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The modern classic market has exploded recently, but not everything has gone crazy. Here are 13 cars that have slipped through the net.
There’s been a focus on modern classics recently from both ourselves and our members, who are increasingly looking back in time for the cars they once yearned for, the ones that give you that buzz at any speed, not necessarily the ones with the most power and tech.
That increased interest across the market from both drivers and collectors has of course sent values through the roof, making so many of these cars unattainable. But there are some cars the market hasn’t quite caught onto yet. Cars that haven’t quite captured the market for one reason or another — maybe a flaw, maybe they’re just not old enough yet — but in reality offer all the modern classic experience, without paying three times what it would have cost you a year ago.
Here are our picks from the market right now, and we’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments and chat about the best ‘not quite’ modern classics.
2007 | 8,401 Miles | £POA
There isn’t much about the Ferrari 599 GTB that doesn’t scream modern classic. Naturally-aspirated, Enzo-derived V12 up front, rear-wheel drive, plus Pininfarina styling. And yet, values have never really taken off.
The elephant in the room is the F1 automated manual gearbox fitted to the overwhelming majority of cars, while production of around 3,500 examples means the GTB isn’t particularly rare by Ferrari collector standards. Values have strengthened from the days when usable cars dipped well below £100,000, but the market remains accessible.
It’s still technically possible to get a 599 under £100k, but there are hardly any on the market anymore, meaning prices are already on the up, especially for low-mileage cars like this and HGTE models. The handful of factory manual 599s are another story, and then there’s the lighter, faster and much rarer 599 GTO which feels like another world entirely at well over £1 million, despite both cars sharing the same fundamental architecture.
2006 | 64,589 Miles | £19,995
The E63 M6 is the bargain-basement member of this group, but arguably one of the most fascinating. Underneath Chris Bangle's controversial bodywork sits the S85 5.0-litre naturally aspirated V10, producing 507hp and revving beyond 8,000rpm – an engine whose conception was closely tied to BMW's contemporary Formula 1 era. The coupé also received a carbon-fibre roof and extensive lightweight body components, yet these cars depreciated spectacularly.
Why? Running costs can be frightening, the styling remains divisive and, in the UK, every car came with the seven-speed SMG automated manual — continuing the gearbox theme. North America received the unicorn: a conventional six-speed manual. The result is a car with one of the most extraordinary engines BMW has ever fitted to a road car, still available for the price of a used 118d.
In an era of downsized turbocharged and electrified M cars, the V10 M6 (and its brother the E60 M5) will only become more of a wild snapshot of a time that will simply never be repeated. Whether collectors can forgive the SMG and the potential bills is another matter.
2018 | 26,371 Miles | £94,950
Ok, maybe the AMG GT R isn't old enough to be considered a modern classic just yet, and maybe that's the explanation for the values, because there isn’t really anything wrong with it. The 'Beast of the Green Hell' took the already dramatic AMG GT and added more: rear-wheel steering, aero, wider bodywork and extensive chassis development to create perhaps AMG's finest driver's car.
Values, however, initially behaved more like those of a used C-Class than a future collectable, quickly tumbling to below the £90,000 mark. They have strengthened, but still remain remarkably attainable with this 26k-mile example on sale at £94,950
Part of the GT R’s problem is the rarer, more extreme models that came later — the Pro and the crazy Black Series — that overshadowed the early model, but for me, the original is arguably the sweeter car, it’ll always be the first one which carries importance in the collector market, and whatever the case, it represents a superb amount of fun for the money.
2005 | 22,000 Miles | £69,950
If the 599 looks undervalued, the 612 Scaglietti borders on absurd. Here is a Pininfarina-designed, aluminium-bodied Ferrari powered by a naturally aspirated V12, capable of carrying four adults and built in relatively modest numbers, yet a good 612 can still cost less than a new BMW M3.
The styling has taken time to find favour and the 612's size and GT remit mean it has never attracted the same enthusiast following as Ferrari's two-seaters, and once again the F1 gearbox is crucial. Even this low-mileage example sits at under £70,000, which is astonishing when you consider what happened to the vanishingly rare six-speed manual cars, which can command several times the price and have become genuine collector pieces.
As enthusiasts increasingly romanticise big naturally aspirated Ferrari V12s, the 612 remains one of the clearest examples of a car possessing almost everything the modern-classic market claims to value, without the corresponding price tag.
2010 | 39,000 Miles | £199,990
Lightweight Lamborghini. Naturally aspirated V10. Carbon fibre everywhere. Huge rear wing. Surely job done? Somehow not quite, until recently at least. I’m perhaps a bit late to the party on this one, but just a few months ago, both generations of Gallardo Superleggera remained relatively attainable compared with equivalent lightweight Ferraris and Porsches, and once again the transmission has plenty to answer for, although that never held the 360 CS back.
Lamborghini's E-Gear automated manual came standard, and this immediately stunts the collector appeal compared to early manual Gallardos. That creates the peculiar situation where the rarer, lighter, more powerful Superleggera can find itself competing for attention with ordinary manual cars.
Values have certainly firmed up massively from lows of barely more than £100,000, and low-mileage cars are now up over £300,000, making this car look like remarkable value, but when you look at the way Murcielago and Aventador SVs have gone, you’d say there’s plenty of headroom yet. Had Lamborghini fitted it with an open-gated manual, you'd suspect we'd be discussing a very different price already.
2017 | 20,400 Miles | £79,995
After the success of the E46 M3 CSL and E92 M3 GTS, BMW once again followed the collector-car rulebook perfectly with the F82 M4 GTS: more power, less weight, carbon-fibre bodywork, a roll cage, water injection and a production run limited to 700 cars. Then it went further with the DTM Champion Edition, effectively combining the GTS hardware with a celebration of Marco Wittmann's 2016 DTM title and limiting production to just 200 worldwide. Only 15 are documented as having been allocated to the UK, yet this car is currently listed £79,995.
That's particularly interesting because an almost delivery-mileage UK DTM sold for £87,000 as far back as 2021, meaning values haven't exactly followed the trajectory you might expect from something so rare. The E92 GTS had the DCT gearbox, so that can’t be to blame. Perhaps the problem is that the F82 remains too new, or perhaps it’s just that the turbocharged S55 engine doesn’t offer the old-school romance of the E46 CSL’s hard-edged straight six or E92 GTS with its high-revving V8. On rarity alone, though, the DTM looks almost bizarrely cheap.
2007 | 52,000 Miles | £59,980
Even Porsche isn't completely immune. The 997.1 Turbo has one of the strongest CVs here: compact dimensions, hydraulic steering, four-wheel drive, nearly 500hp and, crucially, the legendary Mezger flat-six. It comes from a period increasingly regarded as a sweet spot for the 911, after the lesser-loved 996 and before the bigger, more refined 991, yet one thing keeps these cars incredibly affordable — the Tiptronic gearbox.
Unlike the lightning-fast PDK that followed, the five-speed torque-converter Tiptronic now feels unmistakably of its era, and collectors have overwhelmingly decided that a Mezger 997 deserves three pedals. That's created a sizeable gearbox discount despite the cars otherwise being mechanically identical, and some might say the GT capabilities and torquey character of the Turbo lend themselves to a lazier auto.
The Turbo will never compete with GT3 and RS models with their naturally aspirated engines, lightweight and manual gearboxes, but for someone less concerned with heel-and-toe heroics, you can get the sweet spot 911 generation with the last Mezger turbo and near-200mph performance for barely more than £50k. This one is even in a PTS colour!
2004 | 28,900 Miles | £84,950
The 575M is perhaps an even cleaner demonstration of the effect a gearbox can have on values. It is essentially the final development of Ferrari's wonderfully understated 550-era V12 GT, combining a 515hp 5.75-litre (hence the name) naturally aspirated V12 with styling that has aged beautifully and a driving experience far removed from today's turbocharged and hybrid Ferraris.
Yet most 575Ms received Ferrari's then-new F1 transmission after the manual-only 550, and those cars remain amazingly affordable, with this sub-30k-mile car on sale at £85k. Manual examples with the Fiorano Handling Pack are getting on for double that. Same gorgeous body, same magnificent V12, but add a metal gate and a third pedal and suddenly the market sees a completely different car. Few models demonstrate the collector world's obsession with manual transmissions quite as neatly.
2007 | 50,750 Km | €180,000 EUR
The CLK 63 AMG Black Series has virtually every ingredient collectors look for: outrageous looks, limited production, motorsport influence, rear-wheel drive and, most importantly, AMG's magnificent naturally aspirated 6.2-litre M156 V8. It also comes from the period when Black Series meant something genuinely unhinged rather than simply another rung on a model ladder.
Values have appreciated considerably from their used-car lows, but they haven't exploded in the manner of comparable models from Porsche and Ferrari. Part of that is the badge – historically, even the rarest AMGs haven't attracted quite the same collector fervour as Porsche GT cars – and part is the seven-speed automatic transmission, which is pretty lazy and lacks the interaction of the manuals collectors increasingly fetishise.
If attitudes towards the great naturally aspirated AMGs continue to change, this feels like one that could lead the charge.
2016 | 716 Miles | £149,995
On paper, the Project 7 looks very well qualified. It was Jaguar Land Rover's first Special Vehicle Operations product, took inspiration from the D-Type, had a ridiculous-sounding supercharged V8 and was limited to just 250 cars worldwide. It looks spectacular, sounds even better and represents an increasingly unlikely sort of Jaguar given the brand’s recent activities.
Yet values have never quite reflected its rarity. The fact that the standard F-Type R offers much of the same drama for considerably less money maybe doesn’t help, and brand comes into it again, with Jaguar simply not generating Porsche or Ferrari levels of collector demand.
That said, they have definitely strengthened since their lows of under £100,000, but even this sub-1k-mile car is up at £150k, so maybe now is the time to grab such a rarity before more people start to catch on.
2011 | 58,000 Miles | £70,000
Surely the recipe is right here: take the original Audi R8, fit a glorious 5.2-litre naturally aspirated V10 from a Lamborghini, strip out weight, cover it in carbon fibre and limit production to just 333 coupés, of which just 33 came to the UK. The first-generation R8 GT is exactly the sort of hardcore derivative collectors normally adore, yet it has spent much of its life overshadowed by something less exotic: the ordinary manual R8.
The reason, surprise surprise, is the GT's six-speed R-Tronic automated manual, which was already starting to feel dated when the car was new and lacks the open-gate theatre that has made manual V8 and V10 R8s so desirable. This GT, which will be familiar to many Supercar Driver members, is currently advertised at £70,000, despite being one of those 33 UK cars.
It’s no surprise that mileage makes an enormous difference. A 4,700-mile GT sold in America for the equivalent of around £155,000 this year, but another 31,000-mile car made about £86,000 in late 2025. The GT therefore has rarity, a magnificent naturally aspirated engine and genuine lightweight credentials, but when non-limited models are arguably even more sought-after, the gearbox has clearly stopped it from becoming the definitive collectable first-generation R8.
2012 | 7,352 Miles | £89,995
The 12C is perhaps the strangest car here because history ought to be treating it much more kindly by now. It was McLaren's first series-production road car since the F1, introduced the carbon-fibre MonoCell architecture that still underpins McLaren's road cars today and combined it with a 3.8-litre twin-turbo V8 producing almost 600hp at launch. It doesn’t even have a rubbish gearbox!
Yet early criticism of its clinical character, McLaren's relentless subsequent model launches and lingering concerns about running costs and reliability hammered residuals. Values bottomed out spectacularly for something this exotic and remain modest, although they have settled over the past few years. UK cars have sold for less than £50,000, and even this collector-grade example is asking less than £90,000. For a carbon-tubbed supercar that effectively started the modern McLaren road-car story, that still seems remarkably little, especially when the majority of 675LTs, which share the same architecture, are sitting between £300,000 and £400,000, and there are even fewer 12Cs currently on the market.
2004 | 26,990 Miles | £79,950
Honestly, this is the first car that sprang to mind when I was contemplating this list. The original Vanquish should arguably already be one of the definitive modern-classic Aston Martins. Ian Callum styling, a hand-built naturally aspirated V12, aluminium and carbon-fibre construction, James Bond provenance and production at the end of the Newport Pagnell era all sound like ingredients specifically chosen to make collectors reach for their wallets.
Regular models can be had for less than £50,000, and even the enhanced Vanquish S isn’t a great deal dearer. With only just over 1,000 Vanquish S models produced, why are values so low for a car that ticks so many collector boxes? Again, the automated manual transmission and its reputation for awkward low-speed behaviour hasn’t helped. Aston Martin Works famously offered manual conversions, and specialists continue to do so today, with Aston Workshop currently charging £19,995 for the conversion. What has always been the Vanquish's Achilles’ heel may now be the only thing preventing the last hand-built Newport Pagnell Aston from becoming significantly more expensive.
