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MG Midget and Sprite General - Midget Prices

Due to a combination of enforced day doing nothing in the house and the Ashley GT thread I've just been browsing ebay and looking at magazine classifieds.

Seems there are quite a few midgets now on offer at well above £4-5K. As I've had mine since the early 90s I cant say I've always followed prices but it always felt that £4K was about right (Chrome RWA) for a very good car private which I guess equates to about £5K for a good car in a dealer.

There now seems to be quite a few well above that all the way up to the £10K and above. Admittedly they do look very nice cars at those prices. Are they actually making those prices ?

Dean Smith ('73 RWA)

I think some people have said to themselfs ive put this much in so i want so much back recently went to see a midget round wheel arches chrome bumpers up at £5200 and was over priced with jobs that needed doing to it. Think Practical classics list prices are reasonablly right.
D Sartain

all magazine values are high to keep their paying commercial advertisers happy - both are business each dependant on the other to an extent

a lot of private 'restorers' or owners seem to think if they spend a £100 on a car then that increases the value by £100

with the internet a good car will sell for a very high price, a lot to abroad, same as late '80s

there's no real set price for a good or bad car, a car sells for what it can

loads of poor cars sell for the middle prices making them poor value and some good cars go for not a lot more making them better value and the poorer cars possibly over valued

a disproportionate amount of the sale value is down to cosmetics, fresh paint rather than mechanics in good working order
Nigel Atkins

The completed listings on e-bay for the higher priced MGs of all models show very few are selling - not really suprising in these times.

In previous downturns prices have gone down, but back then there were more cars around and more people who wanted them. Now we must be getting close to the point where those who want one already have one.

Check out www.homanyleft.com which shows that since 1994 we have lost half of the UK's 1500 Midgets, that's got to impact prices one way or the other.
John Prewer

Completed listings on eBay is always interesting, I use to to see how I should price things to sell, as it's fairly obvious what people will pay.

There seems to be very few of the 'works but needs a bit of TLC' around, the ones i've seen are either going (and therefore expensive) or totally bu**ered. Where's all the 700 pound middle ground ones gone?

Reckon it's happening with minis as well, but they are a bit ahead on the timeline. P6's are well behind, no-one wants a huge fuel guzzling monster so decent ones can be quite cheap.
Rob Armstrong

I have always lusted after an Elan Sprint (who hasn't ? !)
About 3 years ago I nearly bought a nice looking one that needed a bit of tiding up for £3750 it was a good price then as nice examples were up to about 6K. Since then they have absolutely skyrocketed - and for no real apparent reason. There is very little now below 20K and good ones are nearer 30K ! Nice little cars despite their reliability reputation but I just cannot see what has caused such a sudden price hike in just the last couple of years.
Guy

Well it's been a long time coming for Sprdgets to start making decent money.

However, ---- there is a big downside for those of us who have been used to realtively plentiful and cheap spares. Now everybody and his toddler, is suddenly buying Spridgets, the spares are drying up. The breakers are getting empty, and the cost of 2nd hand parts is on the up too.

A 1275 engine, of unknown condition can now fetch upto 400 quid I'm told, and pre 1500 cars are getting scarce in breakers altogether.

What was once a scrapper, is now viewed as a "restoration project".

Personally I preferred it when there were far fewer people interested in Spridgets.
Lawrence Slater

Guy the answer is the increasing interest in Appendix K historic racing. Anything that was homologated with FIA before 1.12.65 commands silly money. A new turnkey FIA-legal MGB racer is now circa 30k. Good job the 1275 wasn't put in the Midget until late 66 or we couldn't afford them either!
David Smith

It seems to me that whatever make or model you look at now, basket cases that are cheap and sell quick for restoration and immaculate fully restored cars are fetching top money probably because people cant make money on invested cash so decide to buy a car which they hope nothing goes wrong with as they dont know how to fix it. That leaves the majority of classics in the "drive and improve" middle ground which appear much harder to shift in the current climate, probably because people are afraid of what it might cost to keep them going. Not really logical as we all know that even top notch cars can still breakdown, but it appears to be how some people are thinking.

Trev
T Mason

usually top notch cars are rarely driven
Nigel Atkins

This thread was discussed between 11/01/2012 and 20/01/2012

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