The Winning Bid

Here's the latest poster child for rising values of 1980s and '90s performance cars

by Grady Eger
3 August 2021 2 min read
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Photo by Bring a Trailer

The car: 1993 Ford Mustang SVT Cobra, for sale on Bring a Trailer.

Hagerty Price Guide value: Condition #1: $66,900/ Condition #2: $42,600/ Condition #3: $29,100/ Condition #4: $18,800

Our take: We’ve noted that for all the talk of millennials and Gen–Zers taking over the collector car market, it’s really Gen–X—those who were kids in the 1970s and 1980s—driving up prices right now.

Mustangs are a perfect microcosm of this effect. Certain 1960s-era Mustangs still tend to be the most valuable, and the newest ones the most powerful, but some of the fastest-appreciating are the ones produced in between, from 1979–1993. The long-lived Fox-body design, penned by Jack Telnack, was a sharp break with tradition for the pony car yet is, for those of a certain age, the image that comes to mind when they hear the word “Mustang.” We’ve seen a few notable Fox-body sales of late, most recently a 1987 Saleen Mustang that brought $52,500.

All that said, this 1993 Mustang for sale right now on Bring a Trailer is a bit unusual. It’s already crested six-figures with two days to go. What’s the big deal? Start with the condition. It has 16-miles on the odometer and the seats are still wrapped in plastic. Then look at the badge on the fender: in place of the typical “5.0” is a snake, denoting this as a rare, desirable SVT Cobra. A revised camshaft and so-called “GT40” cylinder heads pushed output to 235 hp, up from 205 hp on other ’93 5.0s. Only 4,993 examples of the high-performance ‘Stang ever roamed the streets, and it’s safe to say many crashed and/or rusted out of existence. (Rarer still is the track-focused Cobra R, with only 107 units ever produced.)

In short, it’s hard to imagine a better time capsule to be transported back to the era when Nintendo, Walkman, and, yes, Vanilla Ice were in full swing.

Median value for Fox-body Mustangs in the Hagerty Price Guide are up 81 percent since 2015, and Cobras in particular are up 89 percent. Most of this, as noted, is coming from Gen–Xers, who account for some 45 percent of the people calling us for quotes on insurance for Mustangs of this era. Those who came of age when Fox-bodies were new now have the cash to live their childhood dreams. Just how much cash this SVT Cobra Mustang will fetch remains to be seen. As of this writing, it has already smashed through our price guide (not unexpected, we have to say, for a “wrapper car”). Where do you think the hammer will fall?

Update: The high-bid as of this story’s publication was cancelled. Bidding with one day remaining sits at $90,000.

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Comments

  • Bill Tobey says:

    So depressing, cars should be driven.

  • Eric says:

    Sad some deadbeat re negged on six figure bid…Atleast bat will ban the loser…ebay needs to start doing the same!

  • Patrick Browning says:

    Interesting tid-bit: I am viewing the interior photo taken from outside the driver’s door. I own a 1989 Ford Probe LX; the interior of my Probe is almost identical to this ’93 Mustang. The steering wheel, the dash, the console, the armrests and visors, even the power window switches are practically the same!
    (My car is condition #4, I’ll gladly accept an offer around $15,000. Call me.)

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