Inside Saudi Arabia’s unexplored $8bn classic car market

The last time I visited Saudi Arabia’s capital Riyadh, I had the misfortune of experiencing one of its frequent traffic jams.

While marvelling at the unfurling cityscape of steel towers stretching toward the heavens, I was repeatedly brought back to earth by the task of coaxing my ageing SUV through its manual gears, doing battle with container trucks and blacked-out luxury 4x4s alike.

It’s a great place to do business, I thought, but not an ideal location to own a classic or collectible car. And then I checked myself: is that actually true?

While the UAE has now settled comfortably into its role as the region’s premier classic and luxury car destination with a surfeit of dealerships, marque specialists and events to keep even the most ardent hedonist busy, we know little about what’s happening in the Saudi high-end car scene.

Searching for insight into the mind of the elusive Saudi collector, I turned to my old friend Assyl Yacine, owner of classic and enthusiast dealer Speedbird Cars. Since 2020, he has sold more than $8.5 million worth of classic and exotic cars to regional buyers.

Collectors I’ve spoken to love the looks of vintage cars but have little patience for dealing with balky carburetion or heavy manual steering

With the Financial Times estimating the global classic car market at close to $40 billion in 2024, I asked him just how significant the Saudi market really is.

“In 2023, I estimated the UAE collector car market at just over a billion US dollars,” he explains.

“Obviously, the Emirates is a younger country with a smaller population, whereas Saudi Arabia has existed for almost a century. So I would estimate the market is probably six to eight billion dollars in the kingdom currently.

“My average Saudi client is in his forties and is interested in cars from the 1990s up until 2016,” he continues. “Where’s the money coming from? With my clientele, it’s royals, construction and real estate – and sometimes all of the above.”

Given those kinds of numbers, I was keen to delve deeper into the brands the discerning Saudi collector was choosing to buy in 2025.

Regionally, Kuwait is famous for its love of classic American metal, and I imagined it would be the same across the kingdom: a steady diet of big-muscle Chevys, Pontiacs and Fords from the golden age of Detroit.

Not so, says Yacine: “It’s mainly European post-war sports cars, and there’s a huge vintage Land Cruiser market over there as well. At the upper end of the scale, there’s real appetite for Ferrari F40s and Ferrari Enzos. The Bugatti Veyron, which is 20 years old now, is making a comeback.”

This passion for newer metal makes a lot of sense. Just like in the UAE, collectors I’ve spoken to love the looks of vintage cars but have little patience for dealing with balky carburetion or heavy manual steering.

The temptation of a more recent supercar that turns heads on the Boulevard in Riyadh while remaining blessedly easy to drive is difficult to resist. Unsurprisingly, a bulletproof Porsche often becomes the answer, says Yacine.

But there’s one car that eludes even the most fervent Saudi collector.

“It’s the McLaren F1,” reveals Yacine.

“There’s one collector who has one in the UK, but none in Saudi at present. Even clients who have a net worth of $300 million can’t justify spending $30 million on a car. They ask themselves: how am I going to insure it? How am I going to drive it? How am I going to import it?”

Problems for the true 1 percent – and the woes don’t stop there. Saudi Arabia’s diabolically variable tarmac quality would test the patience of a saint, let alone a million-dollar collector car.

Unsurprisingly, many simply don’t end up being driven, covering less than a few hundred kilometres a year – great for maintaining value, less so for inspiring the next generation of owners.