It used to be that used cars were worth less than new ones.  Then, along came the third week of August, with the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance, the Monterey Historic Auto Races, six collector car auctions, road tours, and supporting shows like The Quail, an elegant car show at Quail Lodge in Carmel Valley.  Attracting tens of thousands of visitors, the week is Monterey’s most important of the year.

To some car exhibitors it’s annoying that a visitor’s first question is “What’s it worth?”.  But the answer, often six or seven figures, ensures that these artifacts of the industrial age will be preserved.

In the weeks before “Monterey”, restoration shops all over the country are frenzied preparing cars for show, sale, or racing.  Owners of these cars consider themselves lucky to find a restorer who has the necessary skills and knowledge, plus the discipline to meet deadlines.  Once a car is done, one of a mini-industry of specialized truckers will transport it to Monterey.

If you get the idea that this is an expensive game to play, you’re right.  But often these cars appreciate in value, generally not enough to qualify as a good investment, but sufficient that an owner can avoid feeling stupid.  And he, or often she, has a rewarding hobby in the bargain.

The competition at a Concours d’Elegance is focused on the presentation of the car with every detail correct, as it might have been on the day it left the factory.  Or, a car can be presented as a “barn-find”, preserved, but showing the ravages of time.

An example of the latter is the Voisin pictured here.  Voisins were produced in France from 1919-1939, and were featured at the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance this year.  This one looks dingy, but on close inspection, it was evident that it is complete, preserved, and never re-worked.  It even ran well.  Voisin history isn’t like Ford or Buick or any “normal” car company.  Gabriel Voisin was an aviation pioneer.  Shortly after the Wright Brothers flew a plane, that had to be launched by catapult, Voisin built one that took off under its own power.  Eventually, his factory produced thousands of planes for World War I.  But in 1919, he found himself with a big airplane factory, and no airplane customers.  So he applied his considerable skills to the design and manufacture of expensive, avant-garde automobiles.

The architect Le Corbusier was a friend of Voisin, and owned his cars.  Whenever Le Corbusier showed a car in an architectural sketch, it was a Voisin.  Other famous owners included Maurice Chevalier, Josephine Baker, Rudolph Valentino (three Voisins; one in Hollywood, two in Paris), Anatole France and H.G.Wells.

Voisin’s personal life was also unusual.  Divorced in 1926, he remarried at age 70, in 1950, to an 18 year old Spanish girl.  Her elder sister was her duenna and “came as part of her dowry”.  The three lived together for the remaining 23 years of his life!

Cars at a Concours d’Elegance are expected to run and be drivable.  But at the Monterey Historic Auto Races, a car must accelerate, brake and steer at peak efficiency in order to perform well on the road-racing circuit at Laguna Seca.  Watching these 40-50-60-even 80 year old cars race, it’s not like what you see on TV.  The cars do go quickly, as fast as they can.  But there’s a strictly enforced code of conduct:  no damage.  A driver who causes damage is excluded from future events.  So the fragile old treasures live to race far into the future.

The auctions, for those who have enough energy left to attend them after the shows and races, offer hundreds of fine old cars, achieving prices that surprise non-collectors.  The star of the 2006 auctions was a competition Ferrari from the 1950’s that sold for over $5 million.

Just for comparison, the most expensive new car on sale is the Bugatti Veyron, at $1.3 million.  It’s safe to say there will be more used million dollar cars sold this year than new ones!