Special Ks!

Paul Jayson from The Motorcycle Broker examines what happened to the market when our cover star and test machine was sold for £160,000.

- Paul Jayson

It is now over 18 months since the record-setting sale of the historic Honda CB750 prototype at H&H.

The dust has settled and the shockwaves and implications of such a sale can now be evaluated.

At the time I pointed out how it will divide the market into the bikes that are very pretty, but not right, and those that are investment grade. In my article, I also said that it will drive up the prices of die-cast K0s and other collectible Japanese motorcycles. And so it has in all cases.

This sale brought high visibility to the classic motorcycle market, at a time when the classic car market has been taking a well-earned breather after 15 years of growth. This is now leading to classic car collectors becoming classic motorcycle collectors, and they are focusing on Italian and Japanese motorcycles of the 1970s and 80s. The sale of that one motorcycle is starting to have a profound impact on the classic motorcycle market.

The world is taking notice and classic car collectors love that there are no left- or right-hand drive issues with motorcycles. They love that these machines take up a fraction of the space a classic car takes up. But they want only the 8% of these machines that are investment grade.