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Even if I was wealthy, I'm not sure I'd be able to keep a car as a "collectible". Cars are meant to be driven, that's what they're built for. If I was gifted with lets say, an early mint condition NSX from it's original owner and I put it in a garage to sit with other cars, it would weigh so hard on mind ever second of every day that I was not driving it. Why do we especially love performance cars? I might as well have the same NSX with nothing in its engine bay.
With that being said, I'm also fanatical about original OEM condition. Seeing a car you loved as a child in such a condition that it seemed to roll off the assembly line yesterday is incredibly captivating. For example, cars of the 90's have their own "aura" if you will. The way the plastics feel, the smell of the cars, things like this capture the decade. Every time I'm at a car show and I happen upon a car like this, you could swear my expression was of a 5 year old.
Value of cars is a blurry subject. A few posts above someone mentioned the definition of a collector car is one that gets "collected" to be stored. In more cases than none, this will be a better way to find these "time capsules", because our cars are meant to be driven, and I completely agree with it. Enter someone like myself who desires this car because it is so close to having one of these 90's type cars, brand new, never owned. I realize I love this car because of what it was designed to do, so I'm going to drive it, but I also try to take extremely good care of it. If done right, you can drive and enjoy a car while still having it look like new, even years down the road regardless of mileage. The wonderful thing about cars today, (and another reason why I'm such a Toyota fan) is that they are reliable and can hold up to time better than cars have before.
15 years from now, I would have no problem shelling out decent cash for an FR-S that was well maintained from it's original owner even if the odometer was well into 100k. From a mass market perspective, at this point no it's not looking well for value overall, but for someone like myself it can make a difference for sellers. For example lets says I had 10k in the bank and was in the market for an MR2. Relatively good cars go for 5k, but I would have no problem paying 7k because it's worth more than that to me.
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