Raise the price of spiders

[Spiddy]

I bought my '85 in England where the prices are reasonably low, compared with Spain anyway. I was notified of a '85 124 Pininfarina Volumex Spider today for sale here in Spain. The asking price was 28,900 euros ($44,666)!! And guess what; it's sold!!! There is currently another for sale in the Netherlands: 20,950 euros ($32,379) with a dealer. Admitedly, only 500 Volumex Spiders were produced so they don't hang around long when they crop up for sale.

But would you pay $21,250 for a '78 spider? Even if it were concours - which it isn't? That's also in the Netherlands.

[Jazgeek]

all I can say is ....... wow....... if this sells for the asking, mine's going up.

http://toronto.kijiji.ca/c-cars-vehicle ... dZ53584547

[Gunsmith]

Man I hope he gets it just so I can feel more successful for owning one. The best part is in the last picture of the car, look at the two guys sitting at the table. I hope they did not perform the work on the car. They look like the guys you see on the posters with "Don't do drugs" on it somewhere.

[TulsaSpider]

I just purchased my '81 Spider (-my first...Yeah, I'm a "Fiat Virgin") for under $5000. Looks like it has all the stuff you guys discuss regularly ( very minor surface rust, leaks a bit, etc.). As far as these "problems" go, I look forward to stepping up to the challenge! I can finally (at 40-something) afford a toy or two, and I am eager to get my 10 and 8 year old boys under the hood with me.

I just picked up my first Spyder for $1000, 64,000 miles, I could find no rust, except around the seats a bit. My 12 year old son is really into cars and I hope my love for classics is passed to him. While I am sure I will have some challenges with it. It has been pretty easy to figure out, with homage to lotsa help on this site! I might have been stumped many times, heck I have NEVER owned a foreign car before! I am lucky enough to have been on the tail end of the muscle car era, having had a few myself, they never looked great but damn it's all about the speed when you are a teen!! It's sad that that's all out of reach now for the working class like myself. My last one was a "70 ElCamino, and my divorce doomed her, but that's another story...

[BaronKen]

I just picked up my first Spyder for $1000, 64,000 miles, I could find no rust, except around the seats a bit.

Lucky you. Just recently 4 Spiders have appeared on the KC Craigslist for $2000, $2300, $2400, and $7000. The 3 in the $2k range were all crap. Rusty, nasty interiors, etc. That is the price range I'm searching in, but those were not worth anywhere close to $2k to me.

STILL looking for a Fiat in the KC area,
Ken

[miragesmack]

i bought my car for many reasons, one of which was because of its uniqueness. if Spiders go up in value, will that bring more out of the woodwork, and lessen my uniqueness?

That it will. Look at the old Mini Coopers. Two things affected those cars values, the new Mini and the the Oceans 11, or was it 12, 10? movie. Interest, and prices of those cars has risen dramatically since.

PS But please wait for the prices to rise too much, as I still haven't bought one yet!

[Leesfer]

i bought my car for many reasons, one of which was because of its uniqueness. if Spiders go up in value, will that bring more out of the woodwork, and lessen my uniqueness?

That it will. Look at the old Mini Coopers. Two things affected those cars values, the new Mini and the the Oceans 11, or was it 12, 10? movie. Interest, and prices of those cars has risen dramatically since.

PS But please wait for the prices to rise too much, as I still haven't bought one yet!

The Italian job (new and old)

[Jazgeek]

quite interesting. I've been helping a friend out to find a spider up here in the frozen tundra of Toronto (should hit around 105 tomorrow) and I've been noticing that the nice examples are selling for over $8000 and the stripped down shells are selling around the $2500 range.

Andy's spiders http://www.andyspiders.com has some real gems ranging anywhere from $12,000 for the 77 to $34,000 for the 85.

It seems nort of the border here Spider's are rather expensive.

I'm glad I got mine before this jump.

Alfa spiders, 911/914, mgb's are also going for over $10,000 in reasonable shape.

We took a look at a 79 with some fender rust, needed a new paintjob, new top, seats starting to crack, no boot cover but nice body and no rust underneath and the guy wouldn't take anything less than $9,000 for it.

[Gunsmith]

Wow that's great if you already own one. Would it be worth bringing one in from the states or would the taxes be too high?

[Jazgeek]

Wow that's great if you already own one. Would it be worth bringing one in from the states or would the taxes be too high?

yes, I was thinking this. Unfortunately, I did some rough math based on import customs duty, freight transportation and titling and it would run anywhere from 1700-2300 to get one across the border. The other thing that hinders this is that other than asking a member here to check it out, I'd be buying sight unseen or with best a few pictures.

ah well... going to look at a 2 owner 81 tomorrow.... hopefully it's nice. $8000 asking, probably offer less though.

[TX82FIAT]

This thread is older but a resurgence may be due now with the delivery of the 500's around the corner in the States.

There are many great reasons why the Spiders have not increased in value and I agree with the emotional, muscle car, parts cost, rarity arguments presented prior to this. However, I did not see where anyone really spoke to over your head ownership. Let me expand on what i mean by over your head owners (OHO's).

People do not know what they are capable of until they try. People learn through tial and error. There is a large portion of Americans that have an expectation to be able to read what the problem is and fix it our take it down the street to get fixed. My kids fall into this bucket and I'm still trying to teach them that consistent effort over time can fix anything. I think we can all agree that even a seasoned and trained American car mechanic will struggle to appropriatly diagnose a problem with a FIAT spider. A Ferrari mechanic is usually out of the price range of a Fiat buyer. Even simple problems can lead a salvagable FIAT to the crusher with bad advise. I would bet most people under 40 did not turn a wrench as a kid. In fact, after reading this thread the other day, I asked around the office (35 people) and could not find a single person that has flushed a radiator in the last 10 years. One had changed the oil on his older car.

The number of Spiders available and the frequency of transactions play into this. I have seen the same spiders on e-bay two or three times. In my opinion these are OHO's. The owner does not have experience OR time OR resources to maintain thier spider. They wake up one morning and decide to sell the car. Occasionally we get lucky and someone that has fixed the car right and held on to it for a few years has to now sell a great car at a bargain basement price. Depends on your view if this is really lucky. I did not consider myself lucky when I sold my 83 for 10,500 in 2004. However, most of the cars i have seen advertised and traveled to inspect over the last year were not properly maintained. So.... people like us will not buy the car at a high price because we know what needs to be done to bring the car up to snuff. Or we pass on the car and tell the owner a few of the major concerns making them more desperate to sell.

The supply of Fiats for sale by OHO's is driving down the price to allow Fiatista's to buy and restore more Spiders. Good thing when buying bad when you decide to sell a good one. So....What can be done!

I suggest we simply wait. Buy when we can at a good price for good cars and DO NOT SELL OUR CARS. The supply of inferior cars will die off (yes, let the absolute crap go to the crusher) and the brand will improve as the new 500 and other models years hit the US market. Can we wait! Hopefully you already own your spider for the long haul. I just picked up my third spider for $4,600 and have put more than that into her over the last 8 months. I don't plan on selling her! Let's hope fortune is kind in the upcoming years.

Ray

[kristoj]

Like a lot of folks on this forum, I've invested more in parts alone (forget about your time) than my car is likely to sell for. So I'll be hanging on to mine for a while.

[wachuko]

The FIAT Spider is just a beautiful car with timeless classic lines.

I am just glad that it is such a well kept secret, because the entry price point allowed me to buy one.

[courtenay]

And every now and again, like me, you'll find a pristine example of a car that has never been driven in the rain (so has no rust), has been well maintained and has very low miles (36.000) that you're prepared to pay $10 grand for. No fuss, no muss - just a fun car to drive.

[wachuko]

And every now and again, like me, you'll find a pristine example of a car that has never been driven in the rain (so has no rust), has been well maintained and has very low miles (36.000) that you're prepared to pay $10 grand for. No fuss, no muss - just a fun car to drive.

Your car is a gem. Enjoy it in good health.