Modifying Your Alfa Spider - Alfa Romeo 1966 to 1994 Spider Faq

fifties, a time when expendable income is at its highest and nostalgia its strongest. The end of
production also means that the entire line will hopefully become more noticed overall, although
this is small comfort for those who own cars still in the initial throes of depreciation.
Finally, there is the biggest influence of all on the entire market the general condition of the
economy. In "boom„ times consumer optimism is high, expendable income is available, and
most adults feel an urge to spend a little on themselves. After a certain amount of growth occurs
due to these "natural„ causes, speculators enter the field and cause a massive spike in the value of
all enthusiast cars. In the past twenty years this has typically been followed by a turn of the
business cycle that causes a recession in the general economy, which in turn causes the
speculators to move away from cars and on to other commodities. The subsequent crash in
market prices can leave the unwise or over-enthusiastic with massive car payments on vehicles
worth half as much as they were a year ago. However, the "grass roots„ swell that started the
boom usually never goes away, so prices never seem to fall as far as they grew.
So what does this mean, bottom line, to the potential Spider owner or seller?
The original version of this document included rough guides to pricing. Unfortunately I have
been out of mainstream Alfa culture for a few years now, and so I can really no longer speak
authoritatively on how much excellent cars of the various model years are going for at this time.
However, it should be noted that, in general, Series 4 cars should be depreciating, Series 3 and 2a
cars should be holding steady, Series 2 cars should be appreciating slightly (approximately 5-
10% per year), and Duettos should be following market trends (down now but due for an
upswing).
An Alfa Spider of any year probably isn"t a very good investment when looked at through the
cold green light of an accountant"s visor. However, this perception changes noticeably in the
warm orange light of a summer evening, and, after all, isn"t that were you really appreciate a fine
automobile?

Modifying your Alfa Spider

I think one of the biggest misconceptions purchasers of Alfa Spiders have (American ones, at
least) is in thinking that the Spider is like an American high performance car. For those of you
who live elsewhere, I will explain:
Americans tend to be very strange about high performance automobiles (we don"t seem strange
to us, but that"s because we live here.) We have the largest network of "autobahn-style„
roadways in the world, and yet until very recently had one of the lowest highway speed limits
around. In general, Americans have traditionally tended to like cars fast, heavy, large, and plush.
We also have a very strong "hot rod„ tradition dating back to the 1940s. Most American
manufacturers from the end of WWII until well into the 1980s didn"t really produce what
Europeans would consider "performance cars„ in any large numbers. Also, again until recently,
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