Here’s why this five-year-old Volkswagen Golf is worth more than a new car

Have you ever been poking around the collector car market and suddenly come across something you wouldn’t expect to find in this corner of the automotive kingdom? I’m not talking about something like a pristinely preserved Eagle Premier, I’m talking about a fairly regular-looking car produced in the last few years that is too old to generate any new car buzz, but also too new to see any meaningful dents. Well, this 2019 Volkswagen Golf Alltrack SE is one of those cars.

So why did this happen? The Golf in question isn’t the fastest and has no mileage deliverability, yet it went for $24,750 at Bring A Trailer this week. A five-year-old Golf on a trailer? What’s going on? You see, when new supplies of something dry up, used items become more valuable, and that’s exactly what happened here.

Let’s get into the details, starting with the Alltrack name. You see, to create the Golf Alltrack, Volkswagen took a Golf wagon, specified the all-wheel drive option, raised it six-tenths of an inch, and added some cladding. Think of a two-thirds scale German Subaru Outback and you’re on the right track. There is nothing on the US market right now that fits this description. Sure, we’re on par with subcompact crossovers, but a compact wagon? It’s a rare breed.

Then there’s the way this particular Golf Alltrack was chosen. Sure, the DSG dual-clutch automatic transmission was a good choice, but whoever ordered this new one made a bold decision and opted for the six-speed manual transmission. It’s hard to imagine that just five years ago you could order a lifted, manual little station wagon in America, right?

Add to that the stunning Great Falls Green paint, desirable options like a panoramic sunroof, 18-inch alloy wheels, LED headlights and push-button start, and this Golf represents something that cannot be unequivocally replaced. For people who want a wagon with a manual transmission in America, that’s the end of the deal, the newest one might work. Never mind that it has 70,000km on the clock, has a clean Carfax and a mix of features that are simply rare.

Plus, because the Golf Alltrack is, well, a Golf, it’s really fun to drive. Sure, the shifter isn’t the most precise unit in the world, but the 1.8-liter turbocharged four-cylinder engine has plenty of torque and the chassis tuning strikes a good balance between comfort and fun, at least in the context of regular cars, and all-wheel drive definitely helps when exiting corners. Add it all up and you can easily see why this five-year-old Golf costs more than a new Corolla. In fact, that’s par for the course, as six other Golf Alltracks are selling on Bring A Trailer this year for prices ranging from $19,500 to $38,250.

In fact, the Golf Alltrack could almost be seen as a preview of the future of all kinds of cars currently available in the new market, with no successor in sight that fits this formula. It continued to depreciate, albeit slowly and rapidly, and became at least a moderately desirable everyday car for connoisseurs. With a unique way of generating buzz online and reaching a wide audience, don’t be surprised if a clean, stock, well-maintained, gently used M2 and CT5-V Blackwing and GR86 look the same in a few years, depending on which part of the world you live in.

The bottom line is that we live in an era of huge changes in the automotive industry, so don’t count on traditional depreciation that will make your dream combustion machines much cheaper. As every experience becomes collectible, the cycles of devaluation we are accustomed to can become dodo-like. On the one hand, it sucks because it puts the cars we want out of reach for some. On the other hand, this may mean that some of these cars will be preserved. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.

(Image credit: Bring the Trailer)

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