Five Classic Cars Tipped to Rise in Value Next Year, and One Costs Under £15,000

• Hagerty’s 2026 UK Bull Market List names ten classics it expects to rise in value, picked from both insurance data and real buyer demand.
• Entry prices on the list range from under £15,000 for a modern hot hatch up to £95,000 for a manual Ferrari V8.
• The list is built for owners who want to drive the car, not lock it away, since Hagerty values are based on usable, well-kept examples rather than concours perfection.

The List Insurers Build From Real Claims and Quotes, Not Guesswork

Every year, classic car insurer Hagerty publishes a UK Bull Market List, naming ten cars it expects to gain in value over the following twelve months. Unlike a dealer’s marketing puff or a magazine’s wish list, Hagerty builds its picks from data most of the market never sees: its own valuation guide, millions of insurance quotes, and the policies people actually buy. That combination lets it spot cars gaining real demand before auction houses and classified ads catch up and prices move.

Hagerty UK revealed its 2026 list at the Bicester Scramble in January, and its own framing is deliberately down to earth. The company tells buyers to purchase a classic car with their heart, since these are cars meant to be driven, not vaulted. Hagerty prices every pick in what it calls Condition 2, meaning a clean, well-preserved example that presents well without needing full concours restoration, which keeps the list grounded in cars ordinary enthusiasts can actually own and use.

The Entry Point: A Modern Classic Under £15,000

The most accessible car to carry real upside potential this year is not a rare exotic but a hatchback that plenty of readers may have owned new. The second-generation Volkswagen Golf GTI has become the smarter buy in its own family, according to Hagerty’s analysis, as the earlier Mk1 GTI’s prices have climbed so high that buyers are shifting their attention to the newer car instead. Good examples of the Mk2 GTI currently sit at around £15,000, a price Hagerty describes as flat for now despite rising demand, which is precisely the gap a Bull Market pick is designed to spot before it closes.

At the other end of the newest-to-oldest range sits the second-generation Mercedes-Benz SLK, the R171, which Hagerty prices at around £5,000, making it the cheapest car on the entire list. Its combination of a folding hard top, usable daily manners and a price that has barely moved in years makes it one of the easier entries to justify to a partner who thinks a classic car has to be a financial gamble.

The Middle Ground: An Italian Roadster and a Modern-Era 911

Sitting between the affordable entries and the list’s showpieces is the Alfa Romeo Spider, built across a remarkably long run from 1966 to 1986. Hagerty points to the 2000 Veloce as the sweet spot within the range, with good examples priced around £21,000, buying a car that combines open-top Italian styling with a straightforward mechanical layout that independent specialists can service without difficulty.

Also on the list is the 996-generation Porsche 911, long treated as the unloved middle child of the 911 lineage because of its headlights and its water-cooled engine, a departure from the air-cooled cars that came before it. Hagerty names the Carrera 2 variant as the pick of the range for value, and values on 996-generation cars have been climbing as buyers realise the model offers genuine 911 ownership, badge and driving experience, for a fraction of the cost of an air-cooled car from the 1990s.

The Headline Car: A Manual Ferrari for the Price of a New Family SUV

The most expensive confirmed entry on the 2026 UK list is the Ferrari F430, built between 2004 and 2009, with Hagerty valuing the best manual Spider examples at around £95,000. That is a serious sum by any measure, but it buys a naturally aspirated V8 Ferrari with a manual gearbox, a combination the brand has not offered on a new car in well over a decade and is unlikely ever to offer again. Cars with that specific mix of qualities tend to be the ones that hold or gain value fastest once a manufacturer stops making anything comparable, which is the thinking behind including it here rather than a cheaper, automatic-gearbox example of the same model.

The remaining entries on Hagerty’s ten-car list range from a pre-war Riley Nine Imp, whose values the company says have now levelled off after an earlier run-up, to other performance and touring cars spanning several decades. The spread is deliberate. Hagerty is not betting on one type of car or one era, but on the idea that demand is rotating across the classic market as different generations of buyers reach the age and income where a car they admired as teenagers becomes affordable.

What to Check Before You Buy Into Any of These

A Bull Market listing is a forecast built on data, not a guarantee. Hagerty’s own methodology leans on sales trends and insurance behaviour that tend to work best for cars already attracting strong demand and limited supply, and prices can fall as well as rise. Before buying any car on this list, get an independent inspection from a specialist in that marque rather than relying on a seller’s description, since running costs and the price of specialist parts can erode any paper gain in value quickly if the car needs serious mechanical work.

Check the car’s history as carefully as you would check any used car bought from a classified advert, since a classic with a thin or patchy history file is a harder car to insure, harder to resell, and harder to be confident about mechanically. Classic car insurance premiums have also risen sharply this year, so get a quote before committing to a purchase rather than after, since a car that looks like a bargain on the forecourt can lose much of its appeal once the real cost of covering it lands on your desk.

Why 1990s and 2000s Cars Dominate the Current Wave

Hagerty’s own framing of its sister list for 2026 describes the 1990s and 2000s as the final chapter of the analog era, meaning performance cars that still paired a manual gearbox with little electronic intervention between the driver and the road. That generation of buyer is now reaching the age where disposable income and nostalgia overlap, and Hagerty data shows real pull from younger enthusiasts too. Close to 58 percent of recorded interest in one classic BMW M5 generation on Hagerty’s books comes from buyers under 40, a figure that would have surprised the classic car trade a decade ago, when the hobby was assumed to be ageing out rather than renewing itself.

That demand pattern matters for anyone weighing up a purchase now rather than later. A car with strong interest from buyers under 40 has decades of potential ownership ahead of it, which tends to support values for longer than a car whose fanbase is shrinking with age. It is one more reason the Golf GTI and the 996-generation 911, both cars that were everyday performance models rather than halo exotics when new, feature so prominently on lists built from real buying behaviour rather than nostalgia alone.

Sources:

• 2026 Hagerty Bull Market list revealed at Bicester Scramble
• Hagerty reveals 2026 Bull Market List
• Hagerty publishes UK Bull Market List of classics poised to rise in value
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