Thread: The One That Got Away...

Tweet

A few months back I asked a friend about an old car he had mentioned having under a lean-to behind his garage, and he explained that it had been originally purchased by his wife's grandfather, that it was a Plymouth 2dr sedan that had been parked behind the garage about '83, and had last run about '85 but they could not figure out why it was getting hot. He came back and told me it was a 1940, the last registration sticker on it was 1959, and he thought that it had been taken off the road a few years before that, after a daughter had scraped the rock wall on the way home at night several times - both passenger fenders and the running board were pretty badly banged up. The problem was that his brother-in-law had claimed the car, saying that grandma had written him a letter saying that grandpa had wanted him to have it. Though he was always going to get to it he had let it sit for over thirty years. I went over and looked at it, and told him that based on the condition it was going to need a lot of work to restore or even to update, and that I thought it was probably now worth much more than a few hundred dollars. I told him to offer the BIL $350, and that I wanted to talk to him before he offered it to anyone else. Based on that, he decided that he really wanted the car gone, and he said that he was going to press the BIL to sell it, or get it off the property. After a month or more my friend asked if the BIL had called, and then said that the BIL had initially stated that the car was "worth a fortune", but that my friend had shown him several internet links where restored drivers were in the $4-$6K range, and old iron was less than $1000. Apparently the BIL got his nose out of joint, feeling like he was being asked to "give grandpa's car away" and he went home to pout for a few weeks(he's about 55). Fast forward another few weeks, and my friend asked again if I had gotten a call, and then said that he thought someone was coming to look at the car the next day!! I was a bit ticked, having been the catalyst to get the process started (had I not offered to buy, my friend would have just let it sit for years more), explained how the KS bill-of-sale process worked, and asked for first right of refusal. Yesterday I learned that instead of calling me he called a guy affiliated with an old country salvage yard and asked him if he wanted to buy an old car. The guy came out, asked "How much?" and the BIL said, "I want $500!!", thinking he was being a wheeler dealer. "DONE", was the quick reply, and the next day he showed up with a flatbed wrecker, winched it aboard and hauled it away. Turns out that the BIL doesn't like his sister very much, and especially does not like her husband and he refused to accept anything that my friend told him, including contacting anyone he had suggested. Looks like I'm still looking for the next project....