Auctions & Sales

The Amelia Island Concours D’Elegance, held March 12-15, once again presented an amazing collection of rare, exotic and highly-collectible cars.  There were a smattering of British marques represented at the Concours, with best in class winners of two pre-war Rolls-Royce, an Aston Martin DB4 and gorgeous 1947 Bentley coupe.   The real British-action, however, was experienced in the high-end auctions of Gooding’s and Bonham’s.  So while affordability is in the eye of the beholder, there were several tempting offerings, like a driver-quality 1968 jaguar XKE coupe for $44,000, and a pristine 1952 MG TD for $29,000.  After those, however, the appreciation curve shot upward, with an unbelievably original 1965 XKE Series 1 4.2 coupe going for $200,000 and a similarly original 1961 E-Type Roadster hitting $380,000.  And in the I’ve-never-seen-one-of-those-before, a 1951 Lotus, claimed to be the very first road-worthy […]

The one millionth Morris Minor car ever built has been sold at an auction for 25,760 pounds. The classic British-built car was sold earlier at the Surrey auction house, Historics at Brooklands. It was one of 349 “millionth” Morris Minors built in 1960, however, this car was the actual one millionth built. Stewart Banks, from Historics, said there had been an “awful lot of interest” in the car, which had an estimate of between 22,000 to 26,000 pounds. “There were 349 made but this is the only one with the million mark on its chassis. The Morris Minor has a very loyal fan base – people have them for years. This particular car has been owned by the vendor for 19 years,” Banks was quoted as saying by the BBC. “It is just the quintessential British motor car.” The “millionth” […]

Feb. 19, 2015, Southlake, Texas – SVRA and Motostalgia have entered into a joint venture and multi-year agreement, with Motostalgia being recognized as the Official Auction Company of SVRA and hosting exclusive car auctions at select SVRA events- beginning this year with the Brickyard Vintage Racing Invitational. This joint venture will provide the true enthusiast the opportunity to enjoy two of the most exciting experiences in motorsports: auctions and vintage racing! “Working with Motostalgia Auction Company was the next logical step for SVRA, given our demographics and national footprint,” said Tony Parella, President and CEO of SVRA. “Adding a car auction to the Brickyard Vintage Racing Invitational will make this an even more special event.” “SVRA’s schedule is a perfect fit for us. This leading racing organization offers us access to world class cars. With the scale of SVRA’s customer […]

An unregistered 1980 MG Midget with just 162 miles on the clock, fetched over £11,000 when it went under the hammer at Anglia Car Auctions on Saturday. The Vermillion red car sold for £11,025 well ahead of expectations that it might fetch between £7,000 to £9,000. “It was a very good sale – an exceptional price,” said Simon Whitmore, of Anglia Car Auctions (ACA), based at Beveridge Way, Hardwick Narrows Estate. “It had no reserve on it and the vehicle has never been registered.” Also up for auction the same day, but which failed to sell, was a 2001 Mercedes Benz S500L, purchased new by former England captain David Beckham and originally registered as Y3 DVB in June 2001. The car was up for sale with all manuals, service book and the original V5 bearing David Beckham’s name, with 117,000 […]

Seems to be the month of the Aston Martin, not that there is anything wrong with that. On 17 May, 2014, Bonham’s auction house will conduct a special auction of Aston Martin cars and related books, artwork and ephemera. There are some great items, and collectors are sure to turn out in force. Two examples include a special coachwork ’56 DB2/4 and a 1:8 scale model of the Aston Martin ‘DP214’ 1956 Aston Martin DB2/4 MKII fixed head coupe with coachwork by Tickford, Chassis no. AM300/1241, with a bid estimate of £160,000 – 200,000 (US$ 270,000 – 340,000). A 1:8 scale scratch-built model of the 1963 Monza winning Aston Martin ‘DP214’, built by Javan Smith, with a bid estimate of £1,800 – 2,200 (US$ 3,000 – 3,700).   Also on auction will be the Aston Martin DBS that featured in the British television […]

A nearly new MG Midget that has never even been registered is set to go under the hammer this month. With just 162 miles under its wheels, this 1980 Midget’s odometer actually reads 19 after the original faulty instrument cluster was replaced at its first service, which took place 11 months after the car was bought. The car has never changed hands and the current seller bought it new after hearing about the imminent demise of MG. He intended to give it to one of his children after they passed their driving test, but for unknown reasons never did. Anglia Car Auctions (ACA) will carry out the sale on Saturday June 14. ACA’s owner, Lyn George explains: “After 11 months, the car was despatched to Holland Brothers in Sleaford, in a horsebox of all things, for its first annual service. […]

The Bruce Weiner Microcar Museum collection is being put up for auction by RM Auctions with a sale date of February 15 and 16. The collection, housed in Madison, Georgia, includes many generations and badges of microcars from Authi to BMW and Gogomobile to Messerschmitt. From the auction catalog, “RM Auctions is delighted and privileged to have been chosen to offer such an extraordinary collection at auction, displayed in a cohesive and downright jaw-dropping facility that encapsulates Bruce’s youthful spirit and the fascinating post-war era of the microcar. As such, the rarest microcars are joined by the most sought-after, fully restored, and completely functional kiddie rides, coin-operated vending machines, porcelain signs, neons, and perhaps most uniquely, the rarest microcar toys and models in the world. Every item will be sold, wall to wall, right down to the instantly recognizable international […]

The 1974 Rolls-Royce owned by former Queen frontman Freddie Mercury has been sold at auction for more than six times its guide price, fetching £74,000. This is equal to approximately $117,000 USD. The 62,000-mile classic Rolls-Royce had a guide price of just £9,000-£11,000. It features grey leather, wood trim, electric windows, automatic gearbox, a car phone and radio casette player. Power is provided by a 6.75-litre V8 engine. It was sold as part of the Coys auction on January 12, 2013, at Autosport International to a Russian businessman through telephone bidding.

A rusty Mini sold for 40,250 pounds ($65,382) at auction by Bonhams on Monday, April 30, — beating the price of a shiny Pontiac convertible once owned by Keith Richards. The corroded 1959 Mini was described by Bonhams as the oldest surviving unrestored car of its type. It beat the 37,950 pounds paid for a dark-blue 1950 Chieftain Silver Streak used by guitarist Richards at a time when the Rolling Stones recorded “Exile on Main Street” at his south of France home in the early 1970s. Both cars were bought by private U.S. buyers at an auction at the RAF Museum in Hendon, England. Classic cars often get a premium if they have interesting stories attached to them, such as famous owners, years spent in storage before being discovered in original condition. The Austin Mini Se7en De Luxe Saloon, registration […]

One of the largest private collections of Lotus cars will be dismantled in June during the 2012 Goodwood Festival of Speed, the annual motoring celebration at the grounds of Goodwood House in West Sussex, England. The collection of 24 Lotuses consigned by Bonhams is owned by the Dutch textile magnate Olav Glasius, who in addition to being a collector is a vintage-racing enthusiast and the chairman of Lotus Club Holland. The British sports-car marque will be this year’s featured brand at the Festival of Speed, an honor rendered somewhat inelegant by Lotus’s financial troubles. This month, Dany Bahar, chief executive of Lotus Cars, told Evo magazine that development of new models was being held up for three months as the company awaited either an infusion of cash or a sale by its Malaysian parent, Proton. In a telephone interview, James […]

For the average car connoisseur, the only thing that will be familiar in this picture will be the grille design, and even that shouldn’t be familiar if you’re not at least 20, because the MG brand is…. well, let’s say a bit under-marketed. The MG SV-R was supposed to be a sort of halo car to fill the bedroom walls of kids and empty the pockets of the gentlemen wanting a bit of ‘ugly but brutish’ in their driveway. With the chassis from another car you’ve never heard of, the Qvale Mangusta, and the 4.6-liter and 5-liter V8 engines from a Ford Mustang, this cocktail of all world was good for either 320 hp or 385 hp. With strange looks and lack-luster performance figures, it’s no wonder that only 82 were ever sold, of which 42 were the SV-R version […]

As reported by Bring A Trailer, an auction will be held on September 24th in New Cumberland, Pennsylvania that will liquidate the 5-acre property and British car collection of the former owner. It is rare to find such a sale that includes restored cars and vintage racers in what looks like pristine condition. They are shown parked in a finished display area with hardwood floors! Find more info and photos here via AuctionZip.com. A brief (?!) inventory listing of the auction…. Cars – 1966 Austin Healey 3000, 1962 Triumph TR4 vintage race car w/race history, Land Rover Series IIA, Morris Minor 1000, 1979 CJ5 Jeep & P/A plow, off road ATV like new buggy, Areins 14 hp Hydrostatic garden tractor & cart; Lucas items; hundreds of  vintage oil cans & oil & gas station items; British car parts; grill badges & rally plates; […]

RM Auctions, the world’s largest collector car auction house for quality automobiles, is now on the countdown to its inaugural sale at London’s Salon Privé luxury car show and Concours d’Elegance on 23rd June, 2011. The sale, which is only open to British-built automobiles, has attracted fifty-seven stunning examples of ‘Quintessentially English’ cars including some significant collections of Aston Martin, Jaguar and Rolls Royce automobiles. Max Girardo, Managing Director, RM Europe says, “What is nice about this sale is that we have selected some genuinely rare and interesting cars and motorcycles while also offering a very comprehensive selection of British marques that represent a wide cross-section of some of the best loved and most keenly collected models.” The star Rolls Royce lot is unquestionably the unique and historic 1926 Rolls-Royce Phantom I Experimental Sports Tourer, ‘10 EX’, the first prototype […]

The last genuine MG works rally car is up for auction, 35 years after it was retired from action competitive farewell, and is expected to fetch £90,000-£130,000 (R1-1.5-million) – more than 100 times the price of the road-going MGB in 1964. BRX 854B was one of two MGB rally cars built by BMC’s competition department in 1964, when the road car was priced at £850 (the equivalent of R1700 at the time). It made its racing debut in the Spa-Sofia-Liege rally in August 1964 and went on to compete a further five times as a works entry, in the Tulip, Acropolis, Geneva, Danube and RAC rallies, all in 1965. It was retired in 1975 and has since then had a meticulous restoration, overseen by MG historian John Baggott and legendary MG racer Barry Sidery-Smith with meticulous attention to detail. Existing […]

A 1950 Aston Martin that raced twice at Le Mans sold for 550,000 pounds ($900,000) at an auction in London. The dark blue DB2 Team Car came fifth and third in the French 24-hour race in 1950 and 1951 respectively.

A new record high price for an MG sold at auction was set earlier this month, when a a pre-war MG K3 Magnette sold for 231,000 pounds, or the equivalent of $372,000, at H&H’s auction in Buxton, England. It wrested the high-price crown from a 1935 Magnette Airline Coupe sold in 2007 for 199,037 pounds. It would take a book to detail the convoluted history of this car; in fact, a book has been written. Magnette-ised: The Pedigree of MG K3015-2 from 1934 to 2007, written by the seller, details the many changes the car has been through in the decades of its existence. H&H themselves described it as “the antithesis of a ‘matching-numbers’ car,” although it possesses an unbroken history as a genuine K3. The car is sort of like grandpa’s axe; the original frame was replaced with an […]

Driving.ca is reporting that the current financial crisis is having an impact on the collector-car scene, with prices all over the map at the first Barrett-Jackson Auction held in Las Vegas, Nevada recently. Hemi Mopar madness has ended – the days of the $80,000 Austin Healey and six-figure E-Type Jaguars are over for now. A 1962 Healey 300 MKII (Lot 762), which was a ground-up restoration by Healey Lane, of Oregon, was perfect yet sold for a mere $53,900. In January, that car would have sold in Scottsdale, Ariz., for $80,000. (All prices in U.S. dollars.)

Ok, I know things have been going up in price and that Triumphs have really been undervalued for a very long time, but $44,000 for a TR-4A really is a lot of money. This one was beautiful though, with surrey top and everything. Check out the full story here at Autoweek, and please let me know what you think!