A pleasure to cross 6,000 miles with you! I had mileage anxiety with my 1996 NSX, Not making that mistake with my Evora GT. I almost know how much fun it is to drive your amazing car! Cheers!
Hey Doc good to hear from you. Exige my2014 is at 58k caterham my2010 is at 38k. And i dont see any replacment in the horizon. I am waiting for the weather to get better and I waste no opportunity to drive any of them.
Good man 👍. With racing cars as you know no-one cares about mileage, a brand new car is more likely to have problems, we rebuild our race engines every year. No one wants to touch a road car with a rebuilt engine but I bet they drives better than any garage queen, my K series in my Caterham SLR has been rebuilt over 5 times and it gets faster every time!
As for the influencer constant churn... they are buying these cars as a symbol of wealth and then worrying about the finances. To be able to afford the car on your drive is to be able to drive it and not worry. In these difficult financial times - this constant pursuit of more (used to be called Greed) sets a dangerous precedent. My vote... don't get your finances upside down over chasing a fraction of a second... perception of speed is more important than the number on the dial. And if you really must go FAST FAST - get a superbike.
Damn straight! Completely agree. I believe that in places like Miami you can rent exotics for a day, drive around, get seen, film it and pretend you own it. People watch car influencers and think they can get that lifestyle from UA-cam, nearly all of them were wealthy before they started uploading videos!
Hang on to it if you possibly can Jonny. The UK used car market (& performance car niche) is particularly bleak for sellers at present. That’s unlikely to change anytime soon, but markets are cyclical. Better to keep the car in good shape with an ‘average’ mileage until the market picks up again; (which it inevitably will), the closer we get to EV Armageddon. Realistically you will have no chance of ever finding anything to effectively replace a personally specced hand built ‘halo’ model like your 430.
No serious plans to sell any of my cars even though I probably should! I don't think Lotus will top the GT430, such a shame we'll never get to see what they could have done with a pure performance car now they have access to proper development money. The GT430 hints at what might have been. Prices for GT430s have been much stronger recently thank goodness, your timing looks about perfect! I fear the Collecting Cars one won't do so well but they are achieving a lot of low prices on there. I saw a Stratton GT (based on the Evora GTE) only made £50k! Even less than the criminally overlooked Evora Sport 410 (which made £53k on CC, no doubt on a forecourt somewhere for £65k!). Best wishes, Jonny.
Dr. P You have the best 430 content on youtube and my inspiration for my 430 conversion. I'd hate for you to part with the 430. I think its such a rare and amazing car that you'd only be left with a large void and regret trying to find a worthy replacement. I also think you have no reason to worry, 6000 or 60000, you should have no problem with the car's value if you ever decide to sell. Its very obvious you take real good care of it and the car is well documented so that'll reflect in the car's value regardless of the mileage (its condition I would consider to be far more important than mileage). I'd personally never, ever consider selling an actual 430 if i had one unless having dire needs to. The 430 being such a niche of a car is in my opinion immune to mileage anxiety
Very kind comment, don't worry, no plans to part with the GT430 I completely agree and am very aware of how special it is (every drive is an instant reminder of that) it's unrepeatable having spec'd the car from new. It will only get cooler and more special with age just like the Esprit Sport 300 before it. It wasn't necessarily my plan at the time as we all thought Lotus would do an Evora Cup 450 Final Edition or something along those lines. My original plan was to get the last version of the Exige but the GT430 had other plans! With every passing year it's looking more and more like my petrol keeper. Cheers from the UK!
The hypocrisy of the "car enthusiasts" never fails to make me laugh... In the forums, car meets, youtube, facebook, instagram comments etc people make fun of people who don't drive their cars but the minute somone is looking for a new car, they only look for the most prestine and lowest mileage posible and then proceed not to drive it themselves coz their too scared of losing money... Honestly if im ever in a position to comfortably own one of this high end cars, I'll most likely buy one to keep for life and if im gonna sell it, i'd atleast have done 30-50k miles or kms ontop of what the car had done.
Yes car enthusiasts play by different rules depending of whether they are buying or selling. But cars should lose value when they’re used, parts wear out many don’t look after their cars well and bad driving can wreck a car but the whole thing has been distorted by a small number of cars that increase in value over time which makes depreciation seem worse than it is by comparison. For some the idea of losing money on a car has become toxic even though they are wealthy. But I guess who wouldn’t want to own a cool car that makes you money? The bit I don’t get is keeping the miles off a car that’s going up in value! You make money whether you drive it or not so drive it!
@@DrPittenstein Yep...Well said! I'm noticing this with motorcycles as well... Im currently selling a "high" mileage bike and all people keep going on and on about is how high the miles are. People are literally buying toys just to brag about them instead of having fun with them. I bought a bike at the start of summer this year and i've already done over 9000 miles on it alone this year, almost half of what the bike had done when I bought it. Personally I don't give a sh*t, gonna ride the wheels of this thing!! It's a japanese bike so as long as you maintain it properly, it will last forever. When the time comes to sell it, whoever wants it can buy, till then, imma keep the throttle pinned whenever I can never going over the speed limit offcourse...😂😂
A good judge of value of your car is the one currently on CC. It finishes tonight as I’m sure you are aware. Lotus never sell well on CC but for some reason Targa Florio cars always seem to buy them and they sit for a year plus. Something fishy me thinks as I don’t understand why they don’t do a trade sale.
I don’t think it’s good guage of value CC is low balling a lot of cars at the moment. Some cars still doing well but general trend is downward which is to be expected during difficult economic situation and rising interest rates. GT430 values bottomed out around 2020 and asking prices are a lot stronger now. It’s an ultra rare car if more people knew about them and wanted them values would be stronger still. Hopefully new customers brought to Lotus by Emira and EVs will generate more interest in Lotus cars which will eventually increase demand for the older cars.
@@DrPittenstein That CC result was not what it went for at all. I eneded up buying that car after the auction for a chunk more than that, although I still think it was a great price.
I agree, there's a lot to be said for that. I still have my Caterham Superlight R from 1998, currently restoring it to its former glory have long since stopped caring about the mileage!
I would imagine a good few owners with cars like yours and similar are pondering the same question. However I would imagine you will loose a chunk if you were to sell just now. But as you say, that was the previous mindset with cars. Covid has brought along the notion that people can buy cars and not loose money if not make money. Those days are gone. The trade price to retail prices are vast. Vaster than they have ever been because dealers / traders have lost the volume so what changes is the margin. Your GT430 is just the most special car. Keep it and enjoy it and sell something else to fund it. Interesting your CC segment as the orange S3 Elise is mine. I’m after a cup now but as you will be aware the prices people want for them is mental. Hence why they sit for so so long.
Fortunately for me asking prices for GT430 have been much stronger in recent years, they did get down to £70k at one point, I dare say some were traded below that but I think Lotus helped by pitching the Emira below it (in cost and performance terms). I doubt the CC result will help much but they are extremely rare and may not be surpassed by a petrol Lotus, Emira will need 475bhp to match the power:weight will we ever see that? Unlikely.
Very good video and couldn't agree more. I have a Lotus Exige 420FE (1 of 3 in Lotus Yellow, and only one in my spec. 34 UK 420's in total). Did 7k miles in Yr1, 3k Yr2 and already have two European road trips planned this year. It's a shame any 410/420/430 with over 10k miles seems to be viewed as leggy by some - despite cars being better when being used. My take also is, if in the future anything needs doing - can always rebuild the engine/gearbox etc, ultimately most parts are consumable so not the end of the world.
Fantastic car, I bet it drives better than all of the others collecting dust. Complete madness to think any car is leggy over 10k miles, easy to do that in under 12 months but good for you for enjoying yours. At the end of the day you will have much better memories, pics and videos to look back on. 20k miles in an Exige 420 is worth a lot more to me than making £20k by not using one. Cheers DrP 👍
Good stuff. I've never really suffered from mileage anxiety as for years I've been searching for my lifelong "keeper", and of course if I never intend to sell it, then the more mileage i can put on it the better! But I've also been trying to work through the incredibly painful decision of whether that keeper is the 420FE or my blue/white Elise SR like your old one. I've flip flopped back and forth, but back to back driving them recently the call was made to keep the Elise. The Exige is "better" in almost every way, so much better built, the engine is great and really suits the car, and it's the only car I've ever bought new, but the Elise hits higher highs for me; it's modified and even more thrilling to drive and I'll probably change more things on it in the future trying to make it perfect. It squeaks and rattles and currently rides too hard and I've never found a geo setup I really like, but on my favourite local roads and for my limited abilities, it's given me my best drives ever and continues to do so. Ultimately, it's a pretty fortunate position to be in. I hope you continue to enjoy your two also.
I can relate to this completely, really not sure which one of my current two I would sell if I had to. Flip flop between them constantly and was planning to do a video on it too. But as you say it's a privilege to be tormented in this way! To make it worse I'm not convinced I've quite matched the overall ownership experience with the Elise SR either but we have to hope that our best drives are still ahead of us! Cheers!
Great video and points. Could not agree more. My Evora Sport 410 has just ticked over 16000 glorious, smile inducing, miles. I have enjoyed every single mile. 4 road trips to the IoM and the glorious unrestricted roads there. I've got no idea what my car is worth and really do not care. I bought it to drive it. It's a car. That's what they are made for. I've got some art. I enjoyed buying it. And I enjoy looking at it. But it's art. That's what it is for. For you to appreciate it. Too many people buy cars for all the wrong reasons. If I bought a Ferrari 430 today. I'd drive it. The mileage wouldn't bother me and the impact on the value wouldn't bother me. I think a lot of the problem is that people are buying cars on finance that they can barely afford. They want people to know they have the car, as people will think they are wealthy. Just don't ask them about the £1.5k - £3k monthly PCP charge they are paying. I buy my cars with cash. Once it's spent it's done. I no longer think about the cash, and therefore don't have to think about the value. It's something to be enjoyed. That enjoyment and freedom from worry, is my wealth. We're all different. But as you point out, spending six figures on a car that you keep, service and maintain for several years, without driving it, is just bonkers. Utterly bonkers. Thanks for the video and the perspective.
Good to know that a Sport 410 is being fully enjoyed and appreciated. I doubt I'd be in an Evora myself were it not for that first drive of a Sport 410 at Castle Combe, I'm sure I mentioned to you before that I ordered one shortly after, just before the GT430 was announced and then switched it over to a GT430 Sport initially. If ever a car deserved to sell more, that's it. I'd love one day to bring my Evora up to Scotland and do my best to keep up with you on some of your favourite roads, hearing the howl of a Toyota V12 echoing through the glens! Best two fingers to garage queenery there is!
A pleasure to cross 6,000 miles with you! I had mileage anxiety with my 1996 NSX, Not making that mistake with my Evora GT. I almost know how much fun it is to drive your amazing car! Cheers!
Good to have another Doc on board 👍 I would struggle to keep up with your 500hp GT but it would be fun trying!
Hey Doc good to hear from you. Exige my2014 is at 58k caterham my2010 is at 38k. And i dont see any replacment in the horizon. I am waiting for the weather to get better and I waste no opportunity to drive any of them.
Good man 👍. With racing cars as you know no-one cares about mileage, a brand new car is more likely to have problems, we rebuild our race engines every year. No one wants to touch a road car with a rebuilt engine but I bet they drives better than any garage queen, my K series in my Caterham SLR has been rebuilt over 5 times and it gets faster every time!
As for the influencer constant churn... they are buying these cars as a symbol of wealth and then worrying about the finances.
To be able to afford the car on your drive is to be able to drive it and not worry.
In these difficult financial times - this constant pursuit of more (used to be called Greed) sets a dangerous precedent.
My vote... don't get your finances upside down over chasing a fraction of a second... perception of speed is more important than the number on the dial.
And if you really must go FAST FAST - get a superbike.
Damn straight! Completely agree. I believe that in places like Miami you can rent exotics for a day, drive around, get seen, film it and pretend you own it. People watch car influencers and think they can get that lifestyle from UA-cam, nearly all of them were wealthy before they started uploading videos!
Hang on to it if you possibly can Jonny. The UK used car market (& performance car niche) is particularly bleak for sellers at present. That’s unlikely to change anytime soon, but markets are cyclical. Better to keep the car in good shape with an ‘average’ mileage until the market picks up again; (which it inevitably will), the closer we get to EV Armageddon.
Realistically you will have no chance of ever finding anything to effectively replace a personally specced hand built ‘halo’ model like your 430.
No serious plans to sell any of my cars even though I probably should! I don't think Lotus will top the GT430, such a shame we'll never get to see what they could have done with a pure performance car now they have access to proper development money. The GT430 hints at what might have been. Prices for GT430s have been much stronger recently thank goodness, your timing looks about perfect! I fear the Collecting Cars one won't do so well but they are achieving a lot of low prices on there. I saw a Stratton GT (based on the Evora GTE) only made £50k! Even less than the criminally overlooked Evora Sport 410 (which made £53k on CC, no doubt on a forecourt somewhere for £65k!). Best wishes, Jonny.
Dr. P You have the best 430 content on youtube and my inspiration for my 430 conversion. I'd hate for you to part with the 430. I think its such a rare and amazing car that you'd only be left with a large void and regret trying to find a worthy replacement. I also think you have no reason to worry, 6000 or 60000, you should have no problem with the car's value if you ever decide to sell. Its very obvious you take real good care of it and the car is well documented so that'll reflect in the car's value regardless of the mileage (its condition I would consider to be far more important than mileage). I'd personally never, ever consider selling an actual 430 if i had one unless having dire needs to. The 430 being such a niche of a car is in my opinion immune to mileage anxiety
Very kind comment, don't worry, no plans to part with the GT430 I completely agree and am very aware of how special it is (every drive is an instant reminder of that) it's unrepeatable having spec'd the car from new. It will only get cooler and more special with age just like the Esprit Sport 300 before it. It wasn't necessarily my plan at the time as we all thought Lotus would do an Evora Cup 450 Final Edition or something along those lines. My original plan was to get the last version of the Exige but the GT430 had other plans! With every passing year it's looking more and more like my petrol keeper. Cheers from the UK!
The hypocrisy of the "car enthusiasts" never fails to make me laugh...
In the forums, car meets, youtube, facebook, instagram comments etc people make fun of people who don't drive their cars but the minute somone is looking for a new car, they only look for the most prestine and lowest mileage posible and then proceed not to drive it themselves coz their too scared of losing money...
Honestly if im ever in a position to comfortably own one of this high end cars, I'll most likely buy one to keep for life and if im gonna sell it, i'd atleast have done 30-50k miles or kms ontop of what the car had done.
Yes car enthusiasts play by different rules depending of whether they are buying or selling. But cars should lose value when they’re used, parts wear out many don’t look after their cars well and bad driving can wreck a car but the whole thing has been distorted by a small number of cars that increase in value over time which makes depreciation seem worse than it is by comparison. For some the idea of losing money on a car has become toxic even though they are wealthy. But I guess who wouldn’t want to own a cool car that makes you money? The bit I don’t get is keeping the miles off a car that’s going up in value! You make money whether you drive it or not so drive it!
@@DrPittenstein Yep...Well said!
I'm noticing this with motorcycles as well... Im currently selling a "high" mileage bike and all people keep going on and on about is how high the miles are. People are literally buying toys just to brag about them instead of having fun with them.
I bought a bike at the start of summer this year and i've already done over 9000 miles on it alone this year, almost half of what the bike had done when I bought it.
Personally I don't give a sh*t, gonna ride the wheels of this thing!! It's a japanese bike so as long as you maintain it properly, it will last forever. When the time comes to sell it, whoever wants it can buy, till then, imma keep the throttle pinned whenever I can never going over the speed limit offcourse...😂😂
Doc, continue the content.
Yes filming is a good excuse for driving!
A good judge of value of your car is the one currently on CC. It finishes tonight as I’m sure you are aware. Lotus never sell well on CC but for some reason Targa Florio cars always seem to buy them and they sit for a year plus. Something fishy me thinks as I don’t understand why they don’t do a trade sale.
I don’t think it’s good guage of value CC is low balling a lot of cars at the moment. Some cars still doing well but general trend is downward which is to be expected during difficult economic situation and rising interest rates. GT430 values bottomed out around 2020 and asking prices are a lot stronger now. It’s an ultra rare car if more people knew about them and wanted them values would be stronger still. Hopefully new customers brought to Lotus by Emira and EVs will generate more interest in Lotus cars which will eventually increase demand for the older cars.
@@DrPittenstein That CC result was not what it went for at all. I eneded up buying that car after the auction for a chunk more than that, although I still think it was a great price.
You need to buy a car that you will keep long long term once you get past 20,000 you don’t care much anymore then you can enjoy it
I agree, there's a lot to be said for that. I still have my Caterham Superlight R from 1998, currently restoring it to its former glory have long since stopped caring about the mileage!
I would imagine a good few owners with cars like yours and similar are pondering the same question. However I would imagine you will loose a chunk if you were to sell just now. But as you say, that was the previous mindset with cars. Covid has brought along the notion that people can buy cars and not loose money if not make money. Those days are gone. The trade price to retail prices are vast. Vaster than they have ever been because dealers / traders have lost the volume so what changes is the margin. Your GT430 is just the most special car. Keep it and enjoy it and sell something else to fund it. Interesting your CC segment as the orange S3 Elise is mine. I’m after a cup now but as you will be aware the prices people want for them is mental. Hence why they sit for so so long.
Fortunately for me asking prices for GT430 have been much stronger in recent years, they did get down to £70k at one point, I dare say some were traded below that but I think Lotus helped by pitching the Emira below it (in cost and performance terms). I doubt the CC result will help much but they are extremely rare and may not be surpassed by a petrol Lotus, Emira will need 475bhp to match the power:weight will we ever see that? Unlikely.
@@DrPittenstein For info, that CC car was actually bought for much more than the CC result. I know this, because it was me who bought it!
@@EvoraGT430 Congrats! I hope you enjoy many great miles with it.
Cars that cannot be driven.......as you say, madness.
Too much of it about these days. Driving a car regularly is part of good maintenance, cars that have been neglected should be worth less really!
Very good video and couldn't agree more. I have a Lotus Exige 420FE (1 of 3 in Lotus Yellow, and only one in my spec. 34 UK 420's in total). Did 7k miles in Yr1, 3k Yr2 and already have two European road trips planned this year. It's a shame any 410/420/430 with over 10k miles seems to be viewed as leggy by some - despite cars being better when being used. My take also is, if in the future anything needs doing - can always rebuild the engine/gearbox etc, ultimately most parts are consumable so not the end of the world.
Fantastic car, I bet it drives better than all of the others collecting dust. Complete madness to think any car is leggy over 10k miles, easy to do that in under 12 months but good for you for enjoying yours. At the end of the day you will have much better memories, pics and videos to look back on. 20k miles in an Exige 420 is worth a lot more to me than making £20k by not using one. Cheers DrP 👍
Good stuff. I've never really suffered from mileage anxiety as for years I've been searching for my lifelong "keeper", and of course if I never intend to sell it, then the more mileage i can put on it the better! But I've also been trying to work through the incredibly painful decision of whether that keeper is the 420FE or my blue/white Elise SR like your old one. I've flip flopped back and forth, but back to back driving them recently the call was made to keep the Elise. The Exige is "better" in almost every way, so much better built, the engine is great and really suits the car, and it's the only car I've ever bought new, but the Elise hits higher highs for me; it's modified and even more thrilling to drive and I'll probably change more things on it in the future trying to make it perfect. It squeaks and rattles and currently rides too hard and I've never found a geo setup I really like, but on my favourite local roads and for my limited abilities, it's given me my best drives ever and continues to do so. Ultimately, it's a pretty fortunate position to be in. I hope you continue to enjoy your two also.
I can relate to this completely, really not sure which one of my current two I would sell if I had to. Flip flop between them constantly and was planning to do a video on it too. But as you say it's a privilege to be tormented in this way! To make it worse I'm not convinced I've quite matched the overall ownership experience with the Elise SR either but we have to hope that our best drives are still ahead of us! Cheers!
Great video and points. Could not agree more. My Evora Sport 410 has just ticked over 16000 glorious, smile inducing, miles. I have enjoyed every single mile. 4 road trips to the IoM and the glorious unrestricted roads there. I've got no idea what my car is worth and really do not care. I bought it to drive it. It's a car. That's what they are made for.
I've got some art. I enjoyed buying it. And I enjoy looking at it. But it's art. That's what it is for. For you to appreciate it.
Too many people buy cars for all the wrong reasons. If I bought a Ferrari 430 today. I'd drive it. The mileage wouldn't bother me and the impact on the value wouldn't bother me.
I think a lot of the problem is that people are buying cars on finance that they can barely afford. They want people to know they have the car, as people will think they are wealthy. Just don't ask them about the £1.5k - £3k monthly PCP charge they are paying.
I buy my cars with cash. Once it's spent it's done. I no longer think about the cash, and therefore don't have to think about the value. It's something to be enjoyed. That enjoyment and freedom from worry, is my wealth.
We're all different. But as you point out, spending six figures on a car that you keep, service and maintain for several years, without driving it, is just bonkers. Utterly bonkers.
Thanks for the video and the perspective.
Good to know that a Sport 410 is being fully enjoyed and appreciated. I doubt I'd be in an Evora myself were it not for that first drive of a Sport 410 at Castle Combe, I'm sure I mentioned to you before that I ordered one shortly after, just before the GT430 was announced and then switched it over to a GT430 Sport initially. If ever a car deserved to sell more, that's it. I'd love one day to bring my Evora up to Scotland and do my best to keep up with you on some of your favourite roads, hearing the howl of a Toyota V12 echoing through the glens! Best two fingers to garage queenery there is!
@@DrPittenstein You'd be very welcome and yes, I know the back story as it was your review of the 410 that got me into one.