American 70s 911 "barn/stored" cars whats the deal?

[Du1point8]

I see a lot of these on a well known classic car sales site, all look reasonable and all been "stored" somewhere.

The prices are not too bad at 15-20k (excluding shipping). What am I missing?

Whats to stop me picking up a 15k model (assume rust free) and dumping 10k into it to recommission/rebuild the essentials?

Just to note, I dont care if it is LHD as it will likely end up in Europe anyway and not doing it to flip, this is just for a toy car for me to potter around in. I would make upgrades (aka the lights) over time to improve it but as its a keeper, Im not a 100% certain what Im missing?

Like this
https://www.carandclassic.co.uk/car/C878952

look at the dealers own site for more, they obviously do ok as the stock is not around long.

Another off their own site:
https://www.beverlyhillscarclub.com/1983-porsche-9...

[SRT Hellcat]

If something is cheap there is usually a good reason for it. Very unlikely to be rust free. Then before you know it you at £50K down and not £10k. The pre 73 911 are all pretty much £100K to restore nowadays with the price of the parts.

[CanAm]

Tellingly, the ad states "mechanically sound".

[Porsche911R]

SRT Hellcat said:

If something is cheap there is usually a good reason for it. Very unlikely to be rust free. Then before you know it you at £50K down and not £10k. The pre 73 911 are all pretty much £100K to restore nowadays with the price of the parts.

doubt you could do it for /£100k now

air box's are £5k carbs £5k, a light £1k, body work £20k if you are lucky, engine another £20k, prices of old parts are mental now as the cars fetch >£250k
Labour unless it's a personal project is 400 hours at £100 the £100k car if you are paying some one to do it is crazy and they cut corners.

My mates car is perfect he did it him self over 10 years, a lot of dealers say they could not make a car that good it would be to expensive to spend that time on it.

take a look at Paul stevens cars. nice cars but not that good vs a car which has had triple the hours put into it, it's the finer details and finishing let a lot of these cars down, classic at Silverstone was disappointing imo, the cars were not the best, a step up at Classics in the castle mind you.

put in the last 2 years parts have go up 4x+ and no chance of NOS parts unless you pay £1000's a part or as I said £5k or an air box lol

[Porsche911R]

SRT Hellcat said:

If something is cheap there is usually a good reason for it. .

not really, there are 1000's of LHD cars and they are in good nic, it's not a rare car.

UK cars at £50k for a box of rust are the issues, USA cars are ok and quite clean for £20k but see my above post on parts :-( and 3rd party prices for work.

[nxi20]

Du1point8 said:

I see a lot of these on a well known classic car sales site, all look reasonable and all been "stored" somewhere.

The prices are not too bad at 15-20k (excluding shipping). What am I missing?

Whats to stop me picking up a 15k model (assume rust free) and dumping 10k into it to recommission/rebuild the essentials?

Just to note, I dont care if it is LHD as it will likely end up in Europe anyway and not doing it to flip, this is just for a toy car for me to potter around in. I would make upgrades (aka the lights) over time to improve it but as its a keeper, Im not a 100% certain what Im missing?

Like this
https://www.carandclassic.co.uk/car/C878952

look at the dealers own site for more, they obviously do ok as the stock is not around long.

Another off their own site:
https://www.beverlyhillscarclub.com/1983-porsche-9...

If it was really this easy, more people would be doing it.

One big impediment to this sort of purchase is the distance; are you really going to fly over to LA & inspect the car pre-purchase? Even assuming that problem can be overcome, my take on these guys is that they do minimal prep & just knock them out pretty much as they come in. In the pics in the first link, you can see evidence of rot around the edges of the floor so it's a good bet the inner sills will have also rotted. Where does it end? Outer sills, kidney bowls, inner flitches, A-pillars, B-pillars, bottom of the front & rear screens, wings, rear bumper, valences - the list goes on. I think you could throw £10K at this car and it would still look rough. I bought a barn-find a few months ago (1978 3.0 SC) and all of the above & more were present but I knew that going in. The car looked great & easily passed the 5 yard test until you started really looking. The price reflected the amount of work / parts needed to bring it back to a good standard & it was considerably less than what this dealer is asking plus the car was a C16, with a good history & in the UK.

I'm fortunate in that I have access to a good s/h supply of the parts I need but some parts are unobtainable new, even as patterns so you will be scouring ebay etc. and it will be a long slow process to get it all up together again.

If you do go for it, I wish you the best of luck but go in with your eyes wide open; there's a reason these cars were consigned to a barn in the first place!

[hot66]

beverely hills car club .... do a search on them & the 'quality' of their cars !!! .... the one company that seems to crop up again & again when it comes to pre73 porsches

never buy from them without viewing 1st

Anyone got the link to that thread ref the 1967 car that was well writtne off incl roof cut off .. that appeared with BHCC months later , roof attached etc being sold as a 'find'

Edited by hot66 on Friday 15th September 11:00

[Du1point8]

Thanks... I do go in eyes wide open and it is a long term thing as I want to get a place with garage to tinker with something like this and rebuild.

No doubt I will end up being a master machinist and panel beater by the end of this.... All because I turned down a mint 964 for 10k 7 years ago and now I have the classic bug.

DAmn you 911s!!

[BertBert]

Definitely do your homework on BHCC! Not in a million years would I buy from them!