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I need resources that enable me to calculate ROI on art investment

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Mahmoud Al-Sharif

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Hi folks, I'm setting up a business that's focused on investing in art. I need your advice on tracking the historical value (up till date) for any specific piece of art. The purpose why I'm doing so is that I'm trying to figure out (mathematically) what's the value gain and return on investment (ROI) in Art, as opposed to other assets. I'd appreciate your help here. Thanks, Mahmoud

D Hillman

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Somewhere like Christie's auction house will have records for items they have sold and occasionally sell the same items multiple times (as collectors die and their collections are liquidated) Having said that individual pieces of art are likely prone to huge variance depending on trends and fashions. Don't forget either that unless you can buy extremely well much of the potential growth in the value of an asset may be eaten up by commissions and other costs incurred in the pursuit of buying and selling, not to forget storage and insurance costs while they are in your possession. Don't forget either that you will be subject to capital gains taxes which would not be applied if you bought a mechanical item like a watch. This situation is not unique to vintage watches. antique guns, classic cars and motorcycles, antique scientific instruments and some mechanical toys all qualify as wasting assets in the same way.

Sylvia Evans

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Mahmoud. I don’t really think this is the correct place for your query. This is an art discussion site , mainly about the actual painting off our own work. I you look at the gallery you will see paintings done by members , I suppose if you wanted to buy one of those...why not . But this really isn’t a commercial site .
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Alan Green

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There's really only an ROI if the investment increases in value, which is by no means guaranteed. So, it's off to the auction houses to look for repeated sales of individual paintings; your ROI is then something you can work out using a pocket calculator. Historical ROI is no guarantee of future ROI, so I wouldn't put too much faith in it

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by alang23

Alan Bickley

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Art as an investment (generally speaking) has to be long term, obvious really, we all know that. You won't get any information on past records from any of the auction houses, Bonham's, Christie's and the like won't give you the time of day, I know from experience. I used to do a fair bit of art buying and selling on a small scale some years ago, just occasionally these days to keep my interest alive. The only way that you can find out past auction prices, is by joining one of several organisations specialising in this field. The one that I subscribe to is Artprice. They have a huge database of all the major (and some lesser known) artists, and you can see which auction houses their work was sold in, plus the hammer price. Subscriptions vary depending on the amount of data you require. The same paintings do appear more than once but not often. Even so, art investment as a business requires a vast knowledge of the art world, plus huge capital that you can afford to sit on and wait for a return, if you are lucky!