AShearer

You have hit the nail squarely on the head. I'm trying to get at least close to that point of inflection.

993C4Smontreal

"how much you should pay" is almost impossible to answer. There are too many factors in play. What I did, was compare 3 of them in my area. All C4S 96 and 97, mileage ranged from 25K miles to 60K miles.....different options, etc.....price ranged from 55-65K (CAD). I liked the lower mileage one cause it looked so new, MY FAVORITE COLOR COMBO, and the PO had respect for the car, and cared very well for it. didnt skimp on maintenance, etc......it was a 96 with the least options, buy it was also the most expensive one 65K CAD ( plus canadaian taxes 15% ...ouch).........8 months later...NO REGRETS.

besides, the slope is a fun ride

Randy 1

Don't listen to these guys who would buy on emotion. With that kind of attitude, I can't figure out how any of these guys made enough money to buy a 993 in the first place! It's the same attitude propping up the housing market.

The flawed logic here is that you're arbitrarily setting your residual value. Why not let the math dictate what a 40K automobile is worth?

Run a linear regression with mileage, S-car as the independant variables. I can't imagine any significant options that would affect value drastically in either direction; maybe "desireable color"?

The R2 isn't going to be very high, but with enough data, you can get a decent idea of what a mile's depreciation is worth, and what premium you get for flared fenders.

Berkley

How did you arrive at the purchase price for your 993 C4S?

Oh , what is the secret for making enough money to buy a used Porsche ?

By the way the seller determines the selling price at the end of the day and not a abstract analysis such the simple example you offered up......

Randy 1

Well, I suspect the not-so-secret of making any money is not buying assets for more than they're worth.

The analysis is exactly that: a quantitative look at the decisions of BOTH buyers and sellers. It's nothing more than the distillation of the behavior of both parties, so I would suspect that if a seller is significantly out of whack from what one perceives the market to be, you should find another car.

And I got my C4S the old fashioned way: someone gave it to me!!

dcdude

Here's a geeky spreadsheet I did for '95s only when I was shopping in March. Close to the red line is a good deal. Higher and lower are exaclty that. Some of the below the line deals were supplied by you guys (well played!)

The ones way above are asking prices, dreamers and cars listed at Holt, etc.

There is an inflection point, at right around 40K miles.

EDIT: My axis labels are transposed, but you get the idea.

Phil

since when did a car become an asset? Cars with a few exceptions are expenses.
I ask you this question......what is a 1997 c2 S.....silver....with 100 miles worth?

jimbo3

Vehicles are most definately an asset. It's the insurance, fuel, maintenence, depreciation and other associated costs that are the expense part. If you don't believe it, I'll be happy to take over your 'expense' at no cost to you!

-Jim

Berkley

AShearer and now you suggest the market is comprised only of online offerings and the asking price is the key variable in relationship to miles and model year.......if these type analyses give comfort.....enjoy the warm, fuzzy feelin'

Thanks for the answer to both of my questions..... "Gifting", yes a time proven method but available to very few

Mark Harris

I did more than this. My wife said, "If you want a Porsche, go buy one." With some frequently flyer miles and the internet I had one in 3 days. Is it a 4S? Yes. Is it black/black? Yes. Done.

I thought I was weird and had some idosyncracies but if you spend hours hyper-threading Excel spreadsheets together as part of a prepurchase analysis I'm going to skip my meds today.

Randy 1

Oh lord, please don't tell me you actually read Robert Kiyosaki books for the financial information...

Randy 1

I don't understand your sentence.

Obviously, the market is not comprised only of online offerings. The critical question is if cars sold online transact at a different price than one sold face to face, through the paper, at the dealer, or via some other channel. If anything, I'd submit they probably sell for more than "off-market", less than at the dealer. So if you think prices found via online research are unrepresentative, please present your evidence.

The key variable between mileage and model year is...uh, time? Inasmuch as older cars, generally speaking, have more miles? And what does this have to do with price?

You can stick your finger in the air and make a WAG, or you can take a somewhat more reasoned approach to buying the privilege of dropping silly sums on maintenance! Sounds guess you'd rather do the former?

To AShearer: I'm pretty sure, as the above pdf chart shows, that there will be a logarithmic relationship between price and miles. Makes sense. going from 5,000 miles to 10,000 miles is going to show a much bigger drop in price than going from 90,000 to 95,000.

Obviously, some sort of estimation of subjective condition of the car would be useful, too.

Berkley

The key words are "asking price" and the key variable is the net realization sales price to the seller......to my knowledge that is a unknown and a major flaw to your analysis, among others cited heretofore.

Each Porsche needs to be evaluated on its own merits. Condition is key to me, but condition is not a fuction of just model year and miles. Overall condtion ( to include mechanical, body, paint and interior, et.al. ) , options, color combination, owner, damage and service history are major factors for me in buying a 993. Yes, I have owned more than one 993. In fact, I have had the opportunity to own sixteen Porsches since 1973.

Randy do you want to sell your Porsche? Let me know and I'll make you an offer using my old fashioned approach. But.... No just dismiss me if you like as a old fart living in hillbilly land........I'll turn out the lantern and leave you to your B-School analyses

Randy 1

Feel free to write me off as a pointy-headed overanalyzer, but you're effectively determining value in a vacuum. You're doing nothing more using anecdotal information to form your opinions. There's no doubt about that, because there is no intrinsic value in a nice paint job.

First, who said anything about asking prices?
Step 1: ebay.com
Step 2: 993 listings
Step 3: completed listings
Step 4: steal underpants
Step 5: profit!

Sure, it's not a perfect market, but it is a large repository of both executed prices and some condition information.

I'm certainly not proposing a perfect model to 993 pricing, but it certainly should give a baseline for what's reasonable. And it's a first step to a cogent, logical approach to determining the value of a market.

Your approach is the reason Deal or No Deal cracks me up.

David Ray

IMHO: 993s with over 100K on them are the best value, spreadsheet analysis or not.

First, they've been driven (which Dr. F. Porsche wanted). Second, they usually have a good maintenance history (with a lot of the evil problems being fixed) which you're not going to get from a 12 year old car with 40K. (if you want to perform you're analysis correctly check the costs of ownership between 40-80K) Lastly, the money you save goes into all the classic goodies to make them really, really nice!