How do you price your modified stang when selling it?
 

Do you all take somewhere around blue book, depending on condition, regardless of mods, or do you add on money to the sale price for every mod you have made?

I guess it all boils down to how fast you want to sell the car, waiting for the right buyer, etc...

Just curious for other opinions.

I had my car advertised for $6000.00, which I thought was a reasonably fair price. I agreed to sell it to some 19 year old kid on the phone. He is driving to Georgia from Indiana with his buddy in a rental car, and wants the car so bad he is practically overflowing with enthusiasm.

After I agreed to let him have it for $5800 on the phone, he mentions that he was surprised I only wanted $6000.00 for it considering the mods I have done. He said he saw similar cars for $10,000.

I was thinking that you will never be able to sell a modified car for the money you have in it, and priced mine around dealer retail price, which is usually $1500.00 more than a private owner can expect to get in a sale.

I guess the 19 year old kid who wants to buy it isnt aware that if you pay KBB you are paying too much, and you can easily pay private party prices even to the dealer, and the dealer would still make a more than fair profit, as they typically low ball the trade in value.

So in this kids mind, my car is worth full dealer reatail of aproxiamtely $6000.00, plus $4000.00 for the mods I have in it, and he might have paid me $10,000 for the car, and still felt happy with the deal.

I on the other hand belive in selling cars fairly....I guess thats my problem, im too honest?

Then again, if I priced it higher, would I have had any interest in the car?

Did I just screw myself out of $4000.00?

Could I have got $10,000 if I waited for a long time until the right person came along, or would people laugh at my asking price and move on?

I think you priced it right to be ACTUALLY able to sell it. I see people do that all the time, and when you've modified a car it usually means these things (not necessarily, but there is a MUCH higher chance):
1. That it has likely been abused more than a stock vehicle
2. There may be problems associated with the modifications
3. there's no telling how well it was modified (procedures, quality of install and parts) and if things will blow up after short usage.
4. the person knew enough to modify the car, so they know enough to cover up any flaws that will show up down the road.
5. There is a lower demand in the general car market for a modified vehicle because of stated reasons.

You can sell anything at any price, you just have to find someone that will be willing to pay that price for it.

For your Mach 1, since it was modified i'd say 6,000 was a very good price for a modified car because a Stock original version of your car would probably go for 10,000 just because it isn't as molested and changed (for good or worse).

.....i always laugh when i see lifted Chevy 4x4 truck owners asking 10,000 for any 80's or earlier truck....when you take garbage and jack it up 3 feet, it just means it'll topple farther.

Well, I dont have a Mach 1. I have a 93 GT.

You make some good points, but my car doesnt fall into any of them. The car wasnt abused and everything was done right.

To some people, its worth a lot more than $6K, and to others , it would be worth more like $4500.00

I think i did ok getting $6 for it, but after talking to this kid, was wondering if I sold it too cheap and stangs were going for a lot more?

Chris, how in the hell were you supposed to know that the one, true 19 year old Barney addict was going to be the quack that replied to your ad. They say there is always someone dumb enough out there to do whatever it is you want them to do. It's just your luck that he's the one that called first.

Be happy to sell it for $6k, and just forget about it. I sold my 69 SS Chevelle for $4500 in 1986, and I hate myself for it. If you think about it too much, it will create more stress than it's worth. For every nice, expensive hot rod out there, there's 40 more that were unfinished projects, and end up being a bargain parts bonanza for the buyer. Don't dwell, sell.

Take care,
~Chris

a guy at work wants 5,000 for a slightly modded gt, a lot of new part's but mostly stock, go figure, its a 90 model. it's a nice car, but.:rolleyes: :D :D :D :D

Fair Market Price = Whatever someone will pay you for it.

Remeber that when selling anything the price someone will be determines it's value. You could have $1 million invested into the car and if the most anyone will offer you is $10,000, that;s what's worth. Of course the door swings both ways, you can in vest $100 on a good detail job and get an extra $1000.

I'm sorry to hear you say that, Cam

;)

Take care,
~Chris

Thanks Chris, and everybody else. I know these things already, I guess Im getting cold feet at selling her and feeling really bad about it.

I have a lot of money, blood, sweat and tears into the car, and Im struggling with letting some kid buy it , who god only knows how he'll treat it? I guess I would struggle letting anybody else buy it as well....

But if hes crazy enough to drive hear from Indianapolis and pay cash, buy a stang with 4.10 gears and drive it back home, without seeing the car in person first....Im not sure if hes car crazy or stupid? He 19...cant be to smart.

Don't dwell, sell. Don't dwell, sell. Don't dwell, sell. Don't dwell, sell. Don't dwell, sell. Don't dwell, sell. Don't dwell, sell. Don't dwell, sell. Don't dwell, sell. Don't dwell, sell. Don't dwell, sell.Don't dwell, sell................

Ok, Im just going to have to keep telling myself that...

Ahhhhhhh...somebody shoot me....please....before the kid gets hear...

Well hell, I tried. Looks like the stang is going to be your nursery.

Man, thats a little harsh.

Buy another mustang project with that 6K and you'll forget all about that car.
I would be thinking..."Build bigger and faster" right about now.
That's going to be my attitude when I get around to rebuilding my 351w for my '82

.... .... .... :o .... Laugh it up Mac boy :D

Its gone.....no more smoking the tires, no more listening to the cammed 302......no more cruising the strip...

A moment of silence please..............

Don't i know that feeling !!
Sold a 66 Sunbeam Tiger for $1300 ... i pulled it out to the edge of the street to await the guy bringing a trailer to take it home, and no less than 3 people saw it and stopped begging me to sell it to them at 3 times that much :(
but then again i drove that car for probably 7 years and sold it for $300 more than i bought it for :D
Don't look back ... you got a fair price and in the process you made a kid supremely happy
The reality is many times $10,000 worth of engine will get you $2,000 on the price of the car and a $100 detail will get you $2,000 on the car !!

Here was how my sale went...
Add up the cost of the car.
Add up the cost of all the mods including any labor.
Add those 2 figures together and divide by 2.
Settle for somewhere around half of that figure.
Kick yourself in the butt over and over and over, day after day after day!

yeah, i'll miss the car, but its time to move on.

I guess I did ok, after all, I got what I was asking, well, real close anyway, and I think my asking price was reasonable. the car did have some dings and could use a coat of paint....

I might have taught the kid a lesson also...that you cant expect full return on performance parts.

He showed up with two other buddies in a ricer mobile of all things, with a huge sticker on the side...at least one of them has good taste...

For some reason i got you confused with 6T9Pony (i believe that's who sold their car....if it was even a mach 1).....i'm going senile.

I wasn't talking about your car specifically whether it was modified correctly or not, or if it had any flaws. I was talking about any modified car in general. I've seen alot of people overprice their "modified" cars and they've ended up keeping them in most cases. I think you did well on the sale of your car...
now on to bigger and better things, you will always have the memories of that car.

wow.

****. I didn't think I'd feel this affected by you selling it, Chris, but I am actually bordering on depressed just thinking about it. You and I did A LOT of arguing over her. We had some good discussions, too. That little baby was one of the very first rides I tred to become familiar with back in the "old days".

I'm sorry about the nursery comment. That was a little low. I was just trying to help, but I should have thought that one out longer.

Chris, your life will always be richer because of the lessons learned, and the benefits reaped, with that car. Try and dwell on that instead. I know I'm going to have to.

Take care,
~Chris

LOL!

ugg
 

Thats a tough question...
If I were to sell my car NOW there is NO WAY IN HELL I would get out of it what I have in it...

I bought it bout 4 years ago for about $14,500. ( I think but I'm not sure) Since then I have put another $11,000 into it.... MYSELF....I'd prolly strip it to stock, keep the parts. SOMEONE might pay for it as is w/ mods, but unless they are into the showey thing , I highly doubt it.
Unless they are into the car thing and can appreciate what you have, your fighting a losing battle.
Which leads to the next question.......
MY FRIGIN' INS. WENT UP TO $140/MONTH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (almost $900/6mos)
And I'm not even insured under Classic/Show car Ins. Just full coverage......ughhhhhhhhhhhhh. If I ever wreck my car, I'm screwed. Question: for Ins....(not to change the subject) but considering what Ive done to my car, should I take pics and submit it to my ins. company?Would they jack my ins. up EVEN MORE????? What a '94 Verte GT goes for now is prolly a third of what I have in it now, OR LESS. The only reason I changed to my present ins. people is cuz they handle my homeowners, and I got a MASSIVE BREAK on my h/o ins. BUT $140/mos is just way to high! AND MY RECORD IS CLEAR(for now)
Court next month!:rolleyes: SO, if ya'll got any input on this.....I just have a REALLY hard time writing a check for $140 a month for full coverage on ONE VEHICLE!!!!!!!!! (this just happened last month)

BTW: Chris...love that avater.....TOO CUTE...how is she??????????

Re: ugg
 

Hmmm...I'm willing to bet you have Allstate insurance.

:(
 

Nationwide Insurance.....
:mad:
grrr.
TNT :rolleyes:

Yeah, I was gonna throw a rude comment back at ya, but I knew you didnt mean it that way. I guess since you dont own a mustang, or any car that I know of that you have invested so much into recently, it is harder to understand and appreciate the loss at hand. I guess it would be like losing one of your cats...not as bad I suppose, but I think you understand me. I guess part of my problem is that I always told myself, over and over, that I would never sell her...but, things change, and it happened. Anyway, Ill miss her, but Im not going to lose sleep over it...

You have a good point there, and I was thinking the same thing. Tearing that car apart and putting her back together again many times, and studying what made her tick is what gave me my knowledge of modern fuel injected engines. And knowledge is a powerful tool...and I will alway have the memories of our times together, the good and the bad..

later

Re: ugg
 

Keep that in mind the next time you want to throw money at her, unless you can afford to throw money around. Its definately a losing proposition.

Automobiles depricate enough on their own.....dumping money into them, as fun as it is for all of us, is not a wise financial move.

BTW, I had Nationwide insurance in the past, and they were terrible. Very high rates and will drop you in a Nanosecond...

Oh yes, I understand. In fact, that's one of the reasons I'm "inbetween" project vehicles right now. I don't have the "extra" money it will take to build it to my specifications.

My 69 SS, 77 T/A, & 72 Pinto had a lot of me in them, but my Buick had the most. By the time she was retired, she was no longer a Buick, she was a Bower.

Take care,
~Chris

Mach 1:

Jumping in here a little late, but it sounds like you're moving on now which is good.

In regards to your comment about throwing money at a car that is already depreciated/ing - I can understand that to a point. However, my 91 LX is a good example of a S L O W project that I've had in mind for years now. It will eventually have a 331 cu in. motor (done that), Tremec tranny (done that), ProCharger D-1SC (future), 31 spline axles w/5lug Bear brakes, rebuilt rear, Bogart racing wheels, etc (all future). It just takes time. The nice thing is that I'm doing the project in stages that allow me to still 'enjoy' the car. Plus, like most any car from the early 90's it's been paid for for quite sometime now. Insurance isn't really an issue either as I'm 27, married, house, kid, multi-car discounts..etc. The real issue is just the garage space. I get one side and my wife gets the other which leaves my daily driver out in the cold (oh well!).

It's a moot point now, but why did you decide to sell it? I'm really curious after all the hard work and money that you had in it.

And, since I'm asking all kinds on questions today, are there plans to purchase another project vehicle?

Take it easy,
E

Ugh, I'm gonna be in the same situation soon... I have to sell my 88 notch as soon as I find the title, which got lost somewhere between Texas and PA.

Hey Topless, you think $130 a month for insurance is bad? Try $430 a month!!! That's what it's costing me for the Cobra!!:eek:

pull off every aftermarket part u can, sell em separate and sell the car near stock.


Skyler

When I bought the car and started modifying It, I was single, and it was a hobby. A few years later, and Im married and have a 1 year old daughter. I have a second vehicle, but my wife wouldnt drive the stang, so If I had to drive out of town(which I will be doing next year for school for several months, and weekend trips back home) I would have to take the mustang on the road trip and leave her the other car.

As much as I loved my mustang, with 4.10's and non lock up AOD, and 15 mpg, it wasnt the ideal highway cruiser. So i bought a third car, and was considereing keeping all of them, but with vehicle taxes in GA(sucks, you have to pay property tax on your vehicles every year) and insurance on three cars, wife that doesnt work, etc....one of the cars had to go, and it was the stang.

In addition to those things, I started to lose interest in the car for several reasons. After the car is built the way you want it, they become boring, because building them and working on them is the fun part. When your project is complete, and you left with an unpractical car, you start to reconsider.

I couldnt enjoy driving the car fast (there is a cop on every corner in the town I live in), I was tired of every punk with flowmasters revving their engine at me, and I was tired of filling it with gas every 5 days.
Then it had a water leak that was frustrating me, and was stalling occasionally, and I just didnt have the desire to play with it anymore. I also had very limited free time to play with it.

All in all, it just wasnt the best car for a person in my situation, so I figured it best to sell it .

And, no, there are no plans to purchase another project vehicle. I have had many cars over the years that I have modified and enjoyed playing with, and it ends up the same way every time. The more you modify them, the less reliable they become, and you lose a ton of money in this hobby, so Im going to try to not start on another car.

Interesting note on that subject: I had considered selling my stang a couple times over the last couple years, but always told myself that I am addicted to the car hobby, and If I sold it I would eventually start on another car when the bug hit again, and therefore I would never sell the stang, and save myself the expense of starting over. Yeah right..well I did, and well see what happens from here...

that is great advice to anyone in this situation, and I did that to some degree on my car, but I was very limited in what I could pull, as most of the stock parts were gone.

I did pull my aluminum driveshaft, underdrive pulleys, fluidampr dampner, tachometer, speakers, and some other odds and ends, but my basic combination was running well and I didnt want to nor could I go back to stock. I would have had to tear the rear end down , and my stock heads and intake were long gone, stock wheels were long gone, transmission was modified to far to make it worthwhile to go back to stock, etc....

I've had a couple people offer to buy my Mustang over the years. Even receiving a note once on my window with a name, phone number, and offer wanting to buy it. I've turned down $25K flat before for it.

Some enthusiasts will pay decent money for a highly modified car done right. As, to someone knowledgable, they know the amount of money and time that went into doing it and that it is cheaper (and easier) to buy a car like some of ours that is already done rather than doing it themselves.

The comment left previously is very true... What it is worth is what someone is willing to pay for it. Getting a better price for the money and work you have into your modified vehicle is all about finding the right person to buy it.

Mach 1:

Sounds like it was a good decision for you and your family. ;)

You know, it's interesting: I've tossed around the idea of selling my coupe for a new Cobra and then maybe just 'tweaking' it a little. Not much, just maybe an aftermarket shifter....but then maybe a set of gears would be nice, and exhaust really opens up the HP on these bad boys...of course I would probably have to get a set of drag radials for it too...maybe smaller pulley for the supercharger....ahhh it never ends. My wife is right, I can't leave well enough alone. :)

Even though you've sold the Mustang, I hope you continue to contribute to the site as I've enjoyed reading many of your knowledgable posts as I'm sure many other have as well.

E

Thanks man. Yeah, I'll try to continue to contribute, as this is the best site out there with the best people :)