Am I just too big a cheapskate to seriously mess around in the old car hobby?
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| Yeah, you're not going to find me here. |
I'm thinking that the answer is probably, "Yes!"
A couple of weeks ago I passed a dealership displaying classic 1960's cars.
American Motors and Classics. It was housed in a Toyota dealer's previous used car center
Today I happened to be in the area and decided to stop and take a look. Maybe I would see something that would get me excited.
From the sidewalk these looked like really nice cars, obviously restored. There were a number of cars parked outside in the lot, as well as others in the showroom.
The car that initially caught my eye was a '69 Chevelle two door hardtop. It wasn't an SS model but it was in great shape, probably a combination of being an excellent original car, as well as being restored at some time. No bucket seats or console, just the split bench, but the upholstery looked new. The paint, chrome, and vinyl top were perfect, but not quite 53,000 dollars worth!
Out back there was a carport and that held one of the more intriguing models, a '57 Cadillac El Dorado Brougham. This was a limited production, American built, super deluxe four door hardtop, with a stainless steel top. It looked pretty good and had a recent respray, although my trained eye could see a few defects. These are truly rare cars, almost never seen outside of a museum, this was going for the princely sum of 105,000 dollars!
In the mix there were more impressive cars of different ages and price levels, 40's, 50's and 60's multiples of thousands of dollars in pricing.
This level of pricing of course surprised and outraged me at first, but then the shock passed.
On the AACA website there is a forum labeled, "Cars for sale, not mine."
Members post interesting cars that they find listed for sale from various sites. We then give our reactions and opinions on said vehicles.
Something that I have noticed is that the other members are more accepting of much higher prices than I am. I also noted that they will comment on how much time and expense will be necessary to properly restore them. If that was ever a consideration for me! I look to see if the car can be cleaned up and squared away enough to look presentable. I have no desire or intention of ever restoring any car.
I'm also surprised when many of the commentors say that they are not very knowledgeable mechanically and they wouldn't be doing any of the work on the car, themselves! In my mind, if I don't work on the car myself, I'm only going to spend big bucks for a new car. I'm certainly not going to throw my money at mechanics to work on my old car.
This all goes to show me just how different I am from many of the club members. But am I being realistic?
I started out working on old cars because that was all I could afford. Then as I could buy a new car for the family I got an old car as a plaything. Something to fool around with.
However their viewpoint has a lot of validity and is based on their experience. Anyone who has ever just fixed up a car knows that it costs money. But those that have fully restored a car know even more how much that costs. My '96 Mustang cost me 2,800 to buy, but I've spent around 5,000 dollars to keep it in good condition. But It's not restored, no new paint, or interior, just a new convertible top.
If I had even a low buck paint job and some new upholstery, figure at least another 2-3,000 bucks. That would add up to a ten thousand dollar '96 Mustang!
I know that rebuilding, restoring and repainting costs are high, that's why it's usually cheaper to buy someone else's already restored car.
Just off the top of my head, throwing out some made up numbers. ( These are probably on the low side.)
Engine and transmission rebuild 5-10k
Bodywork and paint , excepting major panel replacements, rust and collision damage repair. 15-30k
Exterior trim and stainless, glass and weather stripping. 5k
Interior trim and upholstery, 15-20k
Chassis rebuilding; brakes, steering, suspension, exhaust, and tires, 5-15k
This is all added onto the cost of the basic acquisition of the car. 5-25k
That adds up to a low of 50,000 to a high of 105,000!
Looking at this way, it's almost like you are buying that fifty - sixty thousand dollar car just for the restoration costs! Or less. And you have the advantage of seeing how well all that work came together!
These club members also know that if you want something nice, if that is really is important to you, then you just have to pay the price. Even if you do a lot of the work yourself and act as the general contractor for the work that you farm out, it's still going to cost.
Even I became aware of that when I started adding up the projected costs of improving my '70 Mustang beyond what I had done to it. Besides an engine/tranny swap and chassis updating, it would need just about everything else done -"properly" to make it nice. Or consider my '89 XJS. I often joke that it's a 3,500 dollar car that needs 10,000 dollars worth of work to be worth 7,500 dollars. The Mustang wasn't worth the investment, it was just a six cylinder salvage coupe. The Jag, is something a bit more special. So, maybe.
I went inside and spoke to the salesman, a friendly gent exactly my age. As aging Baby Boomers we had many of the same car crushes in our youthful years. Now we are running down the years on our personal calender's and we are wondering "when?" We told ourselves that we were going to have a cool, special car someday. We've even worked over the years to fulfill that desire. The guys that have already made it happen aren't going to be standing inside that show room.
Well here they are, take a look around, I'm sure that you'll find something that you would like to have. The prices aren't chicken feed, but then, we aren't spring chickens ourselves anymore! A complete restoration can take up to 5 - 10 years with a shop handling it. An owner directed job can take the same or longer. Have we got that much time in our lives left to waste? Probably not.
Okay here's a partial list of cars and prices, mostly the ones that appeal to me.
'63 Corvette convertible 62,500
66 Plymouth w Hemi ( not really my thing) 99,000
'56 Chev 210 2 door sedan 59,000
'36 Ford Phaeton (four door roadster) 49,500
'69 Jaguar XKE convertible, gulp! 189,500
'57 Ford Thunderbird 39,900
'51 Cadillac series 62 convertible, 33,000 original miles original condition car, 97,500
I remarked to the salesman that there hadn't been a dealership like this, selling vintage cars that were really nice for over twenty years. The last one was in the neighboring town of Campbell.
I think that the salesman has a pretty easy job; show the customer the cars, find the one that he has a connection with, talk with them about the car, the past, what it means to them, light the fire. Let them know what the financing options are.
I think that the average customer would need to make a couple of return trips, to stoke the fire. Eventually bringing the Wife down if he was really getting serious. House values in our area, have grown so much over the last couple of years that a home equity loan could be easily swung. What's 50 or 60 grand when your house has appreciated 200-300 thousand dollars or more in just a couple of years.? There will be plenty of value left for the kids when you're gone. This being Silicon Valley, there might be guys that could just plop the bucks down, though I don't see many of these cars appealing to a high tech type of guy. I see them as appealing to someone like me, from my background, who would give up buying a regular new car to get one of these instead.
Why not, there are only so many Summers left.
I would have to compare these cars to a used '21 Mustang GT convertible that I saw on a car lot last week. It had only 32,000 miles on it and the asking price was 41,000 dollars. It was almost exactly like the one that I rented this Summer.
This is something that I would be willing to spend my money on, and it's still quite a bit less that those cars that I saw today were going for!
The Mustang is an almost new car, like my Flex, it only has 30,000 miles on it. It's a 100%, any time, useful car. Those old classics will lead a restricted life of careful and occasional use. Which makes sense, I suppose.
I spend a lot of time thinking about cars, while it has clarified my thoughts, it hasn't revealed any new truths.
First of all, I'm really not a restoration guy. I don't mind working on an old car, but I don't want to spend ten years on a project.
Second, I'm not an "emotional tie" kind of guy. I don't have any emotional attachment to a car out of my past or to some car that I used to dream about when I was a youngster.
So where does that leave me? Hard to say.
But there is an upside in my situation. I discussed the subject of this post with my Wife. She is currently agreeable to me buying a new car that I really want.
This occurs with the frequency of a solar eclipse, so this bears giving the idea some serious thought!
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