The Final Countdown: June 7 at the Petersen
Five days. That is what separates Los Angeles’s collector car community from one of the most concentrated moments of auction intelligence the city will see all year. The Petersen Automotive Museum’s Collectors’ Summit 2026 convenes Sunday, June 7 in Beverly Hills, bringing together the six dominant voices of the North American collector car auction world for an intimate, panel-format conversation on market direction, vehicle preservation, and the evolving collector base.
The Six-House Lineup
The panel roster reads like a who’s-who of the collector car transaction ecosystem:
- Barrett-Jackson — The Scottsdale-anchored house that defines the blue-chip American muscle and resto-mod market
- RM Sotheby’s — The institutional benchmark for European marque sales and concours-quality rarities
- Gooding & Company / Christie’s — The Pebble Beach standard-bearer, now carrying Christie’s institutional weight
- Broad Arrow Auctions — The specialist house leading the charge in provenance-heavy, investment-grade consignments
- Mecum Auctions — The volume leader whose sell-through rates function as a real-time market health signal
- Cars & Bids — The digital-native disruptor whose modern-era results track the collector demographic shift in real time
The range is intentional. From six-figure post-war European exotica to five-figure 1990s Japanese imports, the panel collectively covers every tier of the collector market — which means the conversation will surface both consensus signals and fault lines between segments.
What the Market Needs to Hear Right Now
The first half of 2026 has been instructive for collector car values. The spring auction season delivered strong results at the top of the market — particularly in European marques with documented competition history — while mid-market American muscle showed some softening against 2024 benchmarks. The question that will define the second half of the year: is the bifurcation between investment-grade consignments and enthusiast-grade vehicles widening, or is the mid-market finding a new floor?
Six auction house principals sitting in the same room on that question is a rare thing. The Summit format — intimate, moderated, with audience participation — tends to produce more candid readings than the polished language of pre-sale press releases.
Morning Format: Reception, Panel, Vault Access
The Summit runs as a morning event. Guests arrive to an elegant reception with curated breakfast and complimentary mimosas before the panel begins. General Museum Admission and Vault Access are included — the Vault being the Petersen’s subterranean holding space for the rarest vehicles in the collection, not typically accessible to day visitors. For collectors who use Beverly Hills Loan as part of their liquidity planning, an hour in the Vault alongside six auction house principals is the kind of compound value a morning rarely delivers.
Logistics for June 7
The Petersen Automotive Museum is located at 6060 Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90036. Tickets for the Collectors’ Summit 2026 are available through the Petersen’s website at petersen.org. Capacity is limited; the Summit is designed as an intimate gathering, not a mass-attendance event.
Beverly Hills Loan tracks the collector car event calendar across Southern California. If you hold a collector vehicle and are considering your options ahead of the second-half auction season, contact our team for a confidential asset consultation.