Classic Car Pricing Magazine

IMO, prices in such guides are pure speculation, not supported by fact or substance.

The problem with the price guides is that there are so few Hudsons sold for the guides to do a good comparison. They typically use auction results as well as some of the major classified venues. They are far from accurate. I task anyone to try to find a driver condition Hornet Coupe forsale at $12,000. As most of us here know, many Hudsons are / were sold between HET members which actually has helped keep the price down. This trend is and has changed with technology. Prices are way up, and IMHO it is about time.

My partner here in the car business is a Ph.D. in Economics and he and I have been having a conceptual discussion about price guides for a couple of weeks now, so it's interesting that this comes up. My argument is this:

1) Where does this price data come from? I have a friend who has the ONLY 1918 Cadillac Roadster on the face of the earth. Cadillac club has confirmed this, and General Motors has confirmed this and offered to buy it from him. The NADA lists a price for it. Where does that come from? From sales data of 1918 Cadillac Roadsters? Less rare but still valid, how many 1929 Hudson Standard Sedans are sold to give a reasonable source of data to price my own car?

2) Where does the sales figure come from? From being in the car business for a number of years I have myself seen many bills of sale written for less than the actual sale price of the car, to avoid sales taxes. It is not unusual to see a bill of sale on a $12,000 car written for "$2000 and other considerations". The only people who know the actual sales prices are the buyer, the seller, and the banker if there is one. Certainly not a bluebook author. This brings to a secondary point, does that false $2000 number water down the bluebook value? Certainly if the authors get wind of it, it has to. A strong argument can be made for under-valuation on this point alone.

3) To what extent do bluebook values and car prices have a reciprocal relationship? Are the "for sale" prices you see on old cars a result of someone consulting a valuation guide to price their car, or are the valuation guides a result of the sales of those cars at any figure regardless of what the guide may say? Looking at this, a valuation guide can either set the market, or report the market. A similar argument can be made about Ivy League schools: Does the University make the student, or does the student make the university? Did Yale produce X number of successful people, or did X number of successful people going to Yale make it a successful university?



But I digress.

Ilt All Boils Down To What The Seller And Buyer Agree To, Thats The Way I Do It. If Someone Feels They Are Willing To Pay What I Have In The Car, Its A Done Deal, If Not, I Keep It, Bill Albright, But Then Again, I Love All The Hudsons And Am Willing To Put In Much More Than The Book Says They Are Worth. Bill Albright