Graph of the Week: 10 Biggest Drops in Insurance Quotes
Online insurance quotes are useful because, along with some other metrics, they show what people are buying or at least are interested in buying. Interests, tastes and trends in the collector car market are always changing, and it is often predicted and reflected to some degree in quote activity.
These 10 cars saw the largest drop in online quote counts with Hagerty since December 2014. Half are cars that saw huge appreciation over the preceding two or three years and then flattened out more recently. While Porsche 911 prices remain high at about $30,000 for a really good ’77 Coupe and about $80,000 for a really good ’97 Coupe, they aren’t growing at the same manic rate that they were last year. The buying frenzy has slowed down, so fewer people are seeking quotes. Since just about every air-cooled Porsche was caught up in this trend last year, it makes sense that the 356 would follow a similar path in quote activity.
It’s much the same story with Ford GTs and 190SLs. Staggering auctions results encouraged other examples to surface, and prices continued rising. For example, average Hagerty Price Guide values for a 2005 Ford GT went from $180,000 at the beginning of 2014 to over $250,000 at the beginning of this year, and for a 1960 Mercedes 190SL the average price rose from less than $50,000 in the beginning of 2013 to well over $100,000 in a little over a year. However, prices are no longer increasing as many people who wanted a GT or a 190SL have already bought one and not as many folks are looking to insure one. As for what happened to the MG Midget 1500, which saw an enormous drop in quotes, it’s a bit of a mystery. Their square-body Austin-Healey Sprite cousins also saw a sizable drop, but otherwise there’s no discernible pattern that would explain the decrease.
