March 12, 2002
by Rick Carey

A Maserati 3500 GT is an affordable high performance classic Italian GT. The dual overhead camshaft, dual ignition, inline all alloy six-cylinder engine shares tradition and lineage with the 250F Grand Prix cars and the 300S-350S sports-racers. The aluminum bodies are attractive, well built and superbly finished by Touring. In fact, the overall build quality of this period Maserati cars is far better than its Italian competition. With some 260 horsepower from its 3½ liter engine the 3500 GT measured up well against its 240hp 3 liter steel-bodied V12 competition. This was a serious effort to shift Maserati from a boutique builder of racing cars to a manufacturer of high performance, high quality production GTs and it worked.

Some 1,978 3500 GTs were built with Touring coupe bodies. After 1962 the standard 3500 GTs were Lucas fuel injected but could be ordered with carbs. Many 3500 Gti s have subsequently had their fuel injection replaced with good old Webers. Early cars had drum brakes charitably described as "marginal." They got better and then got replaced with discs. The 4-speed ZF transmission of the early cars gave way in 1961 to a 5-speed.

The market doesn't seem to differentiate much among the different 3500 GT flavors although the later cars with five speeds and disc brakes should be better drivers and a purely qualitative look at the data indicates the later cars might be $2-5,000 more. No one seems to give a damn if an injected car has carbs installed. Borrani wire wheels are about the only real premium feature and might account for a $2-4,000 variation in current value. Overall, 3500 GT prices are steady but exhibit a modestly-increasing trend over the past several years. It wouldn't be accurate to describe 3500 GT prices as "predictable," however, as they tend to fluctuate wildly around their trend line. Time and Place are important to their transactional values, as is an individual car's history and presentation. Even "wild" fluctuations, however, when talking about a 3500 GT are less than the value of a decent Isetta. Buyers might get buried in a 3500 GT, but "buried" means $10,000 or less. It's not painless, but can be absorbed on an MBNA credit card (or two) and worked off over time without financial ruin.

A Maserati 3500 GT will get its owner into all the neat events that are not marque- or period-specific. Very few automobiles offer such entrée at so reasonable a price.

The chart below is a summary of seven results for 3 condition cars over a span of nearly ten years. The transactions are adjusted for inflation and for currency exchange rate fluctuations. Transaction amounts were converted to US dollars at today's exchange rate (not the historic exchange rate at the time of the transaction.) The rationale for a constant exchange rate is twofold.

• First, a buyer, particularly for an "affordable" car like a Maserati 3500 GT, is most likely going to be local and not experience much fluctuation in purchasing power due to exchange rates (none of these transactions were denominated in currencies which have suffered "runaway inflation.")

• Second, relative rates of inflation are reflected, at least to some degree, in exchange rates. All transactions are brought to current (January 2002) purchasing power using U.S. Consumer Price Index data from the Federal Reserve Bank.