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Paul Smart Retrospective

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The Paul Smart was a much higher spec production of Ducati’s Sport Classic range, and typical of Ducati & Terblanche, it was a decade too early.The model only ran a few years before lacklustre sales deemed it to the history books.From an investors perspective we flagged the entire Classic range as modes to grab when they were unloved by mainstream, and that has proven spot-on advice. For a couple years now demand for the entire range has been slowly increasing and now desire is virtually outstripping supply, especially on the PS & Sport.

This one currently for sale in the US looks a beaut, very low miles & oem with exception to the glorious Termi pipe, which makes them sound fabulous (we have one here atm).We've said repeatedly that Oz prices have stagnated while the rest of the world has accelerated, which in-turn has produced a pricing phenomenon whereby bikes here are cheaper than O/S.Some have disagreed with this but living in denial doesn’t change the facts; the sort of bikes we specialise in selling and enjoy owning have never before been cheaper to buy here than O/S.Yes there’s the occasional bargain to be had when a seller isn’t chasing or aware of present day values, but main-stream values of dealers and savvy sellers show conclusively that prices here are at best equal, or below the landed cost of buying the same bike O/S.

The asking price of this PS reflects how far behind the world our prices are sitting.A year ago we were offered a new PS in Italy for 15k Euro.At the time landed here that was around 30kAUD, which was about 5-6k more than they were commanding here.Today this PS in the US has a 30k USD ticket, which is circa 42kAU, then add another 7 for shipping & arrival & you're talking 50k without compliance!Anyone who doesn’t have their head in the sand knows and will acknowledge that we don’t influence global values, we follow.The US, UK & EU determine the eventual values of our bikes for they hold the stock and cause the model trends that ultimately determine the values of the bikes we have or seek to own down-under.Obviously we, as local owners, can decide the sale price of whatever we’re selling, but when they’re all gobbled up by astute investors and speculators, or shipped O/S as we’ve done with more than 3 container loads over the past couple years, we’ll have to buy our bikes O/S and pay whatever the rest of the world is paying.

Paul Smart for sale in USA


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