Mark M Chevelle at B-J

[Van B]

I see Mark M66's Chevelle sold for $68,200 at Barrett. Wonder if it met his expectations?

[coolwelder62]

WOW!! that seems a little on the low side.That car is smokin cool.

[wiedemab]

He posed over on Lat-G that he gave it away, so I don't think it met expectations.

That is pretty low in my opinion, for that car

[MarkM66]

Yeah, it wasn't good.

But I didn't loose my azz nearly as bad as a lot are. RPM Firebired only went to 100k, and it's about as good as it gets. There was a '63 Impala that was top notch, had 300k invested, sold for around 130k. He had more in his engine, then I had in my whole car. Ouch.

I met a couple people from these sites. So that's cool.

They're all way, way down. Live and learn.

Not sure what's the cause. To many cars for the auction, to many customs/pro-touring, economy, whatever .

[ProdigyCustoms]

The RPM car is as good as it gets, but again it is the Firebird syndrome. Camaro's as always are bringing great money, they seem to start at $55K for really mild cars. As for $300K cars, they never bring the money back.

Sorry the Chevelle did not do what you wanted but you got it appraised and sold it. And the money in the bank will be nice 45 days from now.

[Van B]

The RPM car is as good as it gets, but again it is the Firebird syndrome. Camaro's as always are bringing great money, they seem to start at $55K for really mild cars. As for $300K cars, they never bring the money back.

Sorry the Chevelle did not do what you wanted but you got it appraised and sold it. And the money in the bank will be nice 45 days from now.

45 days is just excessive. Buyers funds are cleared in 10 days max, give another four to make it an even two weeks just to make sure.

Doesn't the registration process for a bidder badge involve qualifying the buyer with some sort of bank letter of credit? Part of being able to collect the big fees also should involve taking some risk of bad checks and having to collect from non paying buyers.

Won't see me consigning anything to them.

[DarkBuddha]

Bummer. I know there are exceptions, but it seems the old generalization about not expecting a profit from the work put into building an older car continues to hold true.

[ProdigyCustoms]

Weather the buyer pays or not, BJ pays. It was 43 days for us last year

[parsonsj]

Yeah, I watched it go across the block, and I'm sorry it was so disappointing. I guess the only good news is that it is sold. No waiting around for buyers and dealing with tire-kickers for months.

I had another buddy with a red 69 Chevelle SS 396 who was also a little disappointed ($57k). He'd been trying to find a buyer for the car for years (literally). Now he, too, gets to move on.

jp

[Van B]

Weather the buyer pays or not, BJ pays. It was 43 days for us last year

Just too long for my taste to be without your car, title, or money...

[Steve1968LS2]

It would be fun to do but I just don't think I have the guts to put my '68 on the block.

[tellyv]

The last vehicle I sold at mecum I left that night with a check in hand! The whole b.j. thing just does'nt trip my trigger. I think the big money is gone for awhile time to dig in and hope for the best.

[camcojb]

The last vehicle I sold at mecum I left that night with a check in hand! The whole b.j. thing just does'nt trip my trigger. I think the big money is gone for awhile time to dig in and hope for the best.
yeah, same thing at Mecum when Charley sold my 64 Chevelle; had his money that evening after it went over the block.

Jody

[vintageracer]

It's the old "Fat and 55 Plus" thing again.

Watch the show and see that's who are the real buyers at BJ. Think about it. The "Fat & 55 Plus" crowd has had a good run for the last 10 years. Rest assured that for most of these guys the cars they buy are not their first rodeo in the car hobby. They are on the down side of their BIG interest in cars and have certainly built their "dream" car by now and KNOW what it costs to build a car. Most of these guys did not get "Fat, 55 Plus and affluent" by paying too much so why not BUY a great car at half price.

Just think, after we get over next 5-10 year run of European cars being the stars at BJ and other auctions all the buyer's will then be GAGA over Foxbody Mustangs, IROC Camaro's and Japanese muscle.

There's that age thing again. What's goes around comes around!

[kochevy67]

BJ in my opinion has destroyed the collector car hobby as far as the auction goes. They seem to be a bunch of con artists, I went to Mecum and at least there you get to put a reserve on your car. That in my opinion allows you to have piece of mind in case it doesn't hit the reserve.

[vintageracer]

BJ in my opinion has destroyed the collector car hobby as far as the auction goes. That in my opinion allows you to have piece of mind in case it doesn't hit the reserve.


That "Reserve Price" peace of mind that the consingnor ejoys may be the ultimtate downfall of many of these auctions when their sell rate goes to nothing!

Drew at Russo, Dana at Mecom and many other auction companies cannot survive on entry fee's alone. They MUST sell cars and collect sales fee's and buyer's fee's to survive and pay the bills. Why do you think they work over the seller SO HARD to lower or drop their reserve when the car is on the block?

As the market changes so must the seller's expectations. Don't be surprised if you try to consign your car at an "All Reserve" auction and be turned down do to your unrealisitc opinion of your cars value. This IS the big problem facing all reserve auctions. Unrealistic reserves values mean low auction sales numbers. Low auction sales numbers means less attendance and interest in the auction. Less interest and attention in the auction means not enough money to sustain the auction and ultimately no auction!

All the "reserve" auctions already play BIGTIME games with the "number of cars sold" numbers by doing things like including No Reserve cars in the numbers and anything else they can do to bump up the cars sold numbers. The high end collector car auction busines is a tough business to be in and an expensive event to conduct. They must show a high sales percentage whether they have one or not to entice future consignors to want to bring their car to that particular auction. After all what is the goal of a consignor? To SELL their car for the most money!!!! We all know that value of cars can be greatly effected by where they are located. Let's face it. Car's at the Mecom auction in Iowa do not bring as much money as the cars at his Monterey auction or premier event at Indianapolis. If that were not true why do so many consignors spend so much money to haul their crap to Scottsdale in Janaury? The carrot is nice weather, more buyers and MO Money!

If you would have attended BJ for the last 20 years you can see the HUGE changes in the auction and the crowd. BJ Scottsdale is now an event not just a collector car auction as it was 20 years ago. Maybe time will build the other BJ auctions into a local events that must be attended by everyone not just those into cars. I hardly that see that happening in Orange County and Vegas. Way to many other things to do that are way more important. Maybe the Palm Beach Florida BJ auction has a chance?

As the big gun in the collector car auction business BJ has a great business plan. Sell em all at No Reserve. Seller gets a guaranteed sale at some price and BJ get 10% buyers and 10% sellers fee and keeps the money for 45 days. BJ promotes their business as a "Brand" through TV and media advertising and get lot's of business to pay BJ for the privalege of being at the event and make millians of dollars on the side as a "Lifestyle Event". That my friends is an absolutely BRILLIANT business plan!

Time's are going to be a changin in the collectior car auction business!

[ProdigyCustoms]

BJ does not MAKE anyone run their car at their auction. In fact many are turned away. You know what your doing when you sign up, they make it clear. In fact when you turn over the title, they will tell you congratulations, you just sold your car.

One thing you won't get at BJ is a shill bidder running the car up close to what the seller wants for it, where at reserve auctions shill bidding is common practice. There is always a wisper of if the bid is "real money" at reserve auctions, where at a no reserve, you shill bid and you might buy your stuff back. And if BJ finds out, you might not be invited back! Personally as the buyer, I much prefer a no reserve auction as I KNOW I am bidding against real money.

I am by no means knocking Mecum we hit it out of the park here last year at Mecum Orlando, and I also got (what many might say) my ass handed to me at BJ, but I knew what I signed up for when I registered.

As John mentioned, the guy we knew that sold his car there for $57K has asked $125K, $100K, $90K, $80K, for 3 years, no hits. He finally got it appraised and sold it yesterday. I have not talked to him but I am certain he is disappointed, but he was prepared for $50K, so he made $7K extra as far as I am concerned.

Bottom line is you can ask what you want for your car. You can feel your car is worth whatever you want. But at the end of the day it is worth what someone will pay for it, and BJ can bring the a lot of possible buyers in to appraise it.

BJ is for people that want to sell their car, not people that want to have it for sale.

[kochevy67]

While I agree with a lot of points both of you made I always feel that the average Joe has no chance of making a purchase. You definitely bring up a good point about the shill bidding, I have witnessed that numerous times. I due still have some concerns that our hobby or obsession has turned into a business by BJ which I guess makes sense from a financial standpoint on their part.

Both of your guys posts brought up some valuable points that I never thought of.

I was pondering the thought of going to BJ in January or Goodguys in Novmber, I am still up in the air but maybe BJ will be the trip.

[MarkM66]

The RPM car is as good as it gets, but again it is the Firebird syndrome. Camaro's as always are bringing great money, they seem to start at $55K for really mild cars. As for $300K cars, they never bring the money back.

Sorry the Chevelle did not do what you wanted but you got it appraised and sold it. And the money in the bank will be nice 45 days from now.

If my car was appraised, that's news to me. I wasn't pre paid anything.

[ProdigyCustoms]

Appraised I mean what it brought it what it was worth on that day. The best appraisel one cen get is a no reserve auction with live bidders.

I hoped $125K for Emptynest, some expected $250K, it only brought $85K, then only $65K the second time around but I understand it was not represented well at Scottsdale. Regardless, I got it appraised.

[Lenie]

Yeah, it wasn't good.

But I didn't loose my azz nearly as bad as a lot are. RPM Firebired only went to 100k, and it's about as good as it gets. There was a '63 Impala that was top notch, had 300k invested, sold for around 130k. He had more in his engine, then I had in my whole car. Ouch.

I met a couple people from these sites. So that's cool.

They're all way, way down. Live and learn.

Not sure what's the cause. To many cars for the auction, to many customs/pro-touring, economy, whatever .

It seems not very many builders get out what they've invested but in the case of the RPM Firebird build $110,000 is nothing to shake a stick at imo regardless of the make/model. Deserved more, could've been less, but regardless not bad in today's market. To the credit of RPM, you see alot of overdone cars that are done very tacky and stick out like a sore thumb, but this one, the closer you got, the more you admired it.
Mark, really liked you're car especially the way you finished things off under the hood, sorry to hear you didn't get what you were looking for, it seems to be a crap shoot on any given day depending on who's in the market for a car w/a pocket full of cash wanting your car w/a competing bidder(s). Again, nice build.

[vintageracer]

I was pondering the thought of going to BJ in January or Goodguys in Novmber, I am still up in the air but maybe BJ will be the trip.

Go to Barrett Jackson in January and enjoy yourself. While you are there you can also go to Russo, Silver, R&M and other auctions. Spend the week and have a great time.

You can go to a Goodguys event 15 times a year now. About all that changes is the location.

Enjoy Scottsdale in January you will not be dissapointed!!!!