Hi, my cousin lost her husband earlier this year and is looking to sell his restored 4.2 E type. I am a car guy myself but mostly Audi and Porsche so I don’t know all the ins and outs of these cars.
There are some people interested in purchasing it already but I want to make sure that she and their daughter get what its worth.
A couple questions:
What is a ballpark value of a car in this shape?
Where is the best place for his widow to sell it?
Some pics:
Looks like I can’t post more than one pic as a new member – here’s a link to a few more:
We’re unable to view your other photos without an account. Maybe drag them all to imgur.com to create a gallery and post the link. No account required there.
Thanks BillJag, the car is a few hours from me so its difficult to get all that but I will post the other pics I have. The site flagged this post as spam I think because I tried to post the pics individually.
The restoration was done somewhere in NY or PA a number of years ago and then right before he died, my cousin had it looked over and put back into running shape again at Benhass here in Cincinnati. There wasn’t anything wrong that he sent it there, he just hadn’t driven it for some time I think.
As for sale location, I’ve been thinking BAT would be the easiest and likely get the best price. It’s all about the pics and the listing for those so I’d want to spend some time with the car and do all the pics/videos as well. I’ve sold cars on that kind of site in the past as well.
It looks decent. Is it a runner? How much documentation exists on the restoration? Is there anyone nearby skilled enough with classic British cars who could do a pre-sale inspection?
I would strongly suggest a Bring a Trailer auction with a reasonable reserve. You don’t have enough information about it, or Jags in general to be able to negotiate a decent private sale price.
I think, but am not certain that they also offer a service where for an extra fee, they’ll sent out people to photograph it and do a driving video. If not they can probably refer you to people who do this. There was a Jag auction a couple years ago in the northeast owned by a widow, and she wasn’t really involved at all. The people running the sale for her handled the presentation and Q&A answers for bidders. It fetched what at the time was a very fine sale price.
You’re best off letting the market decide what it’s worth. With any luck there will be a bidding war.
I agree with the others regarding BaT. A few of us here hang out on the S1 E-Type auctions, and I think you’ll get top dollar there.
If you host the auction yourself, be prepared to be inundated with questions and supply receipts and restoration photos. No receipts means stories, and stories mean the work will be assumed to be sub par. Plan to participate and don’t ignore the “peanut gallery” or the car will likely not meet reserve.
As mentioned, you can find someone to do the hosting via consignment, or you can bone up on the car with your colleagues here on this site.
In case you aren’t aware, on BAT you can use their search feature to see most, if not all, of the previous auction results. I like to use the search term Jaguar XKE, which will bring a wealth of auction history.
Just FYI for Ben and others, I recently submitted my Etype for a BAT auction. They accepted the car within 2 hours of my hitting the send button. But shortly I got an email saying due to the current popularity of their auction site, they said it could take up to 4 weeks before I am assigned an auction manager. So the actual auction is probably 6 to 8 weeks out from my submittal. Not a crisis, just something for folks to consider.
As an aside, BaT has been hiring additional auction managers who are able to work from home. However, you have to live in certain states to qualify. Maybe someone here looking for work?
Yes, I just sold on BaT and it was 7 weeks from initial submission to the end of the auction - and I had everything ready on my end right from the start. Still, no complaints and worth the wait for the best possible auction result (IMO).
I bought a second E-Type during the pandemic when there was nothing going on in my garage. I meant to keep it longer but life, it seems, had other plans for me and garage space and simplification became the overriding needs.