Every once in a while, I see a post online asking the public which car is set to jump in value in the near future as it ascends to true collector status. The Lotus Elise? Maybe. The first-generation Miata? Sure, that makes sense. But neither of those cars is the first that comes to mind. Any time someone asks me about this, my answer is always the same: The first-generation Porsche Cayenne GTS. Specifically, those optioned with the six-speed manual transmission.
A late 2000s SUV might sound like a strange choice, seeing as how most collectors don’t really give a damn about cars that aren’t low-slung, low-production, sporty, analog machines. But the truth is, the manual Cayenne GTS ticks a majority of those boxes, plus, it’s a Porsche, which means there’s no shortage of people obsessed with the brand who have enough money to blow on an oddball SUV to add to their collection.
Weirdly, though, despite the rarity of these stick-shift, V8-powered SUVs, they haven’t exploded in value like I expected they would. Used examples have certainly climbed in price since they bottomed out a few years back, but no manual first-gen Cayenne has broken the six-figure barrier at auction … not yet, anyway.
Any Day Now
I predict it’s only a matter of time before that happens. To understand why, all you have to do is look at recent market trends. If you were anywhere near car internet back in December, you’ll remember that a V6-powered Cayenne—a later 958-generation car with no sporting intentions—sold for a whopping $125,000 on Cars & Bids.
As my colleague Thomas pointed out in the wake of that sale, a base Cayenne selling for over six figures—more than any manual GTS has sold for at public auction—is sort of strange. Before that sale occurred, most similar examples sold in the $30,000 to $40,000 range. The most expensive GTS the market has seen is this grey example with 30,000 miles, which sold on Bring a Trailer for $91,000 back in 2021. Usually, examples with reasonable mileage never crack the $70,000 barrier. A Cayenne S Transsyberia with a six-speed, of which only three exist, sold for $70,500 back in 2023.
Some will say that Cars & Bids’ sale was a fluke, but I think it points to where the market is eventually heading. As younger people get richer, the taste in the collector market shifts. While the manual Cayenne probably wasn’t on anyone’s bedroom wall, it’s still weird and interesting enough to be aspirational. And the people who were growing up when it was new certainly understand that, and want it for themselves. The GTS model, in particular, checks a couple of boxes that few cars can: It’s an SUV with three pedals, which is rare enough on its own. But it also has a 405-horsepower V8, which makes it exciting. Porsche’s decision to restore one through its factory “Sonderwunsch” program last year is proof that these things have staying power.
The final piece of the puzzle is, of course, rarity. I’ve asked Porsche about manual GTS production numbers in the past, and it couldn’t give me a definitive answer. But the number is somewhere between 134 and around 300 examples, depending on who you ask. That means these things are incredibly hard to come by. And because many of them were used as daily driver workhorses, finding one with low miles is especially difficult. I suspect it’s only a matter of time before a minty, ultra-low-mile example appears on Bring a Trailer and breaks all the records.
A Collector Car You Or I Could Own
If you don’t care about mileage, a manual Cayenne GTS could be a unique way to break into the collector Porsche market at a reasonable price. Because of their rarity, these trucks only occasionally pop up for sale—you’d be hard-pressed to find more than two or three for sale in the U.S. at any given time. While examples with low miles usually only appear at fancy dealers or auction sites these days, high-mile versions still pop up on Facebook and Craigslist from time to time.
The car you see here is one such example. I found it this morning while browsing Facebook, showing over 217,000 miles on the odometer. With an asking price of just $18,957, it’s far cheaper than any of the other results I’ve mentioned so far, and even comes in the car’s GTS Red launch color.
This GTS isn’t perfect, of course. All those miles mean there’s a bunch of stuff that needs replacing, including the windshield, the center support bearing, and the driver’s side fender (due to rust, according to the seller). It also has a check engine light and needs some suspension work, going by the listing.
At this mileage, it probably won’t gain much value as time goes on, but still, for a car I believe won’t lose any value, it’s a solid buy. And because the miles are already so high, you don’t have to worry about adding any more. For a daily driver you can actually use to haul cargo or people, you can’t do much better than something with a manual and a V8.
I think I’m right here, but maybe I’m totally off. If I were a rich Porsche collector, I’d definitely have one of these in my airport hangar. What do you think? Will the Cayenne GTS be the next hottest thing at this year’s PCA club meetup? Or is there something else that’s taking off in value that I’m not aware of? Let me know in the comments.
Top graphic image: Facebook
There’s a dealer selling one here in Switzerland with 145k miles for under 18 grand US. Of course, you have to pay Swiss fuel prices, Swiss labor, Swiss insurance, pass roadworthiness inspections every few years, and then try to fit it on European roads.
Absolutely love my manual GTS. I scored it from a gated neighborhood family who had never heard of BaT and only ever taken it to the dealership for service, with ~85k miles. I just rolled over 103k miles the other day. I’ve been very happy with both the driving experience and the practicality. The rear seats can fold flat which leaves you with a frankly comical amount of enclosed storage space, and having a 2″ trailer hitch is a hoot. I’ve towed boats and full size U-Haul trailers without any issue, I think towing capacity is north of 7k pounds. Hauling my mountain bikes to and from the mountains is a blast in an SUV that handles like a 911. The adjustable air suspension is surprisingly useful. I lower it down for the on-road journeys, but lift it up for the light off-roading I end up doing to get to some trail heads. It’s on summer performance tires, so think more forest service roads than actual off-road trails, but it’s still nice to have the extra clearance. I’m not sure I will be singing the same tune when I inevitably have to replace 4 absurdly priced air shocks, but it’s nice for now.
As far as maintenance, it’s still a German car – so there are some seemingly random dings and lights that come and go. The car actually beeps at you and illuminates a warning light when you hit 50 miles of fuel range. It’s the same beep and warning that would accompany a much more expensive problem – so guaranteed jump scares every road trip. The only real maintenance I’ve had to do is a new battery – which was both expensive (Close to $300 for an AGM in the size I needed), and relatively difficult to replace. Cayenne batteries are located underneath the drivers seat, which requires triple-square sockets to swing up and out of the way. One of my headlight lenses has clouded, I tried an at home polishing kit – which helped – but I’m planning to just replace the whole lens. I also sprung for one of Porsche’s PCCM+ units, which added just the right amount of tech.
Anyway, I love the car. +1 to buying one with miles so you can enjoy it – provided you have the money to pay someone to work on it or the tools/patience to work on it yourself. It’s honestly a shame these are so rare, it’s a truly fun SUV – but not one that should warrant an entry price of over 40k.
Sounds like you use the air suspension to its fullest but have you considered switching to coilovers if they eventually wear out?
Worked in the testing department of Porsche for quite a while. We had a manual Cayenne as one of the calibration vehicles of our wind tunnel. only one I’ve ever seen.
These things are so cool and a manual GTS is the absolute sweet spot.
The first gen Cayenne was famously overengineered (this one going strong at 200k+ is good evidence). They don’t get the credit they deserve, but I suspect that’s coming, as you predict.
These can also have their infotainment retrofitted to the PCCM+, a more modern, dedicated upgrade from Porsche. I made the switch on my 997 and it’s well worth it. You keep all the good stuff about an older car, but gain a clean and modern, factory looking CarPlay install
I’d buy that one right now if I could…
Unless I’m wrong from when I was looking into Cayenne’s for a friend one time, don’t the V8s have issues with bore scoring, particularly in cold climates?
We so live in the worst timeline. Fast SUVs are the most pointless thing ever set loose on the road.
I’d rather have a Toureg if I needed an overcomplex German SUV-thing. Same basic thing, cooler engine options, better looking by far, IMHO, and lots cheaper. No Porsche Tax.
But I would infinitely prefer the right Range Rover to either of them. They are actually comfortable.
I could see them raising in value just like anything else. But I can’t see them staying there. Could be a massive bump for a few years. 1st gen Cayenne has been underappreciated for a while but people have realized they were something special.
Maybe some if the nicest around is in a room or auction with enough people with deep enough pockets that really want it. Like any auction it will go for way more then it should. But more likey then not they will come crashing back down once this renewed appreciation wears off.
The Porsche guys are more or less 911 guys lusting after or being rich enough to have speedsters ,Carreras, and 918s. They might have bought a Cayenne for a daily or one for their wife but collecting them long term unless they just have one they are keeping around I don’t see it.
The collector truck market is just like that. Its a lot more trendy then other collector car markets. People were paying $150k for a patina build that would have laughed at the concept a decade prior. While the restomod truck they bought for $120k the decade prior would maybe sell for $20k – $30k.
I agree that they are collectible. I have enjoyed the idea since new. I wonder if an S4 Avant with a manual is the less painful albeit more common alternative
Had to do a quick search myself and came across this beauty. Love that color of interior.
https://www.cars.com/vehicledetail/3871b46f-79a6-40cc-ae56-2c3ac56ef40a/
Too bad it has a branded title, accident, and 114k miles. The crappy subwoofer also raises some concerns. But if you could get one with a clean title, fewer miles, and an extended warranty for $5-$10K more, that might be a sweet deal.
Nice find and Brakes: Approximately 5060% life remaining is amazing 🙂
The temptation, if I were wealthy enough to afford it, would be to get one of these, and then work with a competent fabricator and body shop to chop it into a single-cab, short box sport pickup truck. Put a roll-bar in the back with some smiley-face K.C. Daylighters, really make the Porsche purists angry, you know? I’d actually rather see a Cayenne Turbo turned into a baja/trophy truck, something to make Raptor owners raise an eyebrow, but with a GTS, the low-slung street truck would fit better. I bet that’s actually pretty fun to drive with the manual, Porsche transmissions, at least the few I’ve ever rowed, are really, really good.
Yes! You could call it the “PorTruck”
“Pork” for short, and paint it up like the 917/20 “Pink Pig” from back in the day!
I could only wish to be wealthy enough to find that unicorn vehicle from history that I can drive year-round and keep in near-mind condition.
But picking something relatively pedestrian suggests that you’re looking for that specific car.
It’s both a flex, and a slight against what the automakers are making now.
I can appreciate that.
To be fair, when you factor in the buyers premium of 4.5% that Cars and Bids charges, THIS ONE did in fact sell for 6-fiugres. And when the majority of clean manual GTS Cayennes with over 100k miles are in the 30’s, while automatics are barely half that, I’d argue the explosion in values absolutely has started already.
That gap in pricing is similar for SMG BMWs of that era, as well as F1 equipped Ferraris.
I wonder if a conversion is as “easy” as it is in those cars for the Cayenne? I’m guessing not. SMG and F1 are manuals, chuck the robot out and you have your conversion. Automatic Cayennes were always torque converters which probably complicates things…
I think a manual Cayenne is an odd choice for a collector car. To me, collector cars are fun because practically need not be a consideration. The appeal of a manual Cayenne is that you can have 80% of the fun of a 911 in a body style that is comfortable and family-friendly.
I could see wealthy car enthusiasts paying big money for one of these to use as a daily driver, though. No one bats an eye at a rich guy driving the kids to school in a G-Wagon or Range Rover – some of these people are presumably car enthusiasts who are willing to spend the same money to get a nice manual Cayenne instead.
I agree, but I think this is true for all collector cars. Why would a manual be worth more to a collector if they aren’t going to drive it?
But yeah, specially with the 955 cayenne, the whole point of the car is that it’s extremely utilitarian but is also decent on a back road.
I think currently the people buying manual Cayennes are exclusively wealthy people that must have a manual and don’t really care what they pay for it.
You lost me at SUV.
I live near a Porsche, RR, Audi dealership and as a kid, that probably would have been cool to see. Today it will be SUV, SUV, SUV, SUV…
I once saw a yellow gts parked on the curb in midtown Manhattan. The tag read “6speed” As I was staring at it the guy came out and got in. It made the most awesome exhaust note. He lowered the windows enough for me to yell sweet manual gts. He gave me the thumbs up revved it a couple of times, popped the clutch, chirped the tires and took off up the street. Probably the best experience I’ve ever had with a porsche driver.
The last time I saw the 217k example for sale was in 2015 with 125k miles and an asking price of $23k. It’s also a PDCC example, which only about a 1/3 of the manuals have.
I test drove a manual GTS over a decade ago and came away astonished at how “truck” like the transmission felt. It shifted more like my Toyota Van than it did my BMW. Luckily Numeric may have fixed that now with a short shifter kit (I have yet to install it in the manual VR6 I eventually purchased as I couldn’t stomach the GTS w/ PDCC prices).
There are supposedly 342 manual GTS for USA+Canada plus the additional 3 manual Trannsyberias. I’ve collected 313 of the manual GTS VINs, but someone out there supposedly has them all.
That’s the other thing. People simp over manual-transmission cars that just aren’t very good. I once drove a lightly-used 2012-era BMW 535i M Sport 6MT. The manual felt like it belonged in something much less expensive. I was appalled. The ZF 8-speed was a much better experience…or at least it was in the 2016 example of the same I ended up owning.
Some other cars I’ve driven with MT-setups that were sorely lacking, or noticeably worse than the AT versions of the same:
I don’t think any variant of the 957 or 958 Cayenne (including a 6MT GTS) would be regarded as particularly cool or collectible if the Porsche sports cars weren’t valued into the stratosphere and inaccessible to most people. Sure, they’re excellent cars…but a manual transmission isn’t worth that much to the experience, and a helluva lot of them have just fallen prey to negligent owners.
I think there are a lot of people who just want to experience the Porsche badge however they can, or are told they should…and this is the most affordable way to do so right now. And it’s not that affordable, in the case of your subject ad. $20K for a careworn example with 217K miles is a special kind of luxury to be able to pay, for a car that will be materially less functional and less dependable than most newer cars and that most people won’t notice or care about.
Even in the ad, the seller’s only justifications for the price are that a) an example of the same car with very low mileage went for almost $100K last month, and b) the production numbers were low. The seller doesn’t say a whole lot about the maintenance and doesn’t present the car especially well.
I have a problem with the Porsche culture in general. Porsche aficionados glom onto some long-discontinued Porsche product, decide it’s the best thing ever, and then everybody participates in a seemingly coordinated effort to heap the highest praise upon that car until its value doubles. Then, it takes off and you have people smugly paying tens of thousands of dollars for a Porsche that–however remarkable it is or isn’t–they’re never going to actually drive to within an inch of its capabilities. They just want to own it. They want to be seen in it. And–most importantly–they want to be able to sell it to the next chap for more than they paid. Rinse and repeat. Twenty yeas from now, they’ll be telling us the Porsche Taycans are THE! BEST! THING! EVER! and trying to tell us we should pay 60% of their as-new-MSRP…you know, the same Taycans that the dealers currently can’t give away and that have sullied Porsche’s heretofore-unassailable high resale values.
And then, on top of that, there’s the shenanigans that are going on with the newer limited-edition cars and trading them back and forth at astronomical rates to keep the values propped high.
So, yeah, the whole Porsche culture is kind of toxic and dysfunctional. To use a Family Guy quote, “it insists upon itself.”
That’s why I’m more fond of British and Swedish cars. No one driving an older Jaguar or a Volvo ever took themself that seriously.
There are a lot of Porsche people that are rather full of themselves. Or compare everything back against some random 911. For me: it gets old, and those people are far too serious for my liking.
And you’re right, the guy who driving a well-kept Volvo240 is probably going to think that an XJS V12 is a brilliant idea (though, not that they’d wish ownership upon themselves) and would likely happily keep you company if you were to complain about why your car is marking its territory everywhere it goes.
“And then, on top of that, there’s the shenanigans that are going on with the newer limited-edition cars and trading them back and forth at astronomical rates to keep the values propped high.”
Gave you an up-vote just for that very insightful link you provided.
Yeah I’ve been suspicious of many ads I see where crazy prices are being asked for relatively un-special vehicles… like old VW Type 2 vans or on vehicles like the Porsche 912 or any of the earlier, but still relatively common Porsches these days.
I had a 2009 GTS 6-speed manual until 2017, and it was terrible. Pros: It was stupidly fast. Really, scary fast. The seats were great, as all Porsches are. Neighbors knew when the car was started because the startup sounds were awesome.
Cons: It was very thirsty. I think the MPG was regularly in the teens. There was an error condition in the braking system that was aggravated by hot days, and the dealer could never resolve it. The seatback panel of the driver’s seat became unglued. Large, low profile tires and large disc brakes, plus the MPG, meant running costs were high. But even on its best day, the GTS wasn’t great. It was never meant to be a manual transmission, so the ergonomics are bad. For this person in an otherwise valid seating position, the shifter was a little too far aft to be comfortable. It meant a constantly scrunched shoulder to shift gears. The car is pretty beefy on the outside, but inside it is pretty intimate. The cargo area was small. The entertainment system from that era was clunky, and it would start in whatever mode it wanted (radio, BT, CD, etc.) regardless of how you last left it. I may be recollecting incorrectly, but I think it was missing some key comfort features found on its contemporaries such as rear seat climate controls, parking sensors or rear camera. It was too thirsty and wheelbase too short to be an excellent tow vehicle. Vehicle battery was under the driver’s seat.
The GTS was really fast, the 6-speed was a genuine novelty, but together it was not a great package.
Your experience aligns with my perception of these things without ever having driven one. I did have a co-worker that went through two of them, and I got to ride in one a few times, and it seemed surprisingly small inside compared to my CX-9.
The gas milage was also about what I was expecting, and for a daily driver in 2026 that’s just unacceptable to me, in fact it was unacceptable to me in 2006.
They are neat oddities, but I’ll never aspire to own one, and will happily continue to ignore them going forward. The Taycan on the other hand…..
So apart from ergonomics (fair point), your complaints are running costs (to be expected, it’s a V8 Porsche) and packaging (common to all other Cayennes).
I’ll take that for the driving experience. Who else offers/offered something like this?
Sounds like it did mostly did its job as a Grand Touring Sport vehicle. Just lose the manual. For similar money, I think a turbo model would be a hoot.
You are dead on regarding the running costs, specifically the fuel economy. I don’t share your complaint regarding the shifting ergonomics, but when I’ve had to load something oddly sized in the back (meaning the driver seat was shifted further forward than I usually leave it), the cockpit started to feel very cramped. So I can 100% see how that would be a major sticking point.
And you’re right regarding creature comforts. Mine doesn’t have parking sensors or a backup camera – though I think at least a back up camera was an option for Cayennes of this vintage. Honestly, I think dealer’s specced Manual Cayennes to be ‘enthusiast’ builds, meaning all the sporting options and nothing else. Mine has the Bose sound system and the PDCC (both of which I am very grateful for), but doesn’t have any other option boxes checked.
It’s also probably not the best for interior room. My girlfriend has a ’21 XC90, and it’s roughly the same size as the Cayenne, but has a comfortable third row (and gets 25 MPG). I’ve been able to comfortably fit 4 adults + a weekend worth of gear and luggage in mine, which is the most I’ll need to do in the foreseeable future. The driving experience, at least to me, is an absolute hoot and is well worth the running costs and old Cayenne quirks but YMMV.