem to be heading overseas? I know several years ago it seemed like a lot were being exported, just wondering if that trend is continuing?

Ryan

cobalt

Impossible to say and there are many now being exported from Japan and the ROW to the US under the 25 year rule so it is hard to say what is remaining vs being imported. I don't see the large numbers being exported like they were.

LexVan

I would think Singer is helping to keep some cars state side, too?

drola

that all depends on the exchange rate. there are times when the euro is strong and the Europeans buy like crazy. Lately they have not been buying anything (or hardly). So the amount of cars being exported all depends and fluctuates.

tgil

I watch lots of Porsche YouTubes - with "Dutchmann" and a few other overseas builders using just 964s , the exporting thing might be on another upswing.

nathan1

From about 2012-2014 I literally could have sold every single air-cooled 911 that I got to a ready European buyer on a single phone call with no inspection, contingencies, etc. for more than the cars would sell for to a US buyer. If you wanted to sell it in the US then it needed to be fully reconditioned, photo'd, listed and then one had to field a litany of inquiries, spend lots of time negotiating, PPI, etc. and then for a LOWER price. Literally it made it really hard to have any motivation to sell to a US buyer..... however I decided not to sell the majority of my cars to Europe as it was short sighted. What do I mean? Well, once they left the likelihood that they would come back was small. I realized long term that I was selling off my future inventory, so in 2014 I decided to only sell cars to Europe if they were either going to a longstanding client whom I knew I could get the car back from at some point or if they were of a quality I didn't ever want back (project type cars).

By early 2015 however the market answered this as the exchange rate (Euro vs. dollar) dropped to its lowest level (~1.08-1.15) vs earlier it was in the ~1.3-1.4 range. Couple that with the fact the Porsche prices really starting rising here in 2014 and the market was less favorable, as a result the market nearly disappeared overnight!

Imagine in 2013 you were a European dealer. You could buy a car in the US that you could already buy for 50% of the value in Europe(due to market value difference) AND you had a 30% buffer due to exchange rate. You literally COULDN'T lose. So you didn't need to inspect or even quibble on the cars as worst case a steaming pile of crap showed up at your door, but you bought it for less than half price... Now sadly many unscrupulous US dealers did exactly that, sold them absolute garbage, which is now one of the reasons European buyers value original US original cars for much lower than original German cars for example. I dropped some cars off at the Port in this era and some of the cars waiting to go out were SO bad it was painful, I can only imagine what the poor guy in Germany thought when they arrived....

Now in todays climate the exchange rate has started to again really favor the Euro (1.22 today) but the cars values in their respective markets are closer to par. So now a European buyer gets a slight discount due to exchange but once they factor in shipping, duty and making the cars market correct, then really there isn't much money to be made. So what they are buying now are either projects to keep their shops busy or exceptional cars as then the buy is less about making the most money but more about finding a car for a particular buyer who will pay a premium as generally the truly top tier cars are almost always in the US (i.e. the crazy low original mileage type stuff).

Marine Blue

Great insight as always Nathan, thanks for sharing that.

Personally I’ve always considered US Porsche’s to be in far better condition than Euro examples simply because they are not typically used as daily drivers. Having said that, personally I prefer how the Euro cars are configured.

chsu74

Dollar is falling again

Tarek307

2016-2018 i'd say 85% of the cars i got went overseas to Europe or the Mid East (most cars over 30 yrs old) , starting 2019 it really slowed down, 2020 not one car went overseas / 964-993 (cars under 30 yrs old) are subject to a 30% VAT tax, so most of the exports were the older cars, not 964/993 maybe an 89 or a 90 964 here and there but thats it..Values in the USA have now overtaken the value of cars in Europe it seems so doesn't make much sense even with the exchange rate for them to buy here.

There was a dealer in Belgium whom i did a lot of business with but he ended up closing shop especially since all the new EU regulations came out - Had another dealer in Poland, but now he prefers to buy beat up cars from Copart or some dealers/flippers that sell cheap junk and he just rehabs himself, he doesn't see any value anymore in buying good condition drivers cars.