Where's the next generation of rod n custom builders?

BINGO


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I'm 34, I'm knee deep in restorations, normal everyday car/truck work, and other general automotive bafoonery. I'm a master automotive technician, when I get home from my work shop, I head into my house shop. My whole family is like that. I have a 3 year old nephew and I've told my sister that there is no hope for him. He loves hot rods and trucks, loves riding in one of my customers Army Willys Jeep. He has so many tools already.


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Guy's I see and hear it everyday in my business when someone calls and asks me what state Lions Drag Strip was located in !!!!!!!!!!

I no longer get mad because I realize some younger people are interested in building a car but they were born after 1980 so the memories we have they do not have the same memories.

I agree completely with what Corn Fed said in his comments about these kids wanting to build cars from 70's and 80's not 1932 through 1955
One night I went to the drag strip for test and tune night and a dragster pulled up to the starting line and what pulls up in the next lane? An old Mazda with twin turbo chargers!!!

Guess which one won by a country mile. The Mazda had the parachute out by the time I turned my head.

The times are changing and the cars we liked don't seem to be the same thing these teenagers want today.

One call I received was from a guy asking me if I had any drifting decals and I knew what he was talking about but I just said NO.

Jimbo

 

a fox body stang is an old car to my students
when I try to explain year cutoffs like pre 49, pre 65 pre 70whatever they usually just laugh
several of my students build cars at home , just not Hamb friendly ones
anyway, Im glad I don't see fox bodies here

PS.....I really don't look at old cars as an investment, just a toy to enjoy....like 1:1 scale hotwheels

 

Boy howdy, I sure hate this topic/subject. Maybe because I've heard this question/worry/argument off and on since I became aware of our kool shit in the mid 60s. And I was just a little pain in the ass back then! Yet here we are trying to scramble for good buys and even regular availability. Not any more. Priced a Deuce 3W lately? Ok, how about a decent Model A coupe body? No more are the $500 solid bodies around, but what is around carries a price tag of 3 grand more. Most of the hoodlum youth (those like us) don't really look forward to hanging around with a bunch of grey-beard crabby veterans of the sickness. They need us, most show respect, but at the core of it all their circles of friends have varied or different interests. Also think about the activities around our stuff back in the day. Ya think many of the 20-something crowd are hot for post-menopausal women? I think they're chasing tail in places that would make us look like perverts. Perspective y'all. There's more action around our stuff than ever before yet many are worried? Not me. Scared you'll lose money? Hey, I'd gladly give you what you paid for your Deuce hiboy in 1972. As to whether or not they're a bad investment, well I'll close by presenting this, the winning bid:

 

It's all a matter of timing..... and having crystal balls.
I recall being at a used car dealer in '62 checking out a clean '57 Chevy convertible and I noticed this foreign looking roadster sitting on a trailer. I asked the sales dude what its deal was and he said it was a Ferrari and had done "some racing". The asking was $2,800 if memory serves.

It's been more than 20 years but having put both the Chevy and the Ferrari in a sealed envelope, taking them out today, the Chevy would be worth $70K tops but the Ferrari would be worth roughly 42 times that.

My daily is one of those Australian built Pontiac "GTO's", worth chump change today, but in 20 years, plus a few, it may be the high dollar dream car of a new generation of gray headed, bearded or beardless, doctors with money to spend. .......................................or, it may not.

 

Check out my earlier thread about this: https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/how-long-before-no-one-cares-about-what-we-love.503491/

This just scares the hell out of me. With all the scrapping going on by the generations of families inheriting and old guy's field car hoard, when will it all just go away? Times they are a-changin'........

 

Build whatever floats your boat and just have fun with it. If it appreciates in value, that's a bonus. Hell, tomorrow may never come. Savor these moments.

 

This has been asked about a thousand times here. But WHY?
Times change, the newest car to the HAMB cutoff here is around 50 years old! They are ancient to young people, they have no memory of them, how could they? And WHY should they?
Things evolve, not too many guys are into short wave radio or other stuff that was once popular. What young people have the money, let alone the interest?
Why on earth am I supposed to worry or care what the car hobby will be like in 20 years?
I really don't CARE about the question!

 

Sitting here as a 17 year old, who is building what I can afford, and planning for what I cant, I have to say there are plenty of people my age who could be into the traditional side of the hobby. Interesting history and stories are the easiest way for young people to be enticed by old cars, and this community has plenty of that, so if you are really looking for a way to get more young people into the hobby, start spreading it.

And as a response to Gary Reynolds, who I offer nothing but respect to, I as a young person, got into these ancient cars because a family member of mine had a hopped-up jeepster back in the day, and I always wanted to replicate it.

 

Hot Rodding will never die

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Im 19 and i would love to build a traditional hotrod but i just cant afford it. I built a c10 for my first truck because it was cheap and i could afford it. Been looking for a decent model a body for along time but finding one thats in decent shape that wont break the bank is damn near impossible. Kids buy what they can afford to build and have fun with.


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The scrapping is going on because these old codgers wouldn't sell anything for a reasonable price when they were alive because they thought they were sitting on a gold mine and they have left a giant pile for their families to deal with once they pass.

 

Some qualifiers as I reply. I'm 78 (79) in April, I have the misfortune to live in one of the top three most costly areas to live in, in the USA, Seattle, (median, meaning average of couse ) ,home $800,000, so in saying that this may not be what could be seen in the rest of the nation. I mention this because of what I see happening around me here and my damned stupid age can and does skew my view of this messed up world.
Speaking generally I see about (3) distinct groups of car enthusiasts enjoying the "hobby" today, and I'll group those by age.
First group are all those great guys from about, oh I'd say 60 y.o. to those guys still able to get their foot on the go pedal (90). The guys at the pre WW II dry lakes, who just wanted to make those model A's, T's, 33's through 41's a whole lot faster. Then after the war those guys in my age group who took to the streets with the same group of cars as the first group I mention, up through the late 50's. And a lot of us strayed into the Muscle car era and that brings up the Second group that I see.

The second group of guys/(and now a lot of Gals) are the boomer bunch. They don't care to much about the same cars as the first group does, and mostly could not care less about those cars, they love the Chevelles, the Roadrunners, the Pontiac GTO's, Mustangs and so on. This is really evidenced when I attend Barrett-Jackson, and watch Mecum Auctions. When a custom '66 Impala goes for from 60 to a 100K, or a 70 Chevelle goes for 150 K and a tricked out 32 built by someone other than some name shop only goes for 40K or so,, well that says it all. I'd say this group is in the early 50's though the late 60's.

Next the third group which includes up though todays so called Millennials, of which I have 1 grandson and one great grandson, both in their early 20's. They aren't into the first groups cars, (they shrug their shoulders and say nice car grandpa and turn their immediate interests back to their device or their Honda, Subaru, Genius(sp) or what ever kind of foreign car they may be driving.

So I don't see the model T's through the 60,s maintaining the interest at all, and in the years to come cars like mine, the average streetrod or hotrod like my 34 will once again fall by the roadside and meet the dreaded crusher. The only place to be able to see these great cars will be in the museums.
So IMO the answer is the crop of the 70's muscle cars will be the big interest and cloning them with after market bodies and power trains will became the rage for the heavy into it guys. The rest will be driving and cruising their tunner cars, Honda, Toyota, Subaru's and so on.
Recall if you will I'm speaking in general terms. So if I were my grand sons age (25), and I wanted to invest in something that would push along my investment in cars for the future it would be finding a late 60's or early 70's GTO, Chevelle, Roadrunner, Mustang, etc that is plain Jane and cloning the big dog of the bunch.

 

I think that there are plenty of us young cats who would love to own 20s, 30s, and 40s hot rods, but we can't afford them. Were just now starting family's and becoming stable in our jobs but you can bet your ass that when we can afford one we will. Most of us have a project that's in the works and one day will be at those car shows you talk about.

 

Well I'm not a kid at 33, but I think I represent some of the younger part of the hobby that is still building cars. I'm no pro, but I built my A over the last two years, and my buddy riding shotgun is building a deuce coupe with an early hemi. I have a few other friends my age into prewar cars also. We're still out here doing our thing. Maybe the more primo stuff will be more affordable as we get older, we'll see.

 

We're in our garages working on our cars...

 

there is some young guns around the toledo area building cars now most of them are late twenty to thirty years old. they build a lot of rat rods now its a money thing for them but when i talk to them they all say as the money comes the cars will be alot nicer. you have to start somewhere.

 

You're forgetting that same car sold for an additional $100k on top of that less than ten years ago.

 

we don't have to worry about future generations of Hot Rodders, according to my June 1977 Rod Action magazine all the old tin is drying up and soon there will be no more old cars to build anyways.

 

The next generation of hot rodders is building drift cars. I know a lot of guys around here turn their nose up at it here but it is hot rodding to its core. Broke kids building cars in their driveways using what is cheap and available. Hanging out with friends with a similar passion, doing dumb stuff, racing on the weekends, getting hassled by the cops, swapping engines, learning to to fabricate. I honestly think the next '32 Ford is going to be the Nissan 240sx - it was the cheap and available platform that is being ran to extinction and when these kids are 50 and want to relive their glory days or finally have the money to build their dream car - it is going to a 2JZ powered Nissan 240sx.

But don't worry - when all you old farts die I'll be buying your projects for scrap value and build some sick traditional hot rods

 

Buying power is not what it was when you oldsters were their age. A dollar just does not go as far. I am only 47, and my buying power from when I was a teenager, to now, is 30% of what it was then, in location and inflation corrected dollars.

Couple that with the traditional hardware being mostly picked over by now, causing what's left to rise in price, and you get a diminishing number of builds.

I have seen Model A bodies that are held together with dust, shadows, and hope, sell for $3000-4500, not title, no paperwork, no frame.

For that price, I can build a pretty fast tuner car. Yup, not "traditional". Not traditional here, anyway.

The times are changing. Buildings are being constructed in cities that have no parking whatsoever. Condos and town homes are being built in the suburbs that do not have garages, just shared parking lots. Those that have garages often disallow you doing anything in there but parking or laundry. Some folks here actually enjoy living where they can control how their neighbors live.

By the time you get out to where you can work on your stuff in peace, there are few people, and no place to work for a living. That might be just fine for a retired oldtimer, but not a kid. I know, that's where my parents decided to raise me. From then, until now, it has been a haven for drug abuse, alcohol abuse, teen pregnancy, and domestic violence. Why? There is nothing else to do there, and there is no hope. Luckily I saw this, and left. My brother didn't, and it might kill him, but he does have a decent '29A....

 

Nothing beats the warm feelings that go with the memories. Kid isn't going to feel slighted by the fact his isn't worth a shit ton of money, as long as he has warm emotions with it. I am 18, and have had my (un H.A.M.B. worthy) 1966 Thunderbird for a year now. A ran when parked gift from my father, that I have a lot of memories with already. Had it running for a few months, and currently have the engine out of the car so I can give it an overhaul. Now is it worth as much as my great grandad's 1946 Mercury or 1960 Jaguar, the rides that got me interested in cars? Not by a long shot. But it means more than any other car out there to me because I love both it and the memories associated with it so much. I'll probably still have it, in its much bondoed, barely functional state, 20 years down the road because it is amazing. As long as he is attached to the car, he won't care about the money. It's only if he's not attached that it would matter to him how much the things worth.

 

1. The McMullen 32 Ford roadster sold for $700K five years ago. A deuce roadster is a good choice for investment, if it is real Henry steel. And even more so if it has interesting history. They only made in the neighborhood of 12,000 of those, and it is the definition of the species. Maybe to a lesser extent, the 57 Chevy and early Vettes might be destined to go up some more in price. All ages seem to love those. Seems like 1950's pick up trucks are getting more expensive, too. As far as other cars we think of as iconic . . . I have already noticed 49-50-51 Mercury prices falling.

2. Check out The Race of Gentlemen ( https://www.theraceofgentlemen.com ), as a previous poster said. Lots of enthusiasm for traditional stuff.

3. The muscle car comments above are on the money, particularly Hemi's and big blocks. After the 1970's, it's hard to find any car of any make that is consistently going up in value, with the exception of the Porsche 911, which seems to hold or increase its value every year, at least 1963 through the late 1970's. Those are not particularly rare and maybe still gettable.

 

I used to care. Now, I don't. As long as the stuff I like doesn't get stomped by over regulation, I'm going to like what I like. If the younger set gets interested, cool. If not, no worries from me. I think and do about today. Tomorrows too far away to worry about it.

 

To me all the talk of cars being an investment is one of the biggest problems with this hobby. It's a hobby you spend money to have fun and enjoy yourself not worry about what it is going to be worth 10 20 years down the road. You don't hoard a bunch of parts because you will sell them as a retirement fund. It has become way too much of a "business" for far too many IMO. I buy music, tools, instruments, go to concerts, go to movies, sporting events because I enjoy it. I don't worry about what it's going to be worth down the road. I view this hobby in the same light.

 

When I build weird stuff for myself, and my customers, the first reaction, often here is: "Resale value?"

 

I see both sides
nothing wrong with a profitable hobby
definitely nothing wrong with folks profiting from a customers love of this hobby
and folks like me that build things for fun
but the next generation builders are building the same things the first generation of builders did.....stuff they can find and afford
I bet buggy guys were complaining how young folks only want to build the motorized stuff back in the day

 

The next generation of hot rodders are currently building imports or coal blowing diesels. Theyll come around.

If youre asking what the best "investment" car is to buy now and drive for 20 yrs its mustangs ( cobra, saleen, rousch etc) or high end import sports cars - kinda like that Jag.

 

I hesitate to bring myself into this because I like the shadow. Nonetheless, I am 21 years old. I started hoarding up money I got as a kid from birthdays or chores and saved up and bought parts. I was 14 I think when I bought my first body panels for the rod I'm still building. Its a 1920 T, aiming for a look similar to that of Anderson's old '24 T roadster as it's the closest I've seen to the picture in my head. It's taken a lot of time because I've done the work myself and am learning what I don't know to accomplish the tasks in building the car. Ironically, over the last few years I've gotten my dad into traditional rods also.