The first conference of Israeli car collectors and appraisers was held last month with the participation of the chair of the Knesset's economic committee, Eitan Cabel of the Zionist Camp. The attendees sought to establish standards for appraising vintage vehicles that are valued as collectible items, as the number of collectible vehicles in Israel has been growing in recent years. Naturally, there arose a need to determine the monetary value of these expensive cars before their sale or purchase in order to insure them against theft or to assess damages in case of an accident.

In Israel, a vehicle is considered collectible if more than 30 years have passed since its manufacture. According to data from the Ministry of Transportation that was published in Rekhev veTahburah (Car and Traffic) Magazine, 20,597 collectible vehicles are registered today in Israel. The collector group in Israel is called the Five Club, which got its name in 1985, when 30-year-old vehicles had five-digit license plates.

“While for many years there were 700 members in the club, in the last five years there has been an impressive jump and today there are about a thousand members. It’s a significant increase,” Kobi Millo told Al-Monitor. Millo, a 55-year-old engineer, has been a member since the club's founding and owns two English sports cars, a '69 MC-C and a '67 Jaguar 420.

Ron Ackerman, the club’s spokesman and the owner of a '80 Volvo 245, told Al-Monitor that the hobby has significantly expanded since the end of the '90s, when regulations eased for personal car imports. According to him, in recent years the number of collectors has increased even more. “Every month about 20 collectible vehicles arrive in Israel by personal import. In the past the numbers were significantly fewer, and this doesn’t include vehicles that age and are maintained here in Israel,” he said. “There are two reasons for this increase. The first is that it’s possible today; you’re exposed to this world on the internet and get excited, and it’s easier to communicate with sellers around the world. Second, today people have more money and the standard of living in Israel has risen significantly. One of the results is the growth of leisure and collecting.”