Jaguar E-Type (Series 1)
Why 4.0: The XK straight-six is smooth enough for a fast Sunday cruise and the rack-and-pinion steering was genuinely advanced for 1961 — Enzo Ferrari's 'most beautiful car ever made' line still gets repeated because it's true. It's also the most numerous survivor on this shelf next to four true unicorns, which keeps values a notch below the seven-figure exotics and keeps a few more of them actually on the road.
Layout
Natural habitat
Ride comfort
Sound
The XK straight-six on triple SU carburettors makes a hard, hollow note with genuine induction hiss underneath it. But 5,500 rpm arrives early and Jaguar silenced it for a grand tourer, so it stops well short of the great high-revving sixes further up this list.
6-cylinder · naturally aspirated · 5,500 rpm redline · rated 7.7 / 10 for engine sound
Market value
Median asking price, good condition · €5k (1961) → €161k (2026), trending up · illustrative data
Child seats · ISOFIX
Built before ISOFIX existed, so there are no anchor points at all. A child seat here is a seatbelt installation in the only passenger seat there is.
Derived from production years and seating layout, not a per-car source. ISOFIX was standardised as ISO 13216 in 1997, required on new EU model types from 2011 and on all new EU cars from 2014.
The long version
Series 1 production ran to roughly 15,000 cars before the federally-mandated Series 2 changes arrived, which makes the E-Type the closest thing to an obtainable classic on this list — good coupes still trade for real-world money, not just auction-house money. That relative abundance shapes ownership: alongside the concours trailer queens sits a genuine population of clubs, tours, and owners who use the XK six the way Jaguar intended, at least a few thousand miles a year. The roadster in particular has never fallen out of fashion, so unlike some of its shelf-mates it never needed a market rediscovery — the money simply never really left. It still spends more weekends under a car cover than on a B-road, but less than most of what's parked next to it here.