Do Classic Jaguars Face a Dark Future?
Jaguar, as a brand, is on the rocks. That’s the growing sense in the collector car industry, at least. For decades, classics like the XK 120, XK 140, XK 150 and E-Type have been mainstays for dealers, brokers, and buyers, but lately they don’t seem to generate the same market excitement they once did. They are getting harder to sell, and over the past five years many prices are either stagnant or decreasing.
Of course, the market is generally softening from its pandemic-era heights, and this is compounded by demographic shifts that are beginning to favor Radwood-era (1980s and 1990s) cars over their predecessors. This isn’t just affecting classic Jaguars—many carbureted V-12 Ferrari road cars, long-hood (1973 and earlier) Porsche 911s, and Austin-Healeys are also seeing relative slumps. But a surprising number of cars from this era are also seeing an uptick in their values. Porsche 356 coupes, C2 Corvettes generally—and ’63 Split-Window coupes especially—and V-6 Ferrari Dinos have increased in value anywhere from 20 percent to 90 percent over the last five years.
So why does the brand, traditionally so prevalent in the hobby, seem to be getting left behind? This is doubtless a complex question, but in the case of Jaguar, several factors appear to be conspiring to collectively dampen interest in what are some of the greatest sports cars of all time.
Promising Starts
Sir William Lyons, who founded Jaguar between the world wars, was famously good at commercializing genuinely compelling products at prices so low they were scarcely believable. Jaguars were world-class cars, delivering sensational looks and performance while consistently pushing cutting-edge technology and selling in much higher volume than other cars that offered the same. Their on-track record drove this point home: Jaguar won the 24 Hours of Le Mans five times in the 1950s (and twice more after that). Only Porsche, Audi, and Ferrari have won Le Mans more times than Jaguar.
Much of that early success came down to engines. In 1948, when everyone else was still essentially warming up their prewar designs, Jaguar released an all-new car, and not only that, it was powered by an engine with twin overhead cams. The car was the XK 120, and its straight-six “XK” engine was so advanced that variants remained in production for over 40 years. Meanwhile, the XK 120 was so good that in its competition trim as the C-Type, it won Le Mans twice. With the same mechanical bits developed further and fitted to a new, even more stunning, more aerodynamic semi-monocoque body in the D-Type, Jaguar won Le Mans three more times.
In 1961, four years after its last victory of the 1950s, Jaguar was selling all that Le Mans–winning goodness to the public in another groundbreaking and gorgeous new sports car, the E-Type. It was even more advanced, thanks to the addition of independent rear suspension. A few months after the E-Type arrived, Jag put those same technical components into a full-sized sedan, the Mark X.
It’s difficult to overstate the impact of the E-Type. With semi-monocoque construction, a twin-cam engine, four-wheel disc brakes, and fully independent suspension, it was, as Jaguar pointed out in advertisements, the most advanced sports car in the world. No other single car combined all these characteristics at any price: not Porsche, not Mercedes, not Maserati, not Aston Martin, not even Ferrari. And the price of the Jag? Around £2000 in its home market (a relatively modest $46,600 in today’s dollars). That meant it was 80 percent the cost of a Porsche 356, half as expensive as an Aston Martin DB4, and a third as much as a Ferrari 250. It was quicker, faster, and better looking than almost all of them, too. Even Enzo Ferrari famously lavished praise on the car upon its debut, and decades later, an E-Type roadster joined New York’s Museum of Modern Art.
With credentials like these, it’s no surprise that Jaguar sold more than 72,000 E-Types during a 14-year production run. The cars peaked in the 1960s, before American regulations started strangling performance and spoiling their looks. Even so, Jaguar was on top of the world during this period, and it wasn’t only thanks to the E-Type. Jaguar sedans had temptingly similar underpinnings to the sports cars, and if buyers thought those features were advanced in something like the E-Type, they were downright space-age in a sedan. Vast expanses of wood and leather epitomized British luxury, while beautiful and distinctive exterior styling and superb value for money gave four-door Jaguars a unique appeal that no other car in the world could quite match.
Changing Fortunes
And then, everything stopped. Not literally, but Jaguar’s evolution largely did. The 1970s saw the E-Type replaced by the XJS, which was fresh and contemporary but much more grown up. If the E-Type was a sports car with the heart of a Le Mans racer, the XJS was the European version of a personal luxury car. The seminal XJ6 also arrived in 1968, right-sizing the Jaguar sedan formula and setting the world alight, but it remained in production for a full 18 years before being replaced by a car that was really just a 1980s take on the exact same concept. At the corporate level, getting caught up in the woes of British Leyland in the 1970s and eventually being bought by Ford in 1990 did Jaguar few favors.
Little had changed by the early 2000s. Jaguars, despite having contemporary technology under the skin, offered an aesthetic experience that had become anachronistic. They felt like a caricature of olde-worlde England, which gave them virtually no sizzle to youths and younger buyers, who preferred the forward-looking modernity of German or Japanese luxury cars. If those cars were modernist houses of concrete and glass, then Jaguars were Tudors with thatched roofs.
Jaguar set out to reinvent itself by building a new, modern identity starting with the new XF in 2007, followed by other sedan models, entries into the lucrative SUV market, and a new sports car, the F-Type. These cars simply never resonated completely with buyers. Their identity wasn’t strong enough, the engineering and reliability not good enough, and the interiors not nice enough. Unlike Land Rover, who has so effectively modernized the Range Rover while somehow preserving a feeling of Britishness, Jaguar’s post-millennium effort at rebirth lacked the relevance and raw desirability to drive consumers into showrooms in substantial numbers.
Looking forward, it’s unclear (especially given current consumer preferences) whether Jaguar’s assertion of an all-electric future will help or hurt the values of its classic models. Its aspirations to head further upmarket may help the brand’s financial viability, but the impact of any future success on the marque’s past models will depend wholly on whether its execution inserts the kind of passion that brings enthusiasts into the fold.
Struggling for Relevance
Modern consumers have known only two Jaguars: the charming but backwards-looking neo-classical version of the 1980s–2000s, and the modern but ultimately uninspiring rebirth that began in 2007. Unless they consciously seek out classic cars, these buyers won’t be familiar with the greatest Jaguars of all: The ones that did not look fondly toward the past or unconvincingly toward the future, instead descending directly from Le Mans race cars and offering the world’s most advanced motoring experience in a competitively priced, beautiful, contemporary, and authentic wrapper.
One of the troubles for Jaguar’s classics is that their collectibility (and that of all collector cars) is driven by their relevance to enthusiasts. Not enough of today’s enthusiasts associate Jaguar with their core automotive memories—the kind that would drive them to loop back and buy something from a brand they desired in their youth.
BMW provides a stark contrast—the brand retains enthusiastic and growing appeal among collectors. Twenty years ago, a new 7-Series costs much more than an M3. Today, the M3 is worth more. Why? Because many more enthusiasts want a 2004 M3 than want a 2004 745Li. When cars become old enough, the market for them is composed almost exclusively of enthusiasts.
Meanwhile, few Jaguars have set enthusiast hearts alight, even looking back 50 years. There are of course evangelists of the XJS, XK8/XKR, and XJ40/X300/X308 generations of the XJ, and likely other models besides. But we are small in number and a little bit weird. There aren’t enough of us to form an entire new generation of Jaguar fans, especially when other brands have done such a good job of connecting their enthusiast-driven identity to the mainstream. Think Porsche, Ferrari, Lamborghini, and Land Rover.
As for the classic Jaguars of the company’s golden era, their lack of connection to today’s enthusiasts is compounded by the fact that they sold so well when new. Corvettes of the same period sold in large numbers. Porsches and Alfa Romeos did, too, albeit to a lesser extent. But virtually every model of Ferrari, Aston Martin, and Maserati from the 1950s to early 1970s ranged from a few hundred to barely a few thousand units. Given how comparatively abundant Jaguars are, it takes a larger number of buyers to sustain appreciation, and there just aren’t enough such people in the current market. If they had made a few hundred E-Types or XKs, they’d all be worth at least a million dollars. But they didn’t, and they aren’t.
The Silver Lining
While it’s disappointing to see Jaguar values languish, there are upsides. What made them so compelling against their competitors in the 1950s and ’60s is still true today. They represent great value for money given their intrinsic characteristics, and softening prices make them an even greater value.
If you’ve dismissed Jaguars as “old people cars,” take a closer look at them. And if you’ve seen the light and own one, share it with as many people as possible. Let them hear it, ride in it, and form those memories that will reshape them from a car enthusiast into a Jaguar enthusiast. If Jaguar as a company can’t endear itself to a new crop of car fans, it’s up to those of us who know better to do that work instead.
Regardless of their values, the experience provided by these cars has lost none of its appeal. To look at, ride in, or drive an E-Type is one of motoring’s great pleasures, and it happens to be one of the precious few automotive experiences that is getting more, rather than less, financially accessible.
Derek Tam-Scott is a used car salesman and car content grump.
***
Check out the Hagerty Media homepage so you don’t miss a single story, or better yet, bookmark it. To get our best stories delivered right to your inbox, subscribe to our newsletters.
This is the second enthusiast publication discussing the declining fortunes of vintage Jaguars in the past 6 months… as a crazy guy fast approaching 60 that still folds himself in and out of a Scion FR-S Release series 1.0 every day, maybe my dream of getting a 4.2 L, toggle switch dash, 3 Carb, spinner knock off wire wheel XKE droptop in Willow Green ( I’d settle for Primrose Yellow ) is getting closer than ever before. Really choice examples of any of the 50s or 60s cats are going to retain quite a bit of value to the true enthusiast. A couple of polished Weber’s and a nice leather interior? There’s always going to be somebody who’s going to appreciate that… friend of mine’s got an M3 and he can’t work on it… let the investors have their investor cars… skinned Knuckles, the smell of hot motor oil, and dirty fingernails will always have a certain appeal. Now where’s that knockoff Hammer that says “Thor” on the head?
I’m specifically a classic Brit car fanboy, but this may be the most compelling case I’ve seen to take up pre-microchip auto enthusiasm.
Yup!!
The day that mid-to-late ’60s E-Type Roadster gets into my price range, give me a jingle, willya?
This is pretty much how the market works, isn’t it? As the group that drove or desired the cars ages out prices stagnate or fall back a bit, that coupled to the, “does it have enough performance to be useable performance to function in modern traffic” part is f the equation too. Most pre-war cars have been stagnant for a generation or more, MG T series go for similar prices to what they traded for twenty years ago or more.
That said, as a tail end boomer who always wanted one and saw the price spiral ahead of my income my whole life (when they were cheap I was in college, I almost bought a bad one, but even my young self new even if I could afford to buy it, I could afford to keep it running) I would be happy to see them co.e down to earth, but I don’t really see them ever getting cheap, just stagnating and price holding value and not even rising with inflation.
But I hope they get cheap so I can buy one.
I can sympathize with your plight. I’m a tail-end Gen Xer and have to sit back and watch as the prices of various cars I lusted after in high school and college float ever higher of my income level. Just as you start to get creep up on them, they drift further away…
The Catch 22 with ’50s and ’60s Jags, Alfas, etc starting to slowly fall back to earth is that those with the knowledge to maintain them is shrinking as well. Maybe an E-type will be more affordable in the future, but by then the challenges in keeping them on the road will have become far greater.
We can console ourselves with the knowledge that many of these cars are frankly better to look at than to drive. And it doesn’t cost anything to look.
As an owner of a 1961 XK150 (the same engine and transmission as the first E-Types) parts are available, and what’s especially good is that almost everything is mechanical. With a manual, YouTube video, and a little mechanical sense, you can fix it yourself. BUT it rarely needs fixing, despite their reputation. Over the last couple years, the only problem I’ve had was the fuel-level sending unit (began leaking gas). I replaced it myself, and it works fine.
I have several original Jags. From the Corgi, Dinky, Matchbox and Tekno plants. If I could enlarge one- the D-type. Then the E-Type. Or vice versa.
Rode in an E-type coupe owned by my cousin. A religious experience. You will believe!
Everything after the E-type/XHS/XJ12 is lost on me until you get to the F- Type, which recaptures the magic, at least on the outside. And they sound great. But the interiors leave me cold, and they are like most sports cars niw too heavy.
The elephant in the room for Jaguar is reliability. Like working on them? Good, you will get plenty of opportunity to do so.
This has probably not helped values.
Old cars need work, sure.
But I knew someone back in the late ’80’s who bought a brand new Jaguar saloon- and it never made it all the way back to her house.
The thing about old cars and Jaguars: If a particular car was a factory lemon, those original errors will have been worked out by now. Jags were well-designed and solid, so once an individuals car’s bugs are corrected, it should be reliable. Some other brands had serious design flaws, but that was not Jaguar’s problem, in ky experience.
Give me a fairly clean shell of an E-type, plenty of cash and time and I’d be at Bonneville fulfilling my Burt Monro ” World’s Fastest Indian ” dream. I can’t think of a better shape to go way too fast in.
Awesome Review on Jaguar!
You are spot on!
Your sentiments are heard!
Jaguar Owner for the last 30 years
( XJ6, XJ6 VDP, XK8, XKR)
I was fortunate to happen onto a 2006 XK8 with 35,000 miles in 2010. Kids were just off my payroll and I had always admired Jaguar convertibles. 13 years later it’s at 122K miles and has been fun and largely dependable. Replaced the spider hose cooling system a year ago, and now facing issues with the window motors and hood struts. But I still love the car – just wish parts weren’t so hard to get.
My first Jaguar was a beautiful 2002 Jaguar XKR convertible that was my daily driver for about 8 years. I bought it for its beauty, obvious heritage to the E-type, and the 370hp supercharged engine pushing it, plus it was just so inexpensive to buy used that I couldn’t pass it up. I still own it but never drive it since I bought its replacement, a 2010 5.0L XKR coupe. Whereas the 2002 ‘vert. had so much cowl shake (that on the drive home, I felt I had made a mistake buying it), was always breaking down with some service issue, the 2010 5L is so solid, so reliable, so incredibly quick and reliable, that 11 years and 210,000 miles later, it is still my daily driver, still a pleasure to drive, and unquestionably the best automobile I’ve ever owned in nearly 57 years of driving. It will never leave my garage, and will most likely out survive me. Tracked many dozens of times, pulley and tuned to about 600hp, it’s just too good to give up to try something else. I own a gorgeous ’72 De Tomaso Pantera that has been modified (aren’t they all?) and restored, and given the right monetary incentive I could part with it and have no regrets, I will never part with the X150 XKR, it’s that good. I think one of the reasons for the hesitation in buying a Jag, whether as a classic or an everyday car is because of the reputation it gained for both being unreliable and an old person’s car. All I can say is a lot of people have missed out on some great automobiles. I don’t see much of a future for the Jaguar brand. Besides the fact that I don’t believe electric vehicles will be the final technology of propulsion for cars, Jaguars reputation will interfere with its ability to sell their all electric line as well. UNLESS they produce the absolute best in every category electric vehicle. The problem with that is I don’t believe they have the capital to do that. I hope I’m wrong because some great cars will disappear from the roads without a Jaguar brand still producing some iconic models. I hope they survive!
I have a Triumph T120. I discovered that one of the best sources of spares is located in New Zealand. I just ran a search for NZ parts suppliers located in New Zealand and got well over 20 hits. Next time you are having trouble finding something, you might check them out. For my stuff, shipping was always less than shipping from the UK.
Jags E type and D type are beautiful cars but like most Jaguars they just never had that durability of a Benz or 911.
Many collectors today hate that feeling that if they go out they have a lower chance of returning than a B17 in daylight bombing.
Modern collectors are still collectors but the priorities are shifting. They buy restored cars, they want reliable cars, they just looknforcfifferentbyhings in cars. Some due to money, some due to the fact they just drive vs work on cars.
It used to be you had to be a mechanic to own an older car but todsy you buy a fully restored car for less than you can do it yourself.
I’ve owned my E-type and XK120 roadsters for better than four decades and in that time have never, as in not once, been left broken down and stranded at the side of the road. Part of the pleasure of owning these cars is the relatively minimum effort involved to maintain them – relative to the pleasure of driving them, I mean – for which they will reward you with great reliability. Parts are readily available and reasonably priced – you can’t say that about MB, Porsche and BMW, and don’t even think about maintaining a Ferrari unless you have deep pockets. Greater production numbers is an advantage, not a negative. My classic Jaguars are analogue, easy to understand and easy to maintain, and I don’t give a tinker’s damn if their values are dropping.
B-17s had great records of bringing their crews home. Ask any surviving WWII vet.
You can buy a fully restored car cheaper than doing it yourself because some widow took a beating on the sale price.
You should read a bit more. Twenty-two percent of the men flying on the two Schweinfurt raids in 1943 did not come back. There were tremendous losses in the weeks before D-day in 1944, when the bombers were used as bait to destroy the Luftwaffe. The Forts got a great reputation mainly because the correspondents preferred them.
My friend David and I spent 5 years on a nut and bolt overhaul of a 1963 E. One of the most satisfying things after we’d finished, was to listen to the 3.8 XK on song. Nothing quite matches the music of an E-Type with the throttle open.
Most of the comments are right on… yet I owned “2” Jags…an 89′ XJ6 VP…with 104,000 miles on it … I know I replaced a rear bearing on it… but not much else… and then I purchased a 98′ Jag XJ8 VP…with about 63,000 miles on it… had to replace front hub… then rebuild a transmission… I lost faith in it… and sold it… sad…because the car was beautiful… both well maintained… just the XJ8…wouldn’t stay together…. I wouldn’t mind going back to a nice the 89′ era… well maintained… My cousin bought a 70′ XKE…gorgeous car lemon yellow with a black top…his dad drive it once… and got stuck in the rain…because the electric dour locks would open the doors… I wasn’t too surprised…
Electric door locks on a 1970 E?
Electric door locks would OPEN THE DOORS???? Don’t think so. Also… somebody needs to learn how to write messages without… and then just a little while later…
Thank you Mr. Scott,
I do hope to meet you one day. I am a weirdo to all my car friends as I like cars that are older than me. I like all types of cars from all over the globe. What ever the reason I have 3 old English cars now. I bought my 1958 Austin Healey Sprite (very early production) when I was 30. I restore it to a concourse level won trophies and then realized I didn’t really enjoy the concourse thing as much as driving it. So I have enjoyed driving it ever since! I still have that car and also a 63 FHC e-type which is an incredible drive. If anything it drives in a much more modern way than a mid sixty’s Vette, Porsche, really anything. All the ground braking features at time do pay off! It doesn’t brake down, it isn’t hard to work on, it great. The E-type is a fantastic choice as a classic / enthusiasts car as they are a fantastic experience to drive. It’s true theater!
I do tire of people telling me how unreliable the Jags are. I think because I am younger I missed the “used car” time period of these cars when there must have been a lot of cheap , well loved E-types for sales with many fixes of fixes in a less than correct way.
Thank you for the article, was a great read!
Tom
You are completely right I am a Jag enthousiast from my younger years and I was impressed by the classical Englisch charm and smell of all the early Jags I had the luck of owning and restoring two 420 s , 2 xj6 4;2 and 3 x xj40 and loved them all I never had trouble on the road with any of them That was because I maintained them myself I was lucky to have that knowledge and still do That is the only way to drive these cars thesedays Here in Europe you won t find a affordeble mecanic who is capable to work on these cars anymore Parts are rare an the prices are very high You have to be very rich or very skilld to drive these cars now a days So these people are starving out these days Very rich people buy the very expensive cars for financial gains Each time somebody drives with me in the Jag they are flabbergast of the smoutness and the classical refinement of these cars In modern cars that does not exist anymore Also not in the new Jag s Jaguar lost its soul and became a mass produced produkt that is desing d to sell and earn a lot of money Sir William Lyons spirit has left the building
This is a rather simplistic view of the market. Whilst no doubt there will be an element of the younger, newer buyers being more interested in more modern cars. There are still many that love these cars. My son is 19 and loves older Jags.
The other major element that is more relevant is that investors bought these cars, not enthusiasts. For a number of years the return of an E-Type was much higher than investing your money. That has ended, along with much higher borrowing and living costs. Hence the buyers for these cars has dramatically shrunk.
I can’t see the prices falling too far or if any for these classics when mid 70’s gran prix, pickup trucks and Ford LTD are $25-30,000.
Compelling and enjoyable post; a very interesting read. Thank you.
Tossing my personal experience with the JLR family into the ring, I have to somewhat disagree (yet also agree lol) with brand-blanket statements on reliability.
Growing up, I was witness to a stream of curses offered up (or down) at Lucas yet these remained a fixture in our household alongside 911’s, the latter of which to this day I still have a strong dislike for. The 911’s just seemed so savage and…sterile, despite their ability to travel consistently between A and B without seeing a tow truck. Eventually Jaguar got the boot (sew what I did there?) and we entered into the amazing era of the 560SEC’s I likely would have attended prom solo and remained a virgin if not for a certain very reliable AMG..
But I digress..
As an adult, my first Big Boy buy was a 99 XJR in Carnival Red. Just typing this makes me feel all fuzzy and warm about the love affair. You always remember your first. It was quite the attention getter with many gas station, valet and trap house compliments. Reliable? Ummm. kinda. Until it wasnt any more..all at once. But it was a screamer of a ride and well loved.
Moved into the 2007 XJR and 2009 Super V8 and XKR (coupe) and OMFG. All I can say is they were mine alone (no one else EVER got to touch) and are best described as driving a perfectly supercharged fluffy pink cloud made entirely of fried chicken and porn. The ride down the canyon, across the river and back up the other side of the canyon to my house became vehicular Viagra and i would drive 33 miles just for one damn burrito as an excuse to hit it. Each of these were – hands down – the most bullet proof, overbuilt and reliable vehicles I have ever had. I drove TF out of each for over 150k miles and NOT ONE visit to the shop for anything besides normal maintenance. (ok, well, the light inside the trunk of the SV8 came loose at approx 25k and got fixed whilst the oil was being changed) Cannot sing the praises loud enough. These were like Corollas on Crack or something as it seemed they would run forever on 91 oct and Nutella.
Now back then…and still today…I didn’t fit the demo for the brand because TBH, I’m a dirtbag. Until the dealership got to know me, security was all over in their proper conservative suits as I fondled the latest shiny thing on the floor. The eventually chilled. And thus begun the end times…
They hooked me up with a sweet 2007 Range Rover
Supercharged which was – and still is – another sexy, intoxicating vehicle and one in which l felt wouldn’t punk me despite the Rover Rep. After all, it shared the AJ with my plural civil union love affair with the Jaguars what could go wrong?
Umm..yeah. To this day, I’m still a huge fan boy of the L322 but suspect my therapist may well be right and its actually the Stockholm Syndrome talking.
Never…never EVER have I waited for a wrecker so many times with anything before or since. It was like some parallel universe in quantum where things could be both true and false at the same time. It was basically a SV8 with a lift kit and place for the dog right? Nope. Nope….and nope.
I became both Sadist and Masochist as JLR’s little itch. And it all started because of a Mother’s obsession with XK’s and XJ’s.
So be careful kids…your parents and commissioned sales people can cause you to make poor reliability choices in life that are very naughty and you might stay that way.
So, I’m not the only one! I too have an 09 SV8, but an 07 XKR and 04 XJR (173k miles). The Triple Crown as far as I’m concerned. Have they given me a few headaches? Sure. But, as far as Eurocars go, my experience is that they are the most reliable and most beautiful of the bunch. I love to look at them, look back as I walk away, and as ThugGuzzler says, look for a reason to get them out and take the long way home.
All electric? Another Jaguar misstep I think. 2010 and later, no dice. I do wonder what will happen to them as a brand.
But, if an E-type sinks to my price level, analog is the way to go.
Great article overall and timely, at least for me. I’d just been thinking about Jaguar’s future and my cars. Nice to know I’m not as crazy as my friends think. Or if I am, I’m not alone.
So much of the collector market is nostalgia-driven, especially at the lower end of the market. as someone who came of age in the early-mid 1980s, the Jaguars on offer were largely “old people cars”. There was nothing really to form the memory for me to get nostalgic about. E-types were always too expensive for me, so I never really gave them thought, although I did and do think they are great cars. Meanwhile, BMW, Mercedes, Ford, Chevrolet, Toyota, Nissan/Datsun, et al were imprinting memories on me that fuel the things I desire.
The reputation of Jaguar in New Zealand is as beautiful cars strictly for the rich. Dirt cheap at the side of the road to lure the gullible, but shockingly unreliable and eye-wateringly expensive to maintain.