Wine can be an exciting alternative investment. Successful wine investing will have three well planned steps:
1. Wine buying,
2. Wine Storage, and
3. Wine Selling.
Buying Wine For Investment:
Buy only the best wines. This is not the time to try to find an up-and-coming winemaker and hope they get discovered. Of the tens of thousands of wines from all over the world, there are very few that an investor will consider. Probably all their names would fit on about half a page. Investment grade wines include: Chateau Latour, Domaine Romanee Conti, and Krug.
Buy the best years. Don't buy the best wine made in an off year - even if a critic gave it a great score. It will be forgotten. As time passes, the good years become remembered as average, and the very best years get promoted by auctioneers and other wine vendors. Recognize that the term "vintage of the century" is overused in order to sell wine upon its release, allowing you to safely avoid any years that are merely "excellent" or "classic". For example, since 1999 Bordeaux has had three "vintages of the century" (2000, 2005, and 2009). As a result, owners of 2003 Chateau Latour have some terrific 100 point wine, but the 98 point 2000 Chateau Latour will always sell for more.
Investment Grade Wine Storage:
Store your wine in a temperature and humidity controlled wine cellar, or professional wine storage. There is no substitute. Wine bottles in the back of the refrigerator will get something spilled on them in a few months. By the time you sell them they will look as if they had been stored in a garage. Similarly, storing wine in your naturally cool cellar only works until the next heat wave hits. For a year or two you may get lucky, but then you will have a string of unusually hot days (the kind that gets weathermen citing statistics about the last time it was this hot for this long) and the wine will seep through the corks, corrode the capsules and stain the labels. Don't skimp on storage. Proper wine storage requires the investor to buy a wine cellar or pay for professional storage.
Selling Investment Grade Wine:
Know the market for your wine. Bottles that sell for $100-$200 are best sold through an online auction house or on consignment. The fees for selling online are frequently cheaper than the fees for selling in a live auction. But if your wine costs $500-$1000 per bottle, then the live auction route is the way to go. Buyers of the world's most expensive wine trust established brick and mortar auction houses more than any internet venue.
Conclusion:
Be careful and pace yourself. There will be many great vintages in your lifetime, and there's no need to buy it all in one shot. Have patience when it is time to sell. Like all markets, the price movement of fine wine is rarely a linear rise. Big price jumps can occur after years of inactivity. Remember, time is on your side. As the years go by, demand grows for your wines as they mature, and the supply falls as other bottles are consumed.
About this Author
Article Copyright 2010, Benjamin Brandt
Benjamin Brandt has been a wine investor since 1998. To find out more about fine wine investing, including specific recommendations, visit his wine investment blog at The Wine Investor.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Benjamin_Brandt
