has long since decided to limit production to just 7,000 cars a year to maintain its exclusive appeal. It is the opposite dilemma for Aston Martin. The com- pany is hopeful, under the direction of recently appointed CEO Andy Palmer, to double its annual production from the current 3,500 or so: an essen- tial increase if the company is to survive. At least, with an already bulging order book for the recently released DB11 (no, I’m not acquiring one — stun- ning, but dubious investment potential), the imme- diate future for the company begins to look rosy. YELLOW STREAK There is one particularly well-known car in my col- lection, namely a Bahama Yellow Aston Martin DBS (the only one made in this col- our). This is the car with which I helped make actor Phil Glen- ister’s ‘boyhood dreams come true’ in the Channel 4 series For the Love of Cars, screened in April 2015. The DBS, the ‘impossibly sexy motor’ accord- ing to the advertising blurb at the time, was launched in 1967. Mine is the actual car driven by Roger Moore (before he obtained his licence to kill) when he played Lord Brett Sin- clair in the iconic TV series The Persuaders. I bought the car in 2014 at the Bonhams Aston Martin Works auction, which is held annually at the Newport Pag- nell factory. My successful bid- ding took place over the phone from the studio of an artist I was visiting for the purpose of adding to my art col- lection. Not such a success for the poor artist — it rather blew the art budget for that month! I view myself less as the owner of this screen-star vehicle and more its current guardian. I also concede that it is not just the rarity or the manufac- turing quality that makes ‘the Yellow Peril’ such a joy, but it is its sheer fame that makes it so valuable. Classic cars may be my passion, but it is a love affair with an eye firmly on the financial potential. If chosen well and bought with insight, a collection can also be a shrewd investment. Spending one’s money on high-value collectibles is not new but it has begun to have its own special terminology. Classic cars are a relatively new entrant into the ‘passion investing’ class and the tag highlights some of the pitfalls of combining love with money. One of my main regrets was selling a Ferrari Dino when I was in A CLASSIC DILEMMA Collecting classic cars involves a tug of war between heart and head — but if you get it right then you can profit both financially and emotionally July // August 2016 99 JEREMY LEVISON IS A FOUNDING PARTNER OF LEVISON MELTZER PIGOTT SOLICITORS hugely interesting and attractive part of my practice. As a keen collector of both (and having my own art gallery based in trendy Bermondsey Street), I believe I have more of a feel for these type of assets than many of my peers. My own car collection ranges from a 1963 Ferrari to a 2015 Aston Martin (one of six built specially to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Newport Pag- nell factory) with many in between. I tend to find that with advancing age, my taste has changed. In the Seventies it was all Porsche; in the Eighties and Nineties, bling Ferraris. Now, for the most part, it’s Aston Martin. The principal rea- son for the love affair? Their beauty and elegance. But, at the back of one’s mind, also the possibility, if one gets it right, of profitable financial investment. There is one perhaps surprising statistic to aug- ment the reasons Aston Martins are so special: they are still rare. In the whole of its 103-year history, Aston Martin has produced, in total, 80,000 motor- cars. Porsche produces 200,000 every year. Readers may not be surprised to hear that Ferrari I n the good old days, an embarrassed husband (usually) under a legal obligation to make a ‘full and frank’ disclosure of his financial position would ask his divorce lawyer whether he needed to come clean to his unsuspecting wife about the modest (of course) Ferrari which he had purchased a few years before. Or could he continue to keep it under wraps (figuratively as well as literally)? How things have changed. In the past ten years, such has been the phenomenal growth in the value of exotic automobiles that his purchase would no longer need to be concealed. (‘But darling, it is such a fantastic investment.’) As a lover of art and classic cars (which themselves can be works of kinetic sculpture), I am only too aware of what an impor- tant part a car or a collection of cars may play in any divorce case. Not all cars, of course, but at least if I am acting in a case where there is a car collection, I will be able to spot the difference between a marque on the one hand, which is fine, valuable and likely to appreciate, as against run-of-the-mill mediocrity on the other. Even in the classic car market, the gap can be the size of a chasm. What fun it is — as recently happened in a case in which I was involved — to stumble across a cheque in a husband’s bank state- ments for £350,000 and to learn, in answer to the relevant request, that it represented the 5 per cent import duty for a particularly valuable piece of Ger- man exotica. At a stroke, another £7 million added to the matrimonial pot for division. The existence of classic cars and fabulous art collections in divorce cases is a My taste has changed. In the Seventies it was all Porsche; in the Eighties and Nineties, bling Ferraris JEREMY LEVISON’S COLLECTION INCLUDES A FERRARI 250 GTE (ABOVE) AND A HOST OF ASTON MARTINS (TOP), INCLUDING THE YELLOW DBS OF PERSUADERS FAME (LEFT) THE GOOD LIFE // MOTORING THE GOOD LIFE // MOTORING