FBIII

Maybe just maybe the car isn't worth that much. I'd be surprised if it surpassed 20K. The car has a lot of interest in the 928 community but unfortunately its a small community.

Airflite40

I'm really curious as to what it will sell for too.

I've seen MINT OB 928's, I'm not talking about Kermit mint, but really clean nice cars sell for around 8-9000.

This is arguably the most famous 928, between this car and the Holbert car I cant think of any other one that I know of

Shark Attack

You didnt offend me. I am one of few on this board that is not trying to sell something or make money on p-guys. I am here for the cars and the hobby. This gives me the flexability to say (with respect) pretty much what I want with out the worry of someone not buying something from me becasue I offended them.

Sometimes things do not come out in type as they do in person. I stand by the car has been represented badly. I did not say he was a liar. I feel he HAS NOT mis-represented the car. I feel he has done a poor job building the fluff of the car and getting the most out of it possible. I think his mistakes were first grade ebay. So he is not a salesman. He should have asked for help. I think he should bag the auction, sit on the car another year and start over with it. If I had 10K laying around I would go bid and honestly, I feel I woudl be stealing it at that, But I do not.

when I pointed out the door jam I stated "lighting maybe" thus trying to say he didnt really take care in his choice of pictures. Talking about, if you want a million you better look like a million. This guy is used to critics.. Im sure I didnt hurt his feelings.. I think I hurt yours more than his...... Sorry.. Some people play hard to get, I play hard to want... Its a baaaaad thing.

Shark Attack

I think it is worth every penny of it appraisd value... maybe he is not in the position, but i think he should take no less

FBIII

Its worth what someone is willing to pay and this auction will show exatly that. An appraisal in this case is as valid as your guess or mine. You can appraise accurately something that has many equal comparisons. What are you going to compare this car to? Is it as valuable say as the Goldfinger DB5? I think not. I hope this auction runs to completion so we can see what it does fetch.

JP Rodkey

It proves the interior photo in post #7 is not the interior of the car for sale. Nothing more, nothing less - just a clarification.

Dennis Wilson

I wouldn't use any sale on EBay to value the worth of a car. First of all it is an auction, wholesale at best and secondly it just reflects what someone would pay as adjusted for not being able to physically inspect, listen or test drive the vehicle. Excellence and Panorama magazines, NADA and the appraisal are all better sources for determining the true retail value of a vehicle.

Personally, I would like to buy this vehicle on the cheap but as an owner I believe all of our 928's are undervalued and EBay is the primary culprit.

Dennis

MGW-Fla

It will be interesting to see what happens towards the end of the auction. Might show how many of us 928 purists there are who'd want this car that have some spare $$$ laying around. I know if I did, had the time/ability to have it restored, & somewhere to put it, I'd buy it in a heartbeat. Why not? A chance to not only own one of the most famous of our beloved 928s, but also to ensure that it was restored to its former glory.

Mentioned this story to the wife again last night in passing at dinner, even she said the same thing. What 928 purist wouldnt want it? Or want to see it restored and out there for all of us to enjoy, or enjoy knowing its being well taken care of. Lets hope that its not bought by someone who takes it to the Middle East like the auto RB car, never to be seen or heard of again. I say kudos to him for his time, effort and expense tracking it down & now making it available to those that truly place value on these great cars. Just think if it was still owned by the guy in Kalifornia who knew nothing of its historic past? No telling what would of happened to it and we'd never know of it either.

Of course, the ideal would be for him to clean it up, etc. to maximize his return. Obviously, he's at a financial point where he needs to recoup his expenses. As though he's cutting his losses or simply does not have any more money or time to put into the car. I doubt if he has that much love for the RB 928s that he'd spend a year of his life searching for them that he'd be getting rid of it so soon if he was able to keep it. Hope theres a feeding frenzy on ebay & he gets a good price for it. Would be right for him to see some return on his efforts.

Podguy

Have to disagree here. I always get a better deal on cars and parts from the local newspaper and Craigslist than eBay.
Although now that Craigslist has been discovered prices are closer to the market.

Market forces are such that the larger the market the fairer the price. You cannot get a deal on IBM stock. The market tells everyone what it is worth at any moment. Yet again and again people pick up collectables at garage sales far under their real value. Even the seller of the RB car is bragging on how the former owner did not know the car's history.

The magic and miracle of eBay is to take ones person's junk and turns it into aother person's treasure. Trade and markets do this and eBay is an extremely effective place to determine value.

But then few have read and understand Adam Smith.

Dan the Pod Guy

bronto

I have, and do. In fact you both have valid points, but the question not being asked so far is "where is the true market price best determined?". So far only two alternatives have been proposed, and both have deficiencies. Both of the alternatives proposed so far suffer from at least the same issue - a lack of perfect information. This is one of the basic assumptions of a properly functioning market, and the main reason "reality" frequently doesn't match pure economic theory.

On eBay, most frequently the buyer lacks perfect information. All but the most naive buyers are aware of this and bid accordingly. Dennis correctly points out that eBay sales frequently include a "risk premium" because the buyer is fully aware that he is bidding for a car he may not have seen, driven or inspected. But there are also some "buyers" who lack even more information - that it's even available for the short period of time an item is available. This results in less bidding competition than other national markets. Interestingly enough, the seller also lacks perfect information on eBay. Beyond the RB situation where a seller may not know the potential value of what he's selling (which can happen anywhere), he really has no idea how many potential buyers are considering bidding on the item. There might be some eBay tools that I don't know about that will tell a seller how many members are "watching" the item, but even if there are he cannot distinguish between casual watchers vs. genuine potential bidders. There's not much he could do with that information anyway - unless the auction fails, when he might be able to use that info for the next auction. Either way, eBay is far from a perfect market because of these issues. Sometimes it will result in a "deal" for the buyer, sometimes for the seller, and of course sometimes it will happen to yield a good value for both... but even a broken clock is correct twice a day. But ultimately, while sides lack perfect information, the most serious lack is on the buyers part. As in any market, the participants who manage this risk best come out the best. The buyer that knows more about the item than the other will either either 1) avoid overpaying or 2) outbid the less knowledgeable participants, being more comfortable with the risks taken but bidding less than if no risks were taken at all. The net result is a lower than "full market" price.

With local advertising (including craigslist) both sides also lack perfect information. A buyer is much better informed of the item itself; they can usually see, drive and get inspected. Other "potential buyers" suffer from a similar information deficiency as above, except instead of being "time span" based it's location based. There might be a perfect buyer in San Francisco for a car in Miami, but he doesn't know it's for sale. The seller however, in one sense lacks information too; if he's in Miami he may not know about the San Francisco buyer, but even more acutely he is fully knows exactly how many people in his market are interested in his car. They have to contact him directly. He can judge their intent when they do so. If he's had a car on the market for 6 months and have not gotten any serious interest, he knows he's got to make a deal if he wants to sell. If he's had it for sale for a week and there's a frenzy, he might set up his own bidding scenario and end up getting far more than he thought. Since we're talking Craigslist, the former will be more likely then the latter. It's free, it's local, and usually those sellers just want to move stuff. It's the seller in this circumstance who lacks to most information (i.e., all the people outside his locale who might want it more than a local) so it shouldn't be surprising that a buyer can get good deals on things off of craigslist. The problem will be for the buyer to find what he wants locally, or finding local advertisements in non-local markets and then dealing with a seller who expected to sell an item locally.

As I alluded to at the beginning, the real question is where a "real" market price can best be found. Wherever it will be is where both the buyer and seller have the best information. National exposure, long sales availability, easy access for product inspection. Not sure where that would be, but I'd suggest an ad in Hemmings Motor News, maybe cars.com, maybe the live classic car auctions that do the exposure for you with plenty of lead time. Anything other than that, a well informed buyer who manages their risks well can get a deal. I'd say eBay will be somewhat lower than full market value, and craigslist being a bit lower than that. But a buyer is more likely to actually find what they want on eBay because of the size of the market if they set up their searches right.

(yes, I taught economics for a couple of years)

FBIII

Dan I couldn't agree with you more. "The magic and miracle of eBay is to take ones person's junk and turns it into aother person's treasure. Trade and markets do this and eBay is an extremely effective place to determine value."
Over 4000 people have viewed the RB porsche and I'm anxious to see where the chips land. What other venue could create that kind of visibility as quickly and as cheaply?
Dennis's feeling that excellence or panorama would be better at evaluations, good god no. That would be like asking a real estate person if they thought we were in a bear real estate market.

uzzi8865

i think the rb 928 should be taken to barret jackson.
when i attended last years event,several cars were
hyped up and did real well.i remember a tribute elvis
cadillac and the last production sting ray selling for
huge bucks.
barret would be a great place to see what the cars worth.

Podguy

But that is the beauty of eBay. Elvis's Mercedes 600 sold to a merchanizer of star's cars for $100K. A week later it was back up there for a cool million. No one bid. The merchanizer had to do some marketing and often part of marketing is exposure.

Without the marketing of the movie the RB car is worth as a 79 about $1200. Remember it does not run very well and has been repainted several times. I am only valuing it at $1200 because it is a five speed and the price on the older cars is up. Otherwise it is pretty much a parts car. i could have bought number 57 for under $3000 and to me that was too much. So the RB car last I saw was commanding an $8000 premium. That sounds pretty high to me.

As far as markets and perfect knowledge it never exists. It is a Marxist concept and we have the greatest social experiment in the world to see how that worked out. All transactions carry a risk premium. This is particularly true for a used car. There is no perfect used car or perfect guarantee. Even the purchase of IBM, one of the best known companies in the world with huge liquidity, entails a risk premium. Otherwise there would be no stock market and we would all purchase our investments at Sears.

A retailer with accumulated good will like 928 International will from time to time be able to command a premium over market price due to reputation, stability, service and even prestiage, but for this premium there is a cost of being in business, maintaining an inventory and building a client base. Yet the market prevails and Roger is able to under cut 928 International's prices but not steal their entire market. Roger is selling identical parts, but he does not have the client base or quite the level of service Mark and Jim provide.

Here we have a car in less than perfect condition may or may not have been the one seen in the movie. It is one out of four. Other than the documentary there is no certificates or even Cruise's signature. Karen Carpenters Jag sold on eBay a while back for chump change. Steve Speilberg's 928 with the ET sticker on the mirror went for little money. Even a perfect condition S4 with all leather owned by Tom Selick failed to return a premium. If you want a star's car my convertible once belonged to Kevin Duckworth and I paid nothing extra for that great privledge.

Dan the Pod Guy

MGW-Fla

I agree with most of what you say Dan, good stuff. But comparing Karen Carpenter's Jag to a car that helped create more PR for the 928 than most any other is not the same to me. I personally never saw the movie Risky Biz until a couple of years ago, after I already owned two 928s. But how many people have I read on here have stated that their love for the 928 is a direct results of that particular movie? That after seeing the movie as a teenager that they always wanted one. Or how many have commented that when they were out & about in their 928 that others have asked them was that the same kind of car that was in the movie Risky Biz? Why multiple rennlisters have tags on their 928s alluding to the name Risky Biz or UBoat.

Big difference in my opinion. I don't recall hearing or reading that anyone connects Jags to Karen Carpenter or 928s to either Speilburg or Selleck. Haven't seen anyone with a tag on their 928 referencing ET, or a Jag tag referencing a Carpenter song either. Now if it was a 928 personally owned by Cruise or Ferrari owned by Selleck of the same model he made famous in his tv show, then yes. That would cause a multiplied premium I think. And I think this guy has proven enough documentation that its one of the cars that was in the movie. Certainly the museum & Excellence magazine believes his documentation enough to vouch for it. Saying that "maybe" it is one of the RB 928s is the bigger stretch to me. Having Cruise sign it would be great I agree, but that alone wouldnt confirm it was one of the RB cars. Heck, anyone could have a star sign their car if they had the chance. Now if Cruise signed it and wrote that it was a car from the RB movie, then yes, that could add to the premium greatly for sure.

bronto

That's funny Enumerating the basic assumptions underlying any science is basic science 101, and part of any econ textbook I've seen. There are others too, but you probably would call those Marxist too

Just because markets don't have perfect info doesn't mean they don't work, but it does mean they work better the more perfect the information is.