Real Estate Investor Magazine South Africa REIM February 2018 | Page 60

CARS Just browsing A brace of potentially lucrative automotive investment opportunities. BY RUSSELL BENNETT S 58 o, you’re sitting with a pile of funds unallocated to any other investment class, and a portfolio bulging with blue‒chip properties, shares, and alternate investment vehicles. And you’re keen on using the additional resources to get involved in motoring from an investment perspective? Your most likely starting point, at this stage, will be the high‒end car dealerships in your area. Yes, shopping in the personal ads and online options does provide you with a lot more scope, as well as a potentially more reasonable purchase price meaning greater returns. But there are daunting risks involved, which we’ll unpack in a subsequent feature. For now, let’s head out to the showrooms, because we’ve tracked down some gems that you just might want to consider. Alpina E30 C2 2.7 (1986) Found on: Social Media Available for: R899 500 www.roadnrace.com This Alpina C2 shares many similarities with the SA‒ only 325iS of similar vintage. But while the legendary Shadowline was a BMW SA special and forged a cult local following in SA circuit racing, the Alpina (which is actually where BMW got the engine found in the iS) is a product of an internationally‒recognised and revered tuner specialising in perfectly tweaking BMW road cars for the ideal combination of performance and driveability. With stock E30 M3 prices soaring in the markets in which it was sold, even rarer examples of this generation of car can command even higher premiums today. Across three iterations less than 500 examples of C2 were ever built, making this a speculative investment with the potential to pay big returns. Even if the local market might always prefer the more recognised iS for this kind of money, the beauty of this Alpina is that international car fanatics are likely to be interested when you do put it up for resale. However, the asking price is a steep starting point, and by the look of international prices for this car currently, there’s quite a bit of appreciation still needed before you would be able to take any profit from the transaction, and it isn’t yet clear what the ceiling for E30s is going to be. So it is a gam- ble from an investment perspective, and not a sure thing. FEBRUARY 2018 SA Real Estate Investor Magazine