Just ignore the idiots and don't reply, it really upsets them.
You've paid for the advert so don't let the idiots win.

Ditto. Don't feed trolls and don't worry about their twisted opinions. Your car deserves to achieve a good price and there's a serious buyer out there who'll recognise that. Put it up as a classified ad and hold out for a good price - you've got nothing to lose by being patient.

I wouldn't let the clowns get you down Dave, like you say "why do they bother"! We didn't get the reserve we wanted on Ebay but the Ad led to some nice interest from the continent and very similarly to micky1mo we've just waved her off to a french classic car dealer from Dumont just outside Paris for more than the reserve on Ebay, which is nice! Im sure at some point the right person will be in touch for a deal your both happy with! Cheers

Just been looking at the results from the Goodwood Revival auction that is posted on MSN at the moment. Many hand crafted cars amongst them and hardly any sold for less than £200k ! Your car might only have humble origins but so has the DNA 250 California which is listed on ebay at the moment for £99,991 !!

As the general opinion tends to be Dave ...hang in there ... The car is worth the money ...
The market is buoyant ..people are making money on classic recreations ... exactly why I have changed my approach ...tired of working hard to save people money and being shafted in the process ... I haven't seen your car in the flesh but a very similar example sold for far more at Auction ..as you know ...so look at alternative marketing , maybe ? but don't fold and allow somebody else to profit from your hard work ...

In any market, there are a limited number of people prepared to pay the top prices, that is how auctions work. It may be that recent sales have satiated the market. Unless there are other pressing reasons, why not wait until spring and go again?

Prices may be levelling a bit ..there may be something in that ... The Admiral's Ferrari ...a gorgeous little car well documented on the internet just sold at Auction for a little over 5 million ...it just about hit reserve ...I thought it would make twice that ...

I still think Dave's car is worth more ...only other Miglia for sale at moment is 15k ..recently sold one 17k ... I'd be disappointed if he didn't get 12k +

I just spent the weekend at Goodwood Revival. I can assure you that there was no shortage of people with huge wealth and money to burn.

Obviously those bidding on the multi-million pound cars at the prestige auction are only going to be the wealthiest of the lot, but an awful lot of the mid-range classics in the £30k - £100k bracket on the dealer stands had 'sold' stickers in the windscreens by Friday afternoon.

Also check out the prices of 'starter' classics like Spitfires and Midgets. A year ago a nice example of either would set you back around £2,500 but you need about double that today for anything even half decent, while outstanding cars are selling for £10k+. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/MG-Midget...53.m1438.l2649

I guess the problem is that if you're either:

1/ capable of building one of these specials yourself for four to five thousand, you may lose sight of the value you add with your time and skills and only be thinking of the car in terms of the cost of the parts rather than the emotional impact it has on others, or;

2/ unable to see past the 'man built it in a shed so it can't be any good' mentality, you may not be able to see the desirability of something that looks like it's worth millions but could be yours for less than the price of a new Kia Sportage.

The reality for me advertising my Spyder for £24k last year was that there were at least five serious buyers making offers around that price and it sold for very close to the asking price within two weeks. The buyer was given a money back guarantee - return the car in the same condition within one month of taking delivery and I'd give him his money back with no strings attached - but he chose to keep the car and it now lives in a collection worth tens of millions of pounds. A fitting place for a car that turns heads the way it does, despite its humble origins.

And on an even more potentially controversial note, I do find that people who don't have the funds to buy one of these cars for what it's really worth arguing about the 'overpriced' nature of them is rather like the third-class passengers on the Titanic arguing about where the toffs should be sitting in the lifeboats.

Discuss...

Sounds like we need another financial crash then if entry level classics have doubled in a year.

I think specialist cars will sell well when they find their special buyer. These cars are not mainstream, and not classics. They are specials. And every now and again the right buyer will be found.

I've worked in the oil & gas OEM supply chain for the last 10 years. I was involved in the building / fitting of bespoke pumping systems. You wouldn't believe the problems trying to recruit a good team of engineering fitters that were capable, qualified and had the inclination to do that sort of work. The days of apprenticeship trained lads in their 30's and 40's came to end about
5 - 10 years ago. I'm 52 myself and I feel I'm at the end of an era ! The upside is that my skills are a valuable commodity these days, they weren't until a few years ago, that goes for my car building hobby too. If you work your hours out for a build, even at a very modest £25 - 35 / hour there are plenty of people out there with the money to spend simply because they can't do it themselves or don't have the time or inclination.
For those ill informed people out there who think our cars are "just" kit cars I usually compare them to cars coming out of the nearby Morgan works. Every Morgan is hand built by a bunch of blokes in a few sheds under the Malvern Hills. They assembly and fettle the parts by hand into a completed, bespoke car. That will usually sway the argument !

Looks like i started an interesting discussion!

Thanks all for your feedback and kind words, i didn't mean to come across all emo, but it's been hectic back at work after the holidays and i (wrongly) assumed that by putting the car up on e-bay that wouldn't be another worry!
:doh:

I've now decided not to use e-bay to sell the car as while there are some great people looking on there, you're right in that it has more than it's fair share of opportunists and bargain seekers and while i expect a bit of wheel-kicking and bargaining, there was one guy in particular who got right up my nose! :boink:

Financially i'm in no rush to sell, so I could hold-off until next year, but TBH i've got loads of new projects that i want to get on with and it would be good to do them in the garage over the winter!

Your more than welcome to put your car on my web site.
www.sammiocars.com
It's not ideal but at least you'll get the right sort of people looking at it.:pop2:

He wasn’t based in Germany by any chance?

As there seems to be a couple of people over there with nothing better to do. :icon_twisted:

Jokes aside, I believe you were right to pull the ad and I hope you have better luck next time.

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Not sure if these guys do:

http://www.totalheadturners.com/

But it might be worth ringing them to see if they know anyone that does.

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These are all good points.

When I get my car looked at by a Triumph specialist, they charge over £90 an hour.

Which covers both their wages and overheads for premises, tools, etc.
( Note: I'm more than happy to pay this and think it provides value for money to me. )

This puts the £25k price Gary will charge for a ‘standard’ turnkey Formosa into context.

And remember that both the earlier Sammio & Migllia builds required more labour.

Dave – You have built more than one kit car and know what you are doing.
(Unlike me. :icon_wink:)

Your car has a lot of nice touches that take time and effort to do. :cool:

Those who want to put your efforts down or complain about the price need to get a life.

As I will keep going back to this guy’s reaction at seeing my car for the first time.

https://youtu.be/eLS-QQwL5ss

These cars are definitely worth more than the sum of their parts.

Cheers, Paul. :)

Even more so when you deduct approx £10,000 for decent donor , kit , wheels , tyres , parts etc. ... deduct a further £3000 + for a quality paintjob and factor in it takes about 3 months to build one fully from start to finish ...

Looking at some of the donor cars used, that will be 3 months of hard grafting too !

Dave one thing I've learnt there is always people out there that will drag down any good in life.

Don't sell your car for less than it's worth, as it's been said on this thread already hang in there and the right person who appreciates the car for what it is will be happy to pay a premium for what is a one off.

If you wait until the spring you may have a bit of competition as I am thinking of putting my spyder up for sale but have no intention of letting it go for peanuts.

Good luck matey and stay possitive.

that one dealer from germany, mentioned above, has sold a few cars at the beginning, but now the market has realized how much those cars cost in reality.

nearly all new owners popped-up somewhere in a car forum (mostly the triumph ones), complaining how they had been ripped-off....that the car was sold to them far too expensive, they had to invest lots of money to bring it in a kind of reliable state, that the historic registration is questionable etc.

thats not a good way in dealing with those type of cars, nor is it good for the brands sammio, miglia etc.... if a dealer makes profit...thats his way of live...but if a dealer is selling something expensive, than he also needs to deliver quality...

References please.